From Marilyn....

Good morning all,

This e-mail is in reference to disaster relief for Haiti earthquake victims.  As many of you know Dr. Keith Flanagan (OSU Alumni Class of 1978 and Native of Texhoma OK) has been a Veterinary Missionary in Haiti for the past 23 years.  Below is a series of e-mails from him, his wife and another field missionary Dr. Kelly Crowdis to Dr. Kit Flowers Director of Christian Veterinary Mission.  I received this e-mail yesterday from Dr. Flowers and thought some of you