As we begin a new day, I would like to request prayer that God would guide Rod and me to places where there is the most need and places where we can use our skills most to bring God glory. Please join me in praying for direction throughout our remaining 4 days here. God awesomely directed us on Monday, giving us a very encouraging and productive day of assessments. Yesterday was a bit slower paced, but we had a couple good assessments and visits with people at sites, as well as time to catch up with prioritizing water system installations and sites we should visit.

Another team from Water Missions International has been serving with us and following up behind us with installations of systems. Praise God that they completed another water system in the hills at Mission of Hope’s Icondo site for a future orphanage in close proximity to a shelter site without water!

The next EMI water team of two engineers arrive in Haiti tomorrow. Please pray for Tommy and Bob as they prepare to leave, travel, and continue what we have been working on. Ask God for a smooth transition starting tomorrow, and that His direction would be clear as we attempt water solutions. May He receive the glory for working through us so that many might know and praise Him!

The LORD is gracious and compassionate,
slow to anger and rich in love.
The LORD is good to all;
he has compassion on all he has made.
All you have made will praise you, O LORD;
your saints will extol you.
They will tell of the glory of your kingdom
and speak of your might,
so that all men may know of your mighty acts
and the glorious splendor of your kingdom.
Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom,
and your dominion endures through all generations.
The LORD is faithful to all his promises
and loving toward all he has made.
The LORD upholds all those who fall
and lifts up all who are bowed down.
The eyes of all look to you,
and you give them their food at the proper time.
You open your hand
and satisfy the desires of every living thing.
The LORD is righteous in all his ways
and loving toward all he has made.
The LORD is near to all who call on him,
to all who call on him in truth.
He fulfills the desires of those who fear him;
he hears their cry and saves them.
- Psalm 145:8-19

Thank you all so much for your prayers! It has been an extremely busy week, and I apologize for the lack of updates. It is so encouraging to see the smiles on the faces of the people we are helping, and I praise God for the opportunity to be here ministering to them! The picture to the right is from one of the camps close to our base where the kids always yell out my name whenever they see me. We were working there this week to improve sanitation conditions, water storage, and water taps.

I uploaded more pictures at http://haiti.johnagee.com, and here’s a little of what Rod and I have been doing the past week:

• Conducted water quality tests and took samples for bacteria testing at most sites we visited that had a source of water
• Assessed and installed water treatment, storage, and tap stand at Good Samaritan Orphanage in Grand Goave, encouraging the community and training some operators
• Assessed water needs at additional shelter sites in communities around Grand Goave (Nan Sab, Simon, Jeanty, Morne Rouge, & Jacipen)
• Watched God expand the only energy bar I had with me that I gave to a group of hungry  kids at Morne Rouge in Grand Goave so that each of them got some
• Assessed a shelter site in the hills above Grand Goave for water needs (Sant Bonsekou Tezeb)
• Assessed water needs at sites around Leogane, including a Catholic hospital and a community shelter area (AJDP)
• Assessed water needs and visited with communities around Petit Goave, explaining some of the water testing I was doing in Spanish

Praise God for all of the work that He has enabled Rod and I to accomplish this week! I am so thankful for a day to rest and worship the Creator today. Please pray that we remain rooted in Him, abiding in Him so that the Holy Spirit continues to carry us and speak through us to those we are working with and for.

May God pour out His cleansing water and His Spirit that changes hearts here in Haiti!

I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.
- Ezekiel 36:25-27

Good evening!

Today started with more shaking as another aftershock rumbled through this region. I do not have much time to detail today’s activities, but Rod and I had another productive day: assessing potential water site up in the hills near Grand Goave and finishing setup for the water treatment system we started on Friday at Mission of Hope. The ministry and community there was very supportive through the setup process, and they were quite appreciative of the clean water, water storage bladder, and tap stands. Harvey, a chaplain with the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, joined Rod and I this afternoon as we started the Mission of Hope water system. We prayed for and encouraged volunteers and staff with the ministry in starting the first day of class today, as well as their efforts in food distribution, medical clinics, and orphanage care. I praise God for this opportunity to be involved with delivering good water to the kids and community around this ministry–May He receive all of the glory and praise!

I have started posting pictures at http://haiti.johnagee.com, so be sure to check there for updated images from this trip.

Thanks for your continued prayer. Please continue to ask God that He would provide energy and endurance through these long days–I cannot do this in my strength.

