Nicaragua Short Mission Trip

Today, Lamar and Gene are traveling to Nicaragua to join River of Life Fellowship from Washington on a short term mission trip where we will distribute food packs, paint a chuch, and disciple to as many people as possible. Please pray that our team travels safely, that God will put on our tongue's the message of his love as we share with the broken, and that our lives be molded and our minds open as His hand be upon us! Please also pray for Chuck, Dave, Stefan, & Pete as they are in Houston for our community outreach day with the NCAA Final Four this week.

Time Flies

Especially when days are full from pre-dawn to the midnight hour. Can't believe it's Monday already. The pots & pans and food pack give away at Camp Hope seemed like it was a month ago. It's been tough posting at the FTH Travel Blog, but updates via twitter & facebook (along with photo & video uploads) have been easier to do on the fly.

http://twitter.com/FeedTheHungry

http://www.facebook.com/pages/LeSEA-Global-Feed-The-Hungry/109934439031299?ref=ts

Get over to facebook & become a fan when you can.

Rain just started again tonight... been raining every night since last Tuesday. Looks like the wet season is right around the corner.

Lots of tents have been put up around the greater Port au Prince area over the last couple of weeks... thousands & thousands... but there are still many pockets where folks are under leaky tarps, plastic, and bedsheets. In a camp we visited late today, one of the camp leaders told us that the people with leaky tarps just stand up at night in a dry spot & spend the whole night that way. Such a shame.

It's the simple things...

What a great day! Things started off a bit slow-- three ocean going containers are still in customs at Port au Prince. Building materials for the temporary storage canopy we're building at the Love A Child base aren't on site. BUT...

the legendary Dominican team from Resurrection Life Church put 500 family packs of food together, so we headed out to Carrefour to get bags of rice, beans, whole corn, canned veggies, and UHT milk into the hands of 2500 displaced people on Pastor Eddy Francois' lot. It was so good to see the folks again after being away for a few weeks.

So good to hug the kids & let em pluck the hair off my hairy blanc arms :-) so good to make small talk in broken KreySpAnglish with the mommas & poppas, so good to see Pastor Eddy again.

Then off to the Hope Camp at Love A Child, where 200 families are on the mend as loved ones are discharged from the HHI med camp next door. The big surprise for the day was not only bags of food for each family, but... wait for it... !! BAM !!

Each family getting a set of brand new T-fal and Emeril cookware. I mean brand spankin, in the box, stuffed with plastic and styrofoam kind of new. NEW NEW!

Talk about the look of joy, disbelief, shock AND awe! Displaced Haitian families-- who have lost everything from home and possessions to literally life and limb-- getting brand new cookware. I don't think I've been vicariously happier to the point of out & out laughter with a perma-grin in a long while than seeing the mommas, dads, and kids faces when boxes of pots & pans were put into their hands.

Going deep into the camp and into thier tents it was like Christmas in April, mom & kids sitting in the middle of the plastic lined dirt floor, with not a thing to their name, tearing through the boxes & pulling out piece after piece of shiny stainless steel. Kids playing with empty boxes... naughty ones rubbing two pieces of styrofoam together. Yeah, I hate that sound too.

Then the multiple "Messi, messi, messi" thank-you's with tearful hugs from mom and dad. I couldn't take it & had to cry with joy with them.

Listen... no good thing you do, no matter how seemingly little or small, when done with God's love and in Jesus name... goes unnoticed. It means ALL. For those of you reading this that have prayed for Haiti, that have given with compassion, that have gone... you are making all the difference in the world for these precious souls.

Posted some photos from the day & a little flash video at Feed The Hungry's new facebook page, take a second (ok maybe three) and become a fan right now:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/LeSEA-Global-Feed-The-Hungry/109934439031299?ref=ts

Thanks!

BAM! Pots & pans are here in Haiti.

Truckloads of brand new Emeril pots & pans have arrived in Port au Prince, courtesy of Feed The Hungry. Tomorow we start handing em out w/food packs in refugee/displacement camps.

Madame Sherry at Love A Child knows that they'll be a big hit and the mommas will just love them! Honestly, this cookware is top notch, way better that what we have in our home... isn't God good :-)

Will post some photos & try to upload some flash vids Thursday night after our day's work is done.

