Haiti.

Words. I can't seem to find them. I don't know where to begin except to say that God's love is overflowing. That God's church is alive and that He has once again blessed my life in unimaginable ways.

I have returned home after being in Haiti for 10 days. As I sit hear with tears in my eyes and a heavy heart I am going to try and find the words to explain all the feelings overflowing from me. But I know God understands what is going on inside of me as well as the 13 other amazing team members He has blessed me with to serve along side for the past 10 days. Here we go.

There are names and faces and places imprinted into my mind and my heart. All of from Haiti. In a general since we arrived at UCI on Sunday night, after our bus had broken down and we spent two or so hours on the side of the road in middle of nowhere Haiti, but even through that God was evident and present. Presenting a wonderful evening full of stars, songs, and team bonding. Throughout the week we got to spend time with kids at the school and nutrition centers. We got to do construction, hike mountains, build relationships, worship, play volleyball, and love.

For me Haiti is a place that will be in my heart. It is a place that God has used to confirm His calling in my life. a place where I learned more about God's love, God's grace, God's provision and trust than anywhere else. A place where I saw that less is so much more and Love does more for a person than materialistic things ever will. a place where the people are alive and in love with God and a place where God's glory is and will be and that of course I was changed more by it all than I could ever imagine.

Through Haiti, I have fallen more in love with God. I have an overflowing love for my team members, the people who have seen me at my worst, at my best. Whether singing around the dinner table, hauling concrete buckets, falling in a cave of bat poop, or dancing with kids in the grass. The team that God put together for this trip, I couldn't have asked for anyone better and I wouldn't add or take away any of the people. Being able to watch each of my fellow team members spread God's love and word with the specific gifts that God gave each one of them was so encouraging and I know it would have been something I never would have seen if God had no challenged me into leaving my camera behind. To see God's love overflowing in people that I go to school with encouraged me that Northwestern can be impacted and that these people have the ability not only to impact our campus but to impact people around the world. The love I have for my team member is overwhelming, and it's been hard today not waking up and being around all of them. But God's doing some marvelous work in all over lives and I can't wait to see where each one of them ends up, all for the Glory of God.

The feelings I have for the Haitian people are hard to put into words. I love them deeply, but it's not our American superficial love, but a love overflowing from the glory of God and His grace. The way that worshiped and praised God in everything they did was so impacting on my life and to my heart. That even though with little they give so much of themselves to us and to God. They were constantly praising and thanking God for everything. Also reminding me that I never deserved God's grace but that God has freely given it to me out of love. Every person I met and interacted with impacted me in different and wonderful ways. Teaching me how to lead, to love, to be patient, to act, to worship. Things that I have never seen before my eyes were open to God's universal church and how alive it really is and how blind I have been.

Edison, the little boy in the picture. He touched my heart the most. There were so many kids and so many people, but this boy pulls my heart strings. We didn't speak the same language, but God has a ways of breaking down those barriers and doing miraculous work. We communicated through singing, though jumping on a trampoline, through handshakes, through laughter, through dancing, through him just sitting on my lap and letting me hold him. God's love and light in this little boy made me realize the calling on my life. Though it's not in Haiti, it is with children like Edison. Children I can sit with and sing with and love on. It reminded me why God calls us to have a child like faith.

So in all this God has taught me dependence, trust, and faith in Him. That only through Him can I truly have life and love and the desires of my heart. That I don't need fancy clothes and a fancy house to be rich. But that I am already rich in God and in the friends, the family, and the experiences He has freely given me and blessed me with.

And I guess the best way to end this is to just say Blessed Be the Name of the Lord. or as we sang in Haiti "Annou Beni Non Senye A."

In Awe of God's Amazing Love and Grace,

HIS and yours,

Cami