A quick update from Chile: Praise God that Keefe and Paola Daly and their kids are all fine! Paola was in Santiago when the quake hit and will not be able to travel home until roads are reopened. Keefe and their kids have food at home, the house and neighborhood is fine, and they even have pool water from a neighbor to wash and flush toilets with. Pray that they have access to drinking water as it is distributed around their area, and thank you for lifting them and the people of Chile up in prayer!

Reflecting HIM,

John

Bonsoir!

Rod, John, and I arrived here in Grand Goave after a short helicopter ride yesterday afternoon. We spent the remainder of yesterday assessing construction of latrine installations near our camp and working on a site plan for the potential shelter near the Samaritan’s Purse Port-au-Prince base. The Grand Goave base is quite a bit smaller and has more of a family atmosphere, so I am getting to know the people I will be living with and interacting with over the next 2 weeks.

Praise God for a great day today! Rod and I worked most of the day preparing and installing a water filtration and purification system for a ministry and school called Mission of Hope. We will finish the installation on Monday after resting and worshiping tomorrow. I enjoyed spending some time with the people who came to help us level the ground for the system, build a temporary platform for a water storage bladder, and assemble the pieces of the system. I was amazed at their willingness and follow-through in helping us with the setup! God gave us the ability to communicate instructions fairly well, and I attempted to speak a little French. Pray that God would continue to increase my desire and ability to learn and to have more confidence in using it to humbly learn more from people while I am here in Haiti. May God be glorified through my words, actions, and attitudes as He gives the strength to serve!

Please pray for Keefe and Paola Daly and their family and friends in Concepcion, Chile. I regularly support and pray for Keefe and Paola, who are involved with campus ministry in Chile. Please ask God to use the earthquake in their area to show His power and draw people to Himself.

The LORD reigns; let the peoples tremble!

He sits enthroned upon the cherubim; let the earth quake!

The LORD is great in Zion;

he is exalted over all the peoples.

Let them praise your great and awesome name!

Holy is he!

The King in his might loves justice.

You have established equity;

you have executed justice

and righteousness in Jacob.

Exalt the LORD our God;

worship at his footstool!

Holy is he!

Psalm 99:1-5

My teammate Rod and I arrived safely in Haiti this afternoon. Thank you for your prayers as we traveled here! After passing through the new immigration and customs area at the airport, we were met by our Samaritan’s Purse (SP) driver and proceeded to push our way through a huge crowd outside the airport gate. Then we drove through the gridlocked streets with minimal traffic direction from UN and US soldiers to the main SP camp, where we are spending the night tonight. It’s been great to meet many of the SP staff here, and also some other Christian NGO workers who are sharing the Global Outreach ministry site north of Port au Prince. Continue to pray that we can be an encouragement to the responders who have already been here for weeks.

We heard encouraging testimony tonight from the SP medical team who praised God for saving the life of a man close to death. They shared how he had praised Jesus for saving his life, both physically and spiritually, and how God prompted him to pray for them, asking the Lord for more knowledge and understanding for the medical team as He uses them to save lives in Haiti. God is truly at work here in the midst of the pain and brokenness. Would you continue praying for these people who have so little identity and hope? Pray that God would strengthen them and give them identity in Him, and that their hope would rest in Christ alone.

Tomorrow I will be helping survey a potential camp/shelter site and sketching out a site plan with Rod and John Dallmann. Then in the afternoon the three of us will fly southeast by helicopter to Grand Goave, where we will be based out of the Haiti Arise Mission for most of the duration of our time here. This hard-hit area was the epicenter of the quake, and we will focus much of our attention on proper sanitation and hygiene with latrine installations/training before the rains intensify potential for the spread of disease. Most camps still do not have proper toilets, so please lift up this effort in prayer.

Thanks so much for your prayer support and covering! I believe God will do great and mighty things as we call out to Him. Nothing is too difficult for Him! May Haiti see signs and wonders pointing them to God, having an abundance of peace and truth, being cleansed from their iniquity so that the good and merciful Lord of hosts would receive all praise and honor! (Jer. 32-33)

Thank you all so much for your prayers! God has led me to accept the opportunity to get involved on the ground in Haiti for the next few weeks.

