BY BEEHIVE TEAM MEMBERS

For many, the “mission field” is a place where visitors seek to bless the inhabitants. But more and more, it seems as though the visitors are instead being blessed by the ones they seek to help. This was the case during a recent health event held in Bohoc, Haiti.

Already a nation in great need, Haiti has now suffered even more devastation and destruction as a result of Hurricane Matthew. The Beehive, however, a nonprofit organization based in the United States, is there to help.

Practicing Christ’s Method

The Beehive first began working in Haiti right after the earthquake in 2010. It has endeavored to reach families by providing medical and dental clinics in the community.

Dr. Dona Cooper-Dockery, president and founder of Faithful Path International Ministries, was the team leader at a medical/dental clinic held recently in Haiti.

“As Seventh-day Adventist medical missionaries, we all strive to practice Christ’s method of reaching souls for the kingdom,” Cooper-Dockery says. “The Son of God came to earth and left us with His blueprint for soul winning. He mingled with the needy, supplied their needs, won their confidence, and then bade them: ‘Come.’ On this trip I had the pleasure of meeting a missionary, Jonathan Euler, who took up the challenge to practice just as Christ did! What a blessing to have met this Christ-like person.”

Euler is the director of International Development for the Beehive and operates a city ministry in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, as well as a center for manual trades called The Pearl in Bohoc, Haiti. The Beehive is working collaboratively on this project in Bohoc with Restore a Child, led by Norma Nashed. 

“Along with his own responsibilities Euler gives support to other ministry groups that travel to Haiti. These include teams on mission trips from various schools such as Loma Linda University, Southern Adventist University, and numerous Adventist academies,” says Cooper-Dockery. “On this particular trip Euler and his team played an integral role in the logistics of hosting and assisting in running the four-day clinic. More than 900 patients received medical, dental, optical, and social-services care during our short stay.”

A Providential Encounter

At the same time that Faithful Path Ministries was holding a clinic in Haiti, Dr. Trevor H. Paris and his team also traveled there to see firsthand the work that the Beehive was doing. Paris says he thought his team would be the only visitors there at the time, but God clearly had different plans.

“As providence would have it, our small group was able to join with Faithful Path Ministries to assist in the care of hundreds of residents in the Bohoc community,” Paris says. “We were doubly blessed to meet this group of workers for Christ and to see the exciting work that the Beehive is carrying out in Haiti to serve the community and to develop a vocational training program for the youth.”

“Haiti used to be called the Pearl of the Caribbean, and so it seemed a perfect name for the Bohoc land,” Euler says. “We believe there are many pearls here that only need a helping hand, and, of course, our model is He who is the Pearl of greatest price.At the Pearl, we have a center for learning manual trades: carpentry, farming, cooking, construction, and small-engine mechanics. We also have horses, donkeys, dogs, and cats so children can learn to relate to animals and care for them. Adults and children alike can learn through the great book of nature about living things and see the face of a God they know little about.”

Family nurse practitioner Margarone Momplaisir from McAllen, Texas, has been working in medical missions since 2010.

“This last mission trip has been a real life-changing experience for me,” Momplaisir says. “I was born in Haiti and spent my childhood in a community very similar to Bohoc, where there was no electricity, no potable water, no clinic close by, and farming was the only source of income. I remember that my childhood friends and I were often sick with severe impetigo, intestinal worms, chronic cough, conjunctivitis, and so on. Many people in my town died young of curable diseases because of the lack of knowledge and medical care. In the four days I spent in Bohoc I heard people telling the same stories that I had experienced in my childhood.”

A Personal Reflection

Dr. Ubaldo Salazar, one of the participating physicians, reflected on his involvement with the mission project: “My experience in Bohoc has changed me,” he wrote. “I came back home thinking differently. . . . If someone asks me how much I gave to Haiti, I respond that I gave nothing. I am indebted to them. . . . What I received is more valuable than what I gave.”

Please keep the families and the country of Haiti in your prayers as they begin the recovery process following Hurricane Matthew. This includes some of the families working with the Beehive who also lost homes and loved ones in the storm. If you would like to find out more or are interested in helping, please contact Jonathan Euler via e-mail at [email protected]