The wall fell!

A team of about ten Hatian workers has been working all week digging a trench around the perimeter of the Children's Center in order to lay drainage lines. Right before noon yesterday, without any warning, the entire front section of the perimeter wall, which provides security for the Center, collapsed into the ditch. Our team was scattered throughout the property, tending to our various responsibilities, and few of us even noticed...until we saw the children running from the buildings. Our thoughts ranged from: "Oh man, what's it going to cost the Center to rebuild the wall?" to, "Well, duh, you shouldn't be digging so close to the wall!"; that is until we saw the terror in the eyes of the children as they were screaming and crying and stampeding out into the yard! It was then that we realized what the children were thinking: "It's another earthquake!", and all they wanted was to reach a safe place outside of the buildings. Even twenty-four year old Jocelyn who lost his leg in Port au Prince after the earthquake tried to run for safety, when he fell and was almost trampled by the other children. If it hadn't been for one of our team members who, holding a child in one hand and using the other hand to cover Jocelyn and hold the children back from running over him, he probably would have been severely injured. As it was, he had already fallen on his leg and had reopened the fresh wound of the amputation. The team immediately grabbed up children in arms and began comforting them and reassuring them that this was not an earthquake, the wall just fell because of a construction error! The entire experience struck terror in the hearts of all the children and adults who have been rescued from the earthquake. It broke our hearts as a team to realize that long after the physical wounds have healed, these children will carry psychological and emotional scars that may never heal. It was a very traumatic day for all! One man from Port au Prince told a team member that God just keeps pounding the people of Haiti, over and over again. Some of us were wondering just how much these precious people can take? Praise God, no one was hurt. The children were all a safe distance away. The supervisor of the project said that seconds before the wall fell, he was watching the men work, and noticed a light shifting of the sand. He yelled for the men to get out of the way, and it literally saved their lives! Thank you, Lord, there was not another tragedy!

Asking for prayer after Day 4 in Ounaminthe!