This morning I learned that Rod Beadle (another EMI volunteer from Illinois) and I will depart for Haiti on Wednesday afternoon, spend the night in Miami, and arrive in Haiti on Thursday. We will meet up with John Dallmann (who returned last night) and the rest of the Samaritan’s Purse WASH (Water, Sanitation, and Health) team, who we will be serving with throughout our time in Haiti. While we do not know exactly what to expect, our main role will likely be in setting up water systems, water filters, and latrines.

Please pray that God would provide strength, understanding, health, and energy through what will likely be very long days for the 2.5 weeks we will be in Haiti. Pray that we would work well as a team, accomplishing the relief goals that have been set, and ministering to all we encounter along the way, even though we need to be task-oriented and the two of us do not know much French. May God provide many opportunities for us to give Him glory as we minister in some of the most devastated places on the western side of Hispaniola. Let many “sing to the LORD a new song, his praise from the ends of the earth, you who go down to the sea, and all that is in it, you islands, and all who live in them…Let them give glory to the LORD and proclaim his praise in the islands.” (Is. 42:10,12) I trust that Creator God, who spread out the earth and gives life to those who walk on it, will be faithful to turn darkness into light and to smooth out rough places in lives so that He will receive the glory. Ask for His glory and presence to be revealed through the pain in Haiti, and that voodoo practices would be replaced with trust in and worship of Jesus in this shaken nation.

I am amazed at how God is growing my heart for the people of Haiti, many of whom descended from peoples of West Africa. May His love flow through all that He gives me strength to do!

HIS ambassador,

John

I am still working on preparing my first newsletter, and while I was planning to include this request there, things have been expedited. So I wanted to share this request with all of you now.

God has provided an opportunity through EMI to serve Samaritan’s Purse with water and sanitation engineering in Haiti next week. As such, I need to make a decision of whether or not I am going to answer that need. I would be working closely with John Dallmann, who I visited in Cameroon in 2005, and the rest of the Samaritan’s Purse WASH team working in Haiti. Please pray for wisdom and discernment as God directs my decision for this trip. I would likely depart with another EMI volunteer sometime early next week, and our stay would last 2-3 weeks. Ask God to provide another engineer through EMI’s disaster response network, and pray that I would have clarity in sensing and obedience in following God’s leading. I would also greatly appreciate prayer for my role with the Perspectives class that I am coordinating this semester and the support-raising process I am working through as I prepare to join EMI’s staff this summer. May God be glorified as I trust Him!

Thanks so much for your prayers on my behalf!

I just redesigned and updated my website a couple nights ago, detailing more about my staff appointment with Engineering Ministries International (eMi). Check it out at www.JohnAgee.com.

Praise God for already providing 17% of my monthly support needs! I am currently sending out letters detailing this next season of my life and planning to meet with potential ministry partners over the next few months, so I look forward to meeting with many of you soon. Please join me in praying for these meetings and that God would lead and provide. If you would like to partner with me on a monthly basis, please contact me, and I would be happy to let you know how you can get involved. Thank you so much for your prayers as I trust God through this process!

Due to the Perspectives on the World Christian Movement class and support raising activities, I have decided not to travel internationally over the next 5 months. However, I am looking forward to attending World Mandate 2010 at Antioch Community Church in Waco, TX next weekend with one of my former roommates! God continues to provide amazing direction and inspiration as I seek and trust Him. In some ways, it will be difficult for me to stay in the U.S. over the next few months, but I know that God will use my time here for His purposes and His glory. Please pray especially for Mr. Matthew’s family, our host family in Nigeria, as they were looking forward to me returning to work on Prayers Farm. Todd, who stayed to receive the shipping container, has returned to his family in Florida, and it looks like no one from the U.S. will be going back to Nigeria until September or October. Also pray that Mr. Matthew’s young daughter, Immanulla would be healed. She has been in the hospital for over 3 days now. Continue praying that God would provide for Prayers Farm and guide the eMi team as we finalize our plans and report.

Last Friday night, I joined the eMi intern orientation as they all shared their testimonies. Praise God for bringing around 30 interns to eMi for the upcoming semester and for each of their stories that point to Him! They will spend the spring semester in offices around the world: Canada, the UK, Uganda, India, Costa Rica, and Colorado Springs. I look forward to sharing in some of what God does in and through their lives as I have opportunity to volunteer in the Colorado Springs office.

