At the end of last year, a MercyWorks team visited a Micro Enterprise Development project in Pattaya, Thailand, called “Itsera” (the Thai word for “Freedom”). Pattaya is considered the sex trafficking capital of the world where one of every four women is involved in the sex industry in one way or another. The goal of the Itsera project is to employ the very women at risk of sex trafficking and provide them a way of escape. To view a short video clip, click here.

I am thrilled to report we recently received a $25,000 donation towards the Itsera project! The financial goal for the project to reach complete self-sustainability is only $7,000 more. That is exciting indeed!

Along with this news, we also received another generous gift allowing MercyWorks to give micro enterprise loans to 53 more individuals. These micro loans assist the recipients in beginning small businesses, which enables them to provide for their families. A great thing about these micro loans is they are given to those who do not qualify for traditional loans. People living in extreme poverty often have no option but a local moneylender, who charges a 20% or more interest per month.

The ministry we partner with in Thailand assigns each loan recipient a loan officer. The officer knows them by name and meets with them regularly, offering opportunities for personal growth and discipleship. As the client repays the loan, it is recycled and loaned out yet again.

Our next container shipment is scheduled to be sent to Haiti in August. There are still items needed to complete the shipment. For a list of items, click here. If you would like to give a financial gift to help with the shipment of this container, click here.

The Wyatts traveled to Haiti less than a week after the 7.0 earthquake struck the nation on Jan. 12, traveling to a place military veteran Mike had been told many times before to avoid. But after the earthquake, both he and his wife of 43 years could not ignore the call to spread God’s word. Patterson followed soon after.

“The way I got there, I was having devotions the morning after the earthquake,” Mike said. “I’m not quick to go anywhere, because I’ve had offers to go different places in the world — Africa three times and Israel and different places — and unless God tells me to go, I’m not going to go.

“So that morning it was clear. He said, ‘Mike, go to Haiti.’ And my background in the Army, I was put on alert to go to Haiti three times in the early days when they had the civil unrest and…all the fighting was going on. I would go over to special operations center at Fort Bragg and they would give us briefings and said whatever you do, don’t ever go to Haiti because it’s just a bad place. The last place on earth you ever want to go is Haiti. So my brain said don’t go to Haiti But that morning, when I got up, God said go to Haiti, and I heeded it.

“So I came out of the back room and Karen was having her devotion and I said, ‘Honey, God just told me to go to Haiti.’ She said, ‘Well, that’s kind of funny because God was putting on my heart to go too.”

Karen said she had been looking back on past devotions and words “God has given us through the years” before Mike came out and told of her revelation.

“It had been a couple of years since I’d read them and there was something in there about ministering to the poor and I was like, wow, Lord. But when you get a word, you don’t run out and do it, but yet you don’t wait for God to do it. You wait for the time and then you walk together.”

She didn’t have to wait long.

“Mike walked in a few minutes after that and when I heard him say it, I knew,” she said.

The next morning she asked God for another word. “Give me a word to stand on,” she asked him. “I want a word from the word, and so I hadn’t looked at this devotion in over a year. I’ll just look at it and it will get me focused on where I need to look in the word and start meditating. I open it up, January the 14th, and it says Isaiah 6, ‘Here my lord, send me.’ Oh my gosh. I just started crying.”

But making the decision to go and getting there were two different things. They started by going with what was familiar to them.

The Wyatts’ two daughters, Melissa and Michelle, both served with Youth With A Mission (YWAM), an international Christian organization that responds to crises. Melissa received discipleship training through the program, and Michelle served for three years on the Mercy Ship.

“YWAM has different organizations,” Mike said. “They have Mercy Works, Mercy Trucks, Mercy Ships. We didn’t know exactly how we were going to get there, so we contacted Mercy Works in Tyler, Texas.”

They were told then that the organization didn’t know then who they were sending to Haiti or even when they would go. The Wyatts were told to fill out an application.

“This was like Thursday,” he said. “Friday they called and said, can you leave on Sunday? And we hadn’t even finished our application.”

Before that call came in, the couple made their way to the health department to get vaccinations. At first they were told the department couldn’t get to them for two weeks, but Karen convinced them they needed the shots much sooner.

“I said we’re going this weekend,” Karen said.

