Starfish. Blessed Starfish.
It’s a beautiful idea on paper, but it’s much harder lived out. It’s my biggest burden, yet biggest blessing. It gives me the opportunity to serve 21 women, pouring into them so they can better care for the kiddos. It’s mundane work most days, as it’s a lot of budgeting, teaching and strategizing…a slow kingdom coming kind of work. But, it’s kingdom work nonetheless.
Some of the women have been in the Starfish program for 3+ years. I’ve seen so much in just the short year and half I have been leading the program, but over the past six months the Lord has been stirring a new vision for the program in not only my heart but in mama Sarah’s (Haitian woman who helps me lead the program) heart as well. The Lord has been working in the hearts of several other women who we call the “godmothers” – essentially mentors – and they want to be more committed to seeing lives transformed through this program as well.
So, this past week we graduated all twenty-one women from the program, hoping that all we have done and taught and loved have left them standing taller and stronger. We wish we could have done it all but we hope for all the places we have fallen short the Lord will intervene.
As for the future, we are hiring Filane, a dear friend of mine who has a heart for Jesus and a heart to pray for the suffering, as a full-time Starfish staff. She will join Sarah and I as we prepare a program with further teachings and mentorship. We are currently putting together and finding curriculum for a business course, marriage counseling, literacy course and further hygiene and better health practices.
I have a file filled with 85 forms of women who have come to me in the last year and half looking for help + hope. In the month of January, our hopes are to follow up and visit these women to admit 20 women into our revamped Starfish program. Please pray for us and we will need so much wisdom and courage to decide who will be the next faces in our program. Pray for Filane as she will be transitioning into a new job. Pray for Sarah as she has been sick and will need strength to carry out all of her responsibilities. Pray for the next group of women who will enter into this program. Pray for God to show up for these women and we can be vessels for all of His good gifts.
For more information on the Starfish program, click here.
We are always looking for people to partner with us in our efforts of orphan prevention through the Starfish program. Email us at touchofhopehaiti@gmail.com if you would like to learn more about partnership with this program.
All the love from Haiti,
Kayla
Touch of Hope Haiti 