Feels so right to be back in Haiti, living, loving, and laughing with these wonderful people again.

Haiti March 2010

Finally back in Haiti after a long three weeks away... I seems so right to be here for the precious people of oft troubled nation.

Spent some time at the HHI Recovery Camp on the Love A Child compound... amazing to see the progress and impact that has been made in the lives of hundreds of severely injured people brought here literally since the earthquake struck two months ago.

Walking through the rows of jam-packed tents, I was favored to meet a beautiful princess named Emanuelle-- her photo graces this post.

Around the corner of a tent corridor she came, hobbling with her walker with a BIG smile and excited to try out her English on a 'blanc'. She saw the Bible that either Pete Sumrall, the President of Feed The Hungry was carrying, or the one sticking up out of the knee pocket of my cargo pants. It caught her attention like a moth to a flame cause right at the beginning of our conversation she brought it up & asked if she could have a 'Bibla'.

Emanuelle showed us to her tent... it was a long, s-l-o-w walk :-) and we got to learn a little about her...

Emanuelle is 18 yrs old and has been at the recovery center here for 21 days; prior to that she was on the USS Comfort. I asked where did she use to live... Delmas 28-- her home was flattened & her father died in the crash. She didn't say anything about her mother or family, but in her tent of four persons, she was alone. Once on her cot, she was quick to call "Mr. Peter" in to show him her medical file... a broken & pinned femur, a broken tibia or fibia in the lower leg, and a broken foot on the other leg.

We chatted it up for a little bit with nominal English on her part and broken, rusty, high-school French with a pinch of Spanglish thrown for good measure in on my part. Needless to say, we laughed a bit at the confusing and mostly senseless conversation that followed, but boy did she rejoice when Pete gave her the Bible.

It's hard not to get choked up being face to face with these wonderful people. They have literally lost life and limb, yet the resilience of their spirit is beyond belief.

In another tent we gave the second Kreyol Bible we had to an amputee mom living in a tent with her kids and others and she threw her hands up in the air, praising God, and did a happy dance with her arms upward... then kissed her new Bible and hugged it.

Tomorrow it's back to the displacement camp in Carrefour that Feed The Hungry has cared for since the earthquake hit.

Goodbye for now from the place where I would love to spend the next year or three of my life with my family should God permit.

Stefan

Back in Port au Prince & Carrefour

Lamar Austin and I have had two good solid days of ministry and activity here. At dawn yesterday we met up with one of our containers at the border & guided it in to our base in Fond Parisien. Met with Pastor Eddy Francois in Carrefour; this area of Port au Prince was devastated, 80% of the homes either destroyed or damaged beyond repair. Pastor Eddy's home was wrecked, he had 31 people living in his house and thankfully all survived. He is now in a tent along with 2,500 or so people living in the yard lot behind his house.

FTH relief coordinator, Pastor Fernando Fleming of the Dominican Republic, started food & water distribution to these families the week after the earthquake. It was good to finally meet Eddy and many of the families living under nothing more than low-lying bedsheets strung together on sticks & poles.

We had a VERY orderly distribution of a week supply of rice & beans to each of the families... 2,500 people... it was a blessing to see the vision of FTH in action once again, feeding the hungry, strengthening the church, and reaching the lost.

Many of the families living in this makeshift tent city are members of Eddy's congregation, but the vast majority are not. They have all seen God's love in action.

Visited with Mercy & Sharing briefly to introduce the leadership there to Fleming... so he can have quick access to the warehouse where 110 tons of FTH supplies will be stored.

We hoped to see all 7 containers cleared this week while in Haiti, but President Preval declared a three day time of fasting, repentance, prayer, and singing led for the nation. The voodoo/witchcraft folks got real upset at that...but Preval stood his ground. May this be a historic turning time for the nation of Haiti and may it rise from the ruins to become a place of peace and prosperity. A nation CAN be saved in a day.