“She didn’t meant to, like, tell a story,” her husband said. “It was a fact; she just didn’t know it was a fact yet. They took us in and they gave us the shots and we ended up going to Haiti.”

Meanwhile, Patterson had also made the decision to go.

“As soon as the earthquake happened and we heard about, I looked at (my wife) Brenda and she was like, I know you want to go, right?” Patterson said.

Two days later he saw on Facebook how the Wyatts were preparing to go down there.

“I thought, OK Lord, what’s going on here? Because I don’t know if you guys know the history I have with Mike is basically he’s mentored me for five years. Five years we trained to do things like that, so that’s exactly what God spoke to me when I heard that they were going, you are supposed to be there with them, assist them and help them and be there to work with them out in the field, out in the world. I knew right then that I was supposed to go.”

Like the Wyatts, he had to find a way to get there. Familiar with YWAM and after speaking with Mike, Patterson contacted Mercy Works and asked if they could use more help. He was told they were needing mostly medical teams. He told them he could be of assistance in aiding the Wyatts and providing help in administration and logistics.

“That’s what I did for five years, is do that with Mike, right side by side with him every day,” he said. “So to them, the usage that I could offer basically is that I could assist Mike and overlap them, staying to help after he leaves.”

Patterson wasn’t left with much hope that Mercy Works could use him, hearing again they were needing mostly medical help. He was asked to fill out an application and wait for word.

“I went to the Anna Porter library and faxed it to Tyler, Texas, and as I was leaving the library I got a phone call from Tyler, Texas,” he said. They asked him on that Wednesday if he could leave on Monday. That gave him two days to work on getting donations to help pay for the trip and collecting supplies to take to the Wyatts.

“I was excited when I heard Brandon was coming,” Mike said.

“That was a godsend,” Karen added. “He sent somebody we knew and loved to come down there.”’

Tyler, Texas | February 4, 2010  —

Debbie Lascelles, MercyWorks founder and co-director of YWAM Tyler remarked, “We have been swamped with people wanting to volunteer and help in every way imaginable.  It’s a stretching time for all of us, but we greatly appreciate all the donations and help from the east Texas community.”

For now, the East Texas based charity has been given $15,000 to ship the first of several critically needed containers to Haiti to help set up a Refugee Camp.  Pastor Dwight Lawson has volunteered Clearview Church in Mt. Sylvan (across from the Rose Park Horse Farm) to serve as the collection point for supplies for the “Container of Compassion.”

In addition to medical supplies, among the items most urgently needed for the first container are:  easy-up pop up tents, folding tables, folding chairs, foam mattresses, sheets, tarps, pots, pans, eating utensils, shoes, baby supplies such as baby bottles, diapers, pacifiers, toys, 5-gallon buckets, and hygiene kits consisting of soap, toothbrushes, toothpaste and toilet paper.

To participate in East Texas’ “Container of Compassion” bring your supplies by Clearview Church on or before Wednesday, February 10, 2010 where they will be processed and shipped on to Haiti for relief.  Drop off hours are 7:00 – 9:00 a.m. Monday through Friday, and 9 a.m. – 1 p.m. on Sunday, February 7.  In addition to supplies, MercyWorks is looking for additional volunteers, including grief counselors, auto mechanics, medical personnel especially physical therapists, occupational therapists, and a medical coordinator.

About Youth With A Mission: Founded in 1960 by Loren and Darlene Cunningham, YWAM is celebrating their 50^th year of operation.  The international, interdenominational missions organization has 17,000 full-time volunteers serving in over 160 nations.  MercyWorks, a ministry of YWAM Tyler, is dedicated to bringing hope and lasting change to people afflicted by war, famine, extreme poverty or natural disaster.

For additional information, photos or interview opportunities please contact:

Glenn Price Rev. Dwight Lawson

Glenn.Price@ywamtyler.org clearviewfamily@aol.com

(903) 882-5591                                               (903) 882-8949

www.mercyworks.org www.clearviewchurchfamily.com

The “heartbreaking” conditions of “families who have lost everything” has been the week-long scenario Smith County medical workers have endured in Haiti since Tuesday.

The team sent from Youth With A Mission of Tyler’s MercyWorks has experienced “overwhelming conditions” during their week-long stay, a MercyWorks staffer on the scene in Haiti said.

Dr. Jack Jorden, an ER doctor with Mother Frances, treated patients this past week.

