the day the earth shook

i have a friend, more of an acquaintance really, who is a full-time missionary in haiti.

she, along with her husband and their large tribe of children, moved to haiti just a few months before i did. i met her eldest daughter first. then slowly, over time, met more and more family members. i, along with hundreds of others, felt that i knew tara even before i met her.

reason being?

she had a blog. a daily, colorful blog about living in haiti, life with children,

and about the man she loves.

oh, and i always logged on to see troy's pictures.

(i even asked for his book last Christmas. i don't have it yet, so if anyone is feeling so inclined . . . )

anyhow, i have had a few snippets of conversation with tara over the years. most of these have actually been since i left haiti. at that point, she and her family moved into the city and began working with two different organizations: heartline ministries and world wide village.

on january 12, i began praying fervently for the livesay family. i prayed protection over troy as he headed out day after day to find survivors. i prayed for strength, peace, endurance, protection for tara as she daily fielded more tasks than i could take on in a month. she did all this while being afraid and while having absolutely no control over her circumstances. that is hard on a good day. on a bad day, the kind of day when you're not even given options on how to properly care for your own children in the midst of horrendous circumstances, that is your worst nightmare. i was praying for their children. praying peace, praying for visas, praying that the younger ones would not grasp the horrors of the situation.

if you were watching the news that first week, there is a really good chance you saw troy's face and read his tweets about what he was encountering and what help was needed. he was the news before anderson cooper. troy now has nearly 10,000 followers on twitter. that number skyrocketed right after the quake.

as i anxiously waited for news of my loved ones in haiti, i sat by the computer and tried to glean all the information i could from twitter, facebook, emails, cnn, etc. i prayed and prayed.

i cried my eyes out. and i wondered what they were all living through.

my friend megan was there. she was working with the livesays. it was because of her and troy that we learned only hours after the earthquake that every single child at three angels was alive and unharmed!!

in a series of blog posts, tara has taken the time to fill us in on what she remembers happening in those first crucial days. her posts can be found here, here, here and here (in that order).

these are emotionally charged posts and with good reason. i would encourage each of you to take the time to read them, even if it is hard for you to do so. this is history documented. this is real life, unedited (well, mostly).

on january 13, i posted a short blog about prayer, places to donate, and my "family members" from whom i still had not heard. on january 15, i wrote this. what i wrote there rings true today. please remember to pray daily, hourly for the people of haiti.

their pain is still real, but our God is still bigger.