Posted some photos tonight at http://picasaweb.google.com/sradelich/HaitiFeb2010#

And uploaded a couple more short flash videos at
http://www.youtube.com/user/feedthehungryUSA

Tomorrow morning we leave Fond Parisien again with the truck at 5:30 am for another distribution.

Stefan

Petionville & Cite Soleil

Some of the worst damage from the earthquake was found in Petionville, a densely populated section of Port au Prince... Delmas is also a disaster zone that can't be comprehended. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but a million pictures can't convey the what your senses feel in every dimension.

It's a mix of shock, sadness, heaviness that'll come in a flash... and then hope, faith, and joy that swells as the Haitian people erupt in prayer, and grateful, grateful praise as they appreciate what they have... not what they have lost.

One mother in the med clinic lost three of her four children; in the sadness, her authentic expressions of praise for the life of one child saved is a wonder to witness.

We set up four distribution points; three in Petionville and one in Cite Soleil, the notorious slum district of lower Port au Prince, where Pastor Astrel Vincent has dedicated years of time, treasure, and talent to lift lives young and old to new planes of promise and dignity.

He has about 200 families camped in the church yard. Families that live in the poorest part of the poorest city in the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere. And now the very little they could call home has been taken away.

But again, there in the reality of the moment, faith trumps tragedy. Moms & dads and kids with nothing more than the tarp over their heads happy to have each other and to be alive.

Some more photos posted here today.

Children Evacuated from Cazeau Orphanage, Port au Prince

It's been a long couple days... not much sleep, but that's ok, morning can't come fast enough. Every moment taken to wait on this, wait on that... though reasonable & understandable considering the amount of work and the amount of people doing it in Port au Prince... feels like an eternity. Antsy, ready, hyper to go-go-go and get things done emotions have to be balanced with concrete, calculated decisions... because a bad decision means time wasted. Oh well-- at least we can think & talk & brainstorm at 100 miles an hour and scratch off the thoughts and plans about how to do the most with what we have to help the most people... and the right, most people... in the wake of this larger than life tragic earthquake.

Received a txt from Joe K. yesterday... Suzie contacted him that the children's home in Cazeau had to be evacuated; walls had fallen down, supplies had run out, and the already bad neighborhood was getting worse. Way worse. Bands of guys roaming the streets with machetes, looking & looting worse.

Courageously they transported 150 or so kids, most with mental & physical disabilities one hour north of the city to a new facility that is in the process of being finished. Not finished yet, but an oasis away from the chaos and concerns of the capital.

We hoped to leave base around noon with and truck rice, beans, water, & diesel fuel up to the kids' new home. Never been there before, but with Joe K.'s simple directions scratched on a notepad, "Go through Archiae about 8 miles and make a right down the gravel road at the Texaco station", we couldn't miss :-)

On the way north on National #1, lo and behold a small pickup ahead with a load of praising ladies in the trailer... right behind a white delivery truck with half its roof ripped off, loaded with kids, wheelchairs, & iv's. It was them! Thank God for people who get in there and get it done... even if you have to turn a busted up delivery truck into a special kids mobile!

We joined the convoy & bumped up the gravel road to Williamson... and oh what singing, shouting, and dancing there was when the last truckload arrived.

Didn't have too much time to sit & soak it all in-- darkness was coming and the troops have a curfew over the city-- we had to make it through and get back to base or it may have been a long night sleeping in the back of our delivery truck.

Our little friends-- Martin was fine (I could barely hold the tears back when he came around the corner with his little hospital shirt on-- he's the dude up top this post); Eduard was fine... and smiling ear to ear like usual; Henri was fine... and wouldn't stop hugging anyone he could for as long as he could, as usual. And Xanthus was fine and looking better than ever, literally.

And they were all so happy to be in a new place called "Home". Nothing like 150 rejoicing kids and caregivers to lift your spirits.

Hoped to upload more photos, but night is almost spent and the mosquitoes aren't giving up.

FTH team leaving for PauP in the morning

A lot of expectation, anticipation, prayer. Wishing we were there already. But much is in motion; latest news is that 6,000 gallons of water will cross border into Haiti at 0700 Sunday.

