Since 2014, Onaville, Haiti has been home to the Connect 2 Ministries compound. The Haitian government selected Onaville to relocate people from tent cities in Port-au-Prince after the 2010 earthquake, and it has been estimated that there are 800,000 people living in this barren area. All of these factors make Onaville a unique place for ministry.

Our ministry is church centric, which means that everything we do flows out of a local congregation of believers. From the Children’s Homes to the Medical Clinic, all our ministries are run by the church. Along with providing a Christian presence in the community, we also extend our tangible resources to those in need as an opportunity for evangelism. One of those resources is clean water.

According to a study by the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice,

“Only 55.2% of the population [in Haiti] has access to an improved water source, while close to 70% does not have direct access to potable water. These figures, however, almost definitely overstate Haitians’ access to improved water sources, since public systems are rarely available year round.”

The people of Haiti often resort to gathering water from garbage-filled rivers to provide for their daily needs, including using it for cooking and drinking when water becomes too expensive or unobtainable. Access to clean, fresh water is a main concern in Haiti, where waterborne illnesses such as typhoid, cholera, and chronic diarrhea are the cause of more than half of the country’s deaths every year. Contaminated water is also one of the leading causes of childhood illness.

For many years, all the water for our ministry compound and Children’s Homes came from purification trucks we paid to fill our holding tanks. This made us dependent on the water trucks’ availability and delivery timing, so a long-running prayer request was that we would be able to purchase a water truck of our own.

In 2020, Crossroads Church, one of our American partners, responded to the need. Their congregation generously raised and donated the funds needed, and the truck has been an incredible blessing ever since. This story is a picture of our ministry goal in action: to connect the local church in the United States with Christ’s church in Haiti, supporting both pastors and local congregations of believers in ministry however we can. The water truck has done just that, and we praise the Lord for His work in providing this amazing resource.