Haiti Update: February 2024

Written by Brad Hammond, VP, Field Ministries

First, the bad news
Since our last update, Haiti’s complex political and security issues have not improved. On the contrary, they have worsened once again.

• Political impasse: Since the president’s assassination in July 2021, Haiti still has not held any elections. In fact, there are still no elected officials left in office. Widespread street protesters are calling for a change in leadership.

• Gang violence: In the political vacuum, gangs continue their grip on as much as 80% of the Port-au-Prince capital area. The police force is outmanned and outgunned by the gangs, whose violence and brazenness is shocking. According to recent UN reports, in 2023 approximately 8,400 people were killed, injured or kidnapped, and 1,600 police officers resigned from the force. Those numbers continue to grow in 2024. The violence has impacted many of Lifeline’s ministry locations in and around Port-au-Prince. Most recently, a Lifeline regional leader and a Lifeline pastor had to evacuate their homes for the safety of their families.

• Countrywide impacts: As a result of the political impasse and gangs’ control over roadways and the capital, the entire country feels the effects at crippling rates: high inflation, increasing food insecurity, fuel scarcity, school closures, shuttered businesses, losses of personal property to gangs, displaced families, fear on the streets, and a high rate of emigration to other countries.

Here are three ways you can join God in His future work in Haiti.

• Pray over our Haitian leadership. They wake up each morning to this air of uncertainty, while also knowing with certainty that God is their hope and refuge.
  • Pray for daily wisdom for how to approach each day and each decision.
  • Pray for supernatural confidence and peace from the Holy Spirit.
  • Pray for safety and protection over them and their families.
  • Pray for perseverance as they partner with God to see “His Kingdom come, and His will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matt. 6:9-13).

• Donate to Lifeline's Haiti ministry work. Lifeline Haiti needs your support financially to allow for community development training, education for children, local churches, health and nutrition programs, and so much more.

• Follow news on Haiti. The Miami Herald, Reuters and AP News are places to start.

And now, the Good News...
Holistic Impact and Transformation
It will come of no surprise to you that the ongoing crisis in Haiti is having, what I would call, holistic impact on the people of Haiti. Humans are holistic beings. The different facets of our lives are all integrated, meaning they each are tied to, and affect, the others.  For example, growing food insecurity is creating a lack of physical health. A lack of physical health can quickly create a lack of financial health for an individual. A lack of financial health can then create a lack of emotional health, and so on, and so on. Obviously, all of this can have a dramatic effect on spiritual health. As a matter of fact, it is often these very facets (physical, emotional, financial, etc.) that test our spiritual health.

At Lifeline, we believe that if the Gospel is good news, then it is good news for the whole person. That sounds easy enough, but what does that mean, and what does that have to do with the current situation in Haiti?

It means that if we are going to effectively proclaim and demonstrate the Gospel in Haiti, we need to look to the whole person as Jesus did. A traditional belief is that Jesus came to fix people’s spiritual problem. That is a very limited and incomplete understanding of the Gospel according to Jesus. The Gospel Jesus proclaimed and demonstrated was that “the Kingdom of God is here!” He was claiming that God’s reign and rule over all creation was arriving in him (Mark 1:14-15). Jesus’ mission is to take back what is rightfully his, to take back what sin and death have stolen from his children, to take back his good creation. That is the mission we continue to join him in.

Jesus came to redeem and restore the whole person, here and now. Jesus himself said, “I came so that they would have life, and have it abundantly” (John 10:10). Jesus was talking about this life, the present life, the here-and-now life. This is why, for Jesus, addressing things like physical, emotional, social, and financial needs, came right alongside addressing people’s spiritual needs.

So then, with the current crisis in Haiti, how do the Lifeline leaders in Haiti reassess and create ministries that address their own people and communities in a holistic way?

It is with that in mind that Lifeline’s leaders in Haiti have entered into a two-year training cohort with Life In Abundance, a mission out of Kenya, Africa. This partnership gives an opportunity for Lifeline’s leaders in Haiti to learn Gospel-centered, holistic transformational development from experts that not only share their developing-world experiences, but share the commonality of African descent as well.

This is an invaluable opportunity. The specific goal and aim of this partnership is to zero in on how God is inviting Lifeline more deeply in how to proclaim and demonstrate the Gospel in a holistic way in Haiti, and to do it in a long-term, sustainable, way. The desire is to see Jesus unleash holistic transformation in the people and communities of Haiti. 

Make no mistake about it: there is an intense battle taking place in the spiritual realms in Haiti, and it is having very tangible effects on the people. The stakes are higher than we can actually imagine. As always, that battle in the spiritual realms is a battle for the whole person (spiritually, emotionally, physically, intellectually, financially, etc.), and it is our belief that our King, Jesus, is the guaranteed victor.