Today we assembled about 450 lbs. of medicines, wound management, and casting supplies to hand carry to the clinic. Two orthopedic doctors arrive on Monday morning... so far people with the severest breaks & injuries have been taken across the border for care in the Dominican.

Morning can't come fast enough.

Help Haitian Earthquake Survivors!!

By now you may have heard about the tragic earthquake that hit the capitol city of Port au Prince, Haiti; 7.0 magnitude, only 9 miles offshore, and only 6 miles below the earth’s surface.

In the morning the imagery and the extent of the devastation will reveal just how destructive this earthquake was. Potentially tens of thousands of people perished in a matter of minutes.

The earthquake struck just before 5 p.m. EST time; Joe Krabacher from Mercy & Sharing contacted Feed The Hungry at 5:10 p.m. With phone lines and cell towers down, it took quite some time to actually connect with personnel in Port au Prince, but finally got through to Madame Chenet. She reported that the orphanage, school, and three-story medical clinic were spared; but she could not report on the Abandoned Baby Unit… which is housed at the General Hospital in Port au Prince. News reports have stated that the General Hospital collapsed, but those reports are yet to be confirmed. We can only hope that the children at the ABU were spared as well.

Feed The Hungry is in full response mode… ministry partners on the ground in Haiti are assessing the damage and ready to respond with emergency supplies.

Your help is urgently needed. Your generous support today will help provide emergency food and relief supplies to survivors. Survival Kits will include items like the following:

Emergency food

Blankets

Drinkable water

Cooking supplies

Plastic sheeting for shelter

In addition to immediate life-saving aid, your gift will also provide for the long-term needs of children and families, rebuilding communities and restoring hope.

For over 20 years, Feed The Hungry has provided emergency assistance to help people in need all around the world.

If you'd like to help the children and families in Haiti who have lost everything because of this tragic earthquake, please visit http://www.feedthehungry.org/ and help today.

Thank you!!!

Meet Stanley in Yei, Sudan

New video at http://www.youtube.com/feedthehungryUSA

Crises Hit Pacific Islands

Philippines Flood Disaster
- 73,892 people rescued
- 2,254,915 people affected
- 389,616 located in 561 evacuation shelters
- 736,197 displaced people
- 3,374 homes affected




Padang, Indonesia Earthquake
- 7.6 Magnitude
- Devastates Padang
- Current Death Toll: 529 people (number of casualties are expected to increase rapidly as search efforts continue)

Samoa Tsunami Disaster
- 8.0 Magnitude Earthquake devastates Samoa @ 6.48am local time
- Deadly Tsunami strikes islands at 07:00am

Historic and devastating floods in the Philippines, a killer tsunami in Samoa, and deadly earthquakes in Indonesia... its been a horrific week for literally millions of people in these Pacific islands. In the Philippines alone, more than 2 million homes have been destroyed.

Pete Sumrall, President of Feed The Hungry received an emergency e-mail from David & Beverly Sumrall. They pastor Cathedral of Praise in Manila, Philippines, a vibrant church started by Dr. Lester Sumrall more than 50 years ago. Beverly shared these gripping words:

"Flooding was horrific all over the city-- what had been knee high rose to neck high in a matter of seconds-- areas that were neck high rose to 15 feet. Thousands of people spent day and night on the roof of their houses without food or drinkable water. Areas of the city which had never flooded before were inundated with water. The floods rose so suddenly. Entire families grabbed their children by the hands and ran for their lives, only to have their little ones swept away by the raging torrents. They were too weak to hang on, and too little to survive. Many children are among the dead. In the Marikina Jail, prisoners were not allowed to go out to seek higher ground, they drowned in their cells."
The need is enormous and the situation is desperate. Feed The Hungry is responding immediately to help displaced families in Manila, Samoa, and Indonesia by purchasing tons of staple food items and water for the church to serve the suffering.




If you'd like to help families who have lost homes and belongings because of these natural disasters, please visit http://www.feedthehungry.org/ and help today. Thank you.

