Eleven years ago, during my last semester of nursing school, I went on a short-term mission trip to Haiti with my local church. At the end of that trip we spent a few days visiting Real Hope for Haiti, where I was introduced to people who were bringing the hope of the Gospel by providing medical care to the people in their community. To sum it up, you could say that my world as a white, American, sub-urban raised, Christian was turned upside down in those few days.

I had never before seen such poverty and devastation. I saw people dying of diseases that could have been prevented with clean water or medications that are easily accessed in the developed world. The injustice of a mother walking down the mountain all night to bring her severely malnourished child to the clinic, and then giving thanks and praise for the care she received, was incomprehensible to me. Their suffering was so great, and yet so many of the Haitians I encountered were full of joy and hope. I could not walk away from this trip unchanged.

God began to teach me then that I could use the gifts and skills He has given me to be a part of his redeeming work here on Earth. In the years since that first trip I have been back to Cazale nearly a dozen times. I have been there to serve alongside them doing Earthquake relief, to work in their cholera hospital, to provide education to their staff, and it was there in rural Haiti that I discovered my life’s calling to become a midwife. I could tell you stories of stitching up machete wounds, delivering babies by headlamp in a hurricane, and unfortunately, way too many stories of tragedy and loss. Now that I have a family of my own, I don’t get to be on the ground in Cazale as often as I wish, but it is my joy in this season to serve as Board Member and support the mission from afar.

But so much more significant than my service with Real Hope for Haiti, are all the ways that God has changed my heart and given me a greater understanding of His character and His expansive kingdom. He has given me a deep desire to care for women and families who don’t have easy access to safe, quality healthcare. I have learned that God’s heart is especially for the poor, and that it reaches across every race, language and nation on this earth. I have seen true humility and servanthood in the missionaries there, whom I now call very dear friends. And I have learned that if I dare get close enough to let my heart break over the injustices of this world, the pain will be so great, but God’s grace does not leave me there. Because just as this midwife knows, pain eventually gives birth to joy, and because of Christ, I can long with great hope for the day when every wrong is made right and all we know is joy forever.