Each Monday MercyWorks will send a new team of medical volunteers to Haiti by MercyWorks, said Debbie Lascelles, director of the Garden Valley ministry. Financial donations and medical volunteers especially will be needed in the weeks to come, she added.

On the ground for the Tyler Courier-Times–Telegraph sending photographs and updates as conditions warrant is Glenn Price, communications director for MercyWorks. Price has been working “16 hours a day” with the team, which includes emergency room doctor Jack Jorden of Trinity Mother Frances Health System in Tyler.

The stressful conditions the team has been working under, and the sheer volume of help yet needed, has taken its toll on the team, who nonetheless continue to do their utmost.

DISPATCH

A “Dispatch From Haiti” by Price sent early Saturday morning describes the woeful scene, some joyful moments and some perspectives gained by MercyWorks team members:

“We were involved in a dramatic rescue today. A young man who had been trapped in the rubble of a vegetable shop for 11 days was discovered. MercyWorks volunteers were the first ones Haitians called upon when they found him. We administered IV and water and did a lot of digging before the Israeli force arrived and got him out. There was also an 89-year-old woman rescued today from the rubble. Truly, it was a ‘Haitian celebration’ day for people desperate for good news.

Our team of 12, consisting mainly of medical personnel, has been working out of the National Police headquarters just one block from the National Palace. The police station was ruined in the earthquake, but there are five rooms still standing in the building. This central location is ideal for helping the injured as many people are brought here for treatment.

The team is daily experiencing the challenges and rewards of stretching outside of our comfort zones.  We see people in our clinic every day who have broken bones, head injuries and deep gashes into their flesh all from rubble from the earthquake falling on them, among other things.

But that is the easy part.  Nearly everyone who comes to us for medical help has lost a family member or more in the tragic quake.  One 22-year-old woman who is three months pregnant lost her mother and father and now has to be the mother to her younger siblings while preparing to have her own baby.  Another young girl lost her parents and now will raise her five younger brothers and sisters — without any house to live in as that was destroyed as well.

The medical team is still processing a number of feelings and thoughts about our time in Haiti this past week.  Some express feelings that what we are doing is so insignificant, just a “drop in the ocean of need.”

Others say they have tried not to be overwhelmed by the suffering so as to make them inadequate to serve.  Dr. Jack Jorden remarked how much he has learned from the Haitians on this trip.

“They have suffered so much and go about their lives without complaining or demanding,” he said.  ”Instead they are grateful for the help they are receiving.”

Emergency Medical Technician Sam Jorden, Jack’s son, had a similar response to what he was seeing.

“This had made me look at life differently,” he said. “I will never see things from the same perspective. I had a ‘bad day’ recently when my dog ate my passport the week before I was to leave for Haiti.  Never again will I complain as much about things that really are so minor.  This trip has redefined for me what a bad day truly looks like.”

People are walking around with surgical masks to keep from smelling the decaying bodies. The stench is particularly bad under collapsed buildings, indicating some or several people were dead beneath the rubble. Many of the streets are still uncleared and not usable.

It is still heartbreaking to see families who have lost everything, now huddled under a tarp. People are desperate for water, for food, for medical treatment, for help of any kind.

The National Palace is still a shock to see one week after the earthquake. The flag of Haiti waves sadly as onlookers come by to stare at their once-prized jewel. For Americans, the closest thing to comprehending how the Haitian people are taking this, is to imagine the White House lying in ruins.

Within spitting distance of the National Palace tent cities have sprung up. People who have nowhere to go sometimes just take a place on the ground as they wait for help. The tent cities are all throughout the capital. People do their cooking, their laundry and everything all out in the open.

The MercyWorks medical team served hundreds of people daily and took time to listen and to pray with those who came for help.  Working with us was Registered Nurse Naomi Jean-Baptiste, a third year Duke medical student originally from Haiti and interested in pursuing International Health.

“I always thought I would visit other countries before ever returning to Haiti,” she said. “But when the earthquake struck, I knew I must go back and do something.  After my trip with MercyWorks, I know I will go back to Haiti again and do something long-term to make a lasting difference.

In the foreseeable future, Mercy Works teams will be helping in Haiti, sending in waves of teams each week. The next team consists of 20 medical staff and will arrive in Haiti on Jan. 27.”