Managua, Nicaragua

We have been in Nicaragua for 6 days now, enjoying a wonderful ministry experience with a team of 11 wonderful people from Cornerstone Family Church of North Carolina. Under the caring leadership of Troy Doudy (who serves as a missionary in Nicaragua along with his wife, Ginnette and son, Aaron) we provided food paks and conducted evangelistic services in Nueva Guinea, Calderon, Santa Rita and Bluefields. It is the peak of rainy season here, and we battle the rain and mud...lots of mud... each day. However, the weather conditions cannot dampen the excitement of the team as we see God's hand work in mighty ways!

We have seen people respond to salvation, be filled with the Spirit, and receive miracles. One miracle that stands out to me took place in Nueva Guinea - a mother and father brought their young son up for prayer. There were many people lined up to receive healing and we did not even know they were there. Suddenly the father began to weep uncontrollably. When asked through the interpreter what was happening, he told us that their son was scheduled for major surgery to remove a cancerous tumor on his neck. The tumor was clearly visible as a large lump. When Pastor Jonathan Morgan from Cornerstone began to pray, they closed their eyes to agree for a miracle for their son. When they opened their eyes the lump on the side of his neck was completely gone! As I looked at it, I could see a couple of lines but it was perfectly smooth and flat. Praise the Lord! There were many more miracles throughout the trip just like this one!

It was an honour to meet Pastor Angel Gahona in Bluefields. He is in the process of planting 20 churches in Nicaragua, pastors a large church in Bluefields, and is starting a major feeding center to minister to the large number of people in extreme poverty in Bluefields. Lamar, Kandesa, and I traveled with him to one of the poorest areas, which is called "July 19". It's funny that it has a name, since it's actually the city garbage dump. However, it is home to the very poorest who try to survive each day by scavenging in the waste along with the pigs. It is in this very area that Feed the Hungry will partner with Pastor Gahona to begin a feeding center that will feed people each day - in body, soul, and spirit. Pastor Gahona will also use his cell group leaders to target other families imprisoned by poverty in Bluefields and bring the hope of Christ through the Word of God and food provided by Feed the Hungry.

Once we returned to Managua we were able to visit the feeding center where Feed the Hungry is feeding over 250 children. When the bus with our team pulled into the center we were immediately surrounded by children who were laughing and screaming in their excitement to see us. They knew we were bringing food! We held a children's service, where the US team presented their salvation skit, and a clown talked about Jesus using tricks like sticking a needle through a balloon without having it pop. Then we helped to serve the children as they ate their meal. It was heartbreaking to see that many of the children were sick due to improper sanitary conditions, and a number had the tell-tale signs of malnutrion (such as orange hair).

I am so glad that Feed the Hungry is able to make a difference to these children, and hope to be able to increase our ability to help even more children in Nicaragua. I have left a piece of my heart in Nicaragua, with the beautiful children who are so gracious and determined and who need Jesus with all their hearts!

Doreen Sparman

International FTH Director

Canada

Blog by Proxy

Lamar Austin (FTH US) and Doreen Sparman (FTH Canada) are leading a group of 15 down the Escondido River in Nicaragua. The group arrived in Managua last Friday and they've been visiting villages all along the river on the way to Bluefields-- a great little port city on the Atlantic Coast.

Lamar's called in a couple times & Doreen has been able to send a few photos, but web access has been a little sparse, as you could imagine. It's the rainy season (the REALLY rainy season) and the team's been holding up well.

Here's a neat story-- the guys ran into a village farmer who received help from Feed The Hungry on a previous mission, for several years he's harvested a crop from the seeds that we sent to Nicaragua several years ago and used the surplus to benefit others in the village. Pay it forward brother!

Hopefully Lamar or Doreen can connect soon and post a first-person update. Today they are at a feeding center that FTH helped resurrect in Bluefields; two hundred children or so are coming to the center daily for lunch and school tutoring.

News from Uganda

Our friend Solomon sent an update yesterday, thanking everyone for thier prayers for Priscilla. She’s come a long way & has a long way to go but “with God all things are possible” as Jesus said! Here's a photo of Priscilla helping to move bricks as the new school is being built-- she's always smiling and wanting to help or share what she has with the other kids.

----Original Message-----
From: solomon mwesige
Sent: Tuesday, June 09, 2009 5:57 AM
Subject: Priscilla

Greetings in the name of the Lord. Priscilla is doing great, God has been very faithful, she has not been down sick or in hospital since the last time I wrote asking for prayers, I believe the rice and soy meals and the new vitamins you gave us have also done a great job in boosting her immunity, she has not missed class since and her brain power has increased. Based on what the Doctors have said though, they think that she will keep loosing her memory till she cant learn anything new. We have seen that happen at the school in the past, but these days her performance in class is a lot better and her academics are progressing.

Thanks for investing in her life both spritually through prayer and the food and vitamin support.

Solomon

William sent an email to report on the positive impact the fortified rice meals are having on the children at 'Little Angels'. We are so grateful to Feed My Starving Children and their volunteers who pack these rice & soy meals that Feed The Hungry ships to childcare partners throughout Africa.

Greetings and many thanks from me, my wife Jane, the staff and all the children at Little Angels Children Centre. God bless you for your generous heart that has made a great change in our school. The FOOD and the VITAMIN TABLETS that you gave us has really made our children HEALTHY.

Since we recieved this blessing the children who used to be sick all the time are now now well all the time! If you can see them today you would just praise God. The number of children at the school are increasing every term, when we first recieved the rice meals we had 150 students and now 207 . We pray that God may open more doors for you that through you many things can happen in our community and nation. God bless you!

Pastor William Walusimbi
Director

At Work in Port au Prince

The Feed The Hungry team arrived in Haiti on Monday & Tuesday. Seeing the kids at the Mercy & Sharing Orphanage and School was again an emotionally moving experience-- most of the children are here because they were abandoned, left by a parent to basically die. Some were left at the Hospital General in PaP, some were left on a street or field, one was found inside a cardboard box... and I hate to even think of this... one abandoned child I met a few years back was thrown into a latrine hole when only a few months old.

It's hard to comprehend how a mother or father, or both, could consciously decide to do such a thing; I honestly don't know what combination of factors make child abandonment such an accepted 'fact of life' here. Maybe it is abject poverty... a mother knowing she cannot provide for her child (but I've seen moms & dads do some extraordinary things to make ends meet when it comes to their child's survival); maybe it is social stigma or superstition... most of the abandoned children have some kind of handicap or another, either a physical or mental challenge; maybe Voodoo has something to do with it, the nation has been steeped in the dark religion for over a hundred years.

Regardless of how, when, where, or why they've been abandoned IT IS ABSOLUTELY AMAZING to see the wonderful joy and absolute life that these kids exude. From the littlest infants to the largest teens, every one responds with life and laughter to the smallest gift of love-- a smile, a wave, a tickle, a hug, a little game of catch-- causes great joy to erupt.

Today I've been privileged to feel a small portion of what Jesus must have felt when he had the kiddies pressing all around him, getting blessed by their time with Jesus and Jesus getting blessed by his time with them. Remember the disciples tried to shoo them away but he rebuked the guys pretty good saying, "Let the little children come to me! Stop keeping them away! For the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these." He treasured his moment away from the do's & dont's and stresses of adulthood to let loose and feel the joy, sheer innocence, and trusting abandon that makes a child a child... and I treasured my moments today.

JP has arrived in Lahore!

JP called from Quetta, Pakistan... they made it through the border and will clear the vehicle through Customs in Quetta.  He's met up with Salik John from the Evangelical Fellowship of Pakistan and they'll get a good nights rest and then go to Lahore; then back to Germany on Tuesday or Wednesday.

At the Iranian Border

Jean Pierre called and he's stuck at the Iran/Pakistan border.  The border has been closed for two days because of unrest in Quetta.  There doesn't seem to be much in the news cycle at this point, but here is a report from the BBC:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/7991385.stm

JP and the boys are supposed to meet with Feed The Hungry representative Salik John at the border but they haven't seen him yet.

Please continue to pray for safety and secure passage through to Lahore.

Not much from JP today; he did send a couple photos from Turkey. Please continue to remember JP & the boys in your prayers. Bad news out of Pakistan yesterday & today; first a suicide bombing in Islamabad and then today a suicide bombing in Chakwal which is in the central part of the country (a city in the north of Punjab State).

At least 22 killed in Pakistan suicide bombing

By Faisal MehmoodSun Apr 5, 10:02 am ET

CHAKWAL, Pakistan (Reuters) – A suicide bomber blew himself up at a gathering of minority Shi'ite Muslims in Pakistan on Sunday killing 22 people a day after a deadly suicide attack in the capital, police said.

Pakistan is crucial to U.S. efforts to stabilize neighboring Afghanistan and U.S. President Barack Obama has said the release of additional U.S. aid to the nuclear-armed country depends on how it tackles terrorism.

The attack in the central city of Chakwal came a day after a pilotless U.S. drone aircraft killed 13 people including militants in the northwest and a suicide bomber killed eight soldiers in Islamabad.

About 2,000 people had gathered at a Shi'ite religious center in Chakwal, about 100 km (60 miles) south of Islamabad, for a ceremony when the bomber struck.

"There was a break in the ceremony and some people were going out and others were coming in when all of a sudden a young man tried to run into the crowd," said witness Amjad Hussain.

"When guards tried to stop him at the gate he blew himself up."

Regional police chief Nasir Khan Durrani said 22 people had been killed and 35 wounded. Durrani said the death toll would have been much higher if the bomber had managed to force his way into the crowd.

Surging militant violence has raised fears for nuclear-armed Pakistan's prospects, a year after a civilian government came to power ending eight years of military rule.

President Asif Ali Zardari, the widower of assassinated former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, and the coalition government are also struggling to revive an economy propped up by a $7.6 billion International Monetary Fund loan.

Outside the religious center, blood was splattered over the gate and walls while shoes and other possessions were strewn on the ground. Three mangled motorcycles lay outside the gate.

Pakistan has a long history of tit-for-tat attacks by militants from the majority Sunni and minority Shi'ite Muslim communities.

But sectarian militancy intensified after some anti-Shi'ite groups forged ties with al Qaeda and Taliban militants, security officials say.

Shi'ites account about 15 percent of Pakistan's 170 million mostly Sunni population and in general the two communities live in peace.

In Instanbul

-----Original Message-----
From: fthgermany@aol.com
Sent: Sat 4/4/2009 1:52 PM
Subject: Update

Hi FTH Staff,

Thanks for praying. We are in Istanbul at the moment. I decided yesterday to take one day off. Two days full driving and two nights with only a little bit of sleep is enough reason for a break. We got a nice hotel at the airport for a good rate. We spend almost two hours at the Turkish border. On the Greek side the custom office called an inspector and gave order to examine the vehicle. The female officer that came to the car, thought we transferred an ambulance into a camper. But when Marcel opened the back door and when she looked at the orange stretcher and the medical equipment, she became very nice and she gave us all the stamps we needed. On the Turkish side it was difficult to find somebody who felt responsible to work on our papers. They all were not very friendly. Several times the thought came up in my mind, if they want to become a member of the EU, they need to change their attitudes towards foreigners, and should start to study at least a little bit of English. Not talking about German. Every officer refused to stamp our custom papers. I hope that this will not give us any difficulties to get the tax back when we return to Germany.

From there we went straight towards Istanbul. People were walking all along the highway. Can you imagine, driving 150 Kilometers an hour, and there is a donkey on the right hand lane. Well this is this part of this world here. At one point there was a big hole in the surface and I really was worried that this maybe did something to the ambulance. But praise God, nothing happened. Pastor Peter in Zurich had the vision, that our vehicle has a kind of protection wall or skin around it, like an army tank. I really believe that. We are in the army of the LORD and in a mission to bring the gospel, health and delivery to the hurting people of Pakistan. Sunday morning we will leave very early. I have the goal, to get as close as possible to the Iran Border. So we will spend the night from Sunday to Monday again somewhere in Turkey. Tuesday morning we will cross the border into Iran. And I believe we could be at our final destination on good Friday. It would be nice to park the Ambulance on Easter Sunday in front of the church. That would be great, but I will not put myself under any kind of pressure. This could become “unhealthy”, driving tired……Thanks for praying. I believe GOD for seeing you all in South Bend this summer. Any way to drive there…….
Jp, Marcel and Philipp