Most of you have probably felt compelled to pray for the situation in Haiti, and I trust that God is at work in awesome ways through the pain and destruction there. EMI has designed over 80 projects in Haiti and has many ministry connections there. A team of 8 with eMi is currently helping with water and structural assessment. Please lift this team up in prayer as they work with Samaritan’s Purse, Food for the Hungry, and other ministries and local churches. You can follow updates or donate toward eMi’s teams at http://emiworld.org/proj_Haiti10_earthQ.html.

Your steadfast love, O LORD, extends to the heavens,
your faithfulness to the clouds.
Your righteousness is like the mountains of God;
your judgments are like the great deep;
man and beast you save, O LORD.

How precious is your steadfast love, O God!
The children of mankind take refuge in the shadow of your wings.
They feast on the abundance of your house,
and you give them drink from the river of your delights.
For with you is the fountain of life;
in your light do we see light.

-Psalm 36:5-9

Praying for God’s steadfast love, salvation, and delight to be evident in Haiti,

John

Happy new year!

I just returned home after a week full of worship, fellowship, encouragement, and gathering with family. One week before Christmas, I was invited to fill in at the Converge Worldwide (Baptist General Conference) booth at InterVarsity’s Urbana missions conference in St. Louis. My family dropped me off on their way to southern Indiana so that I could attend a few days of Urbana 2009. Throughout my time there, I was able to interact with high school and college students attending the event, as well as to catch up with some old and new friends with Converge. I also visited briefly with several interns and staff who were representing Engineering Ministries International (EMI) there. God continues to affirm His desire to use me in missions so that peoples around the world might know and worship Him, and I am thankful for the opportunity to gather with around 14,000 others with similar vision. Praise Him for the sweet times of solitude prayer and corporate worship I experienced in St. Louis!

I then flew to meet the rest of my family who were visiting my mom’s side of the family in Evansville, Indiana. As we celebrated our Savior’s birth and welcomed the new year with friends and family, I was able to get some much needed rest before what is ahead in January. The college-level Perspectives on the World Christian Movement class that I am coordinating starts in just over two weeks, and I am also preparing to focus on ministry partnership and support raising for my upcoming role with EMI. If you would like to hear more about how God has led me to join EMI as a full-time staff engineer, please let me know, and I can set up a time to meet with you. I would greatly appreciate your prayer as this next month will likely be an extremely busy time in my life with great potential for enemy attacks and stress.

In addition, I am still seeking God for wisdom in joining one of three February EMI trips to West African countries, as well as the possibility of returning to Nigeria for additional survey work. Please pray with me that God would provide clarity and direction. An article about my most recent trip to Nigeria for Prayers Farm was published in the Des Moines Register a few days before Christmas, and you can read it at http://www.desmoinesregister.com/article/20091222/LIFE/912220331/1039/D.M.-couple-helps-village-provide-fish-in-Nigeria

Praising God for the blessing of seeking refuge in Him,

John

Psalm 5:11-12

as he spoke to our fathers, to Abrahamand to his offspring forever.”

As we near the day that we celebrate the birth of our Savior, I am excited to share the news from Ibagwa, Nigeria that the shipping container has arrived with all of its contents! Praise God for His timing and for His protection of the contents!

It took the truck 12 hours to make the normally 4-hour trip from Port Harcourt because of police attempts to pilfer some of the contents, 2 flat tires, and a broken bearing. Praise God that the shipping company sent a representative along to watch the container, and that the shipping company does not pay bribes (even though that delayed the container an extra week at customs). Todd, the Ikpe family, and others spent all night last night unloading the container, which is a blessing because it is so hot and humid during the day there now during the dry season. Todd is now staying through December 31 to drill a well for the family and to do whatever he can at the Prayers Farm site.

People from the villages around have been stopping by requesting Bibles and hearing the gospel from the family as they receive them. Praise God for the opportunity they now have to read the truth of His Word! Please continue to pray for the truth of the gospel to be understood and preached in this part of Nigeria.

The picture below that I took from Colorado Mines Peak near Berthoud Pass is a mosaic that contains 1000 pictures from my trips to Africa (Sierra Leone, Ethiopia, Sudan, Uganda, and Nigeria) this past year. May God be praised for the ways He has worked throughout the past year in and through my life! I look forward to joining eMi full time and partnering with many of you in the coming year!

Magnifying Christ, the Lord,

John

Luke 1:46b-55

“My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant.
For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
for he who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name.
And his mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;
he has brought down the mighty from their thrones and exalted those of humble estate;
he has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty.
He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy,
as he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to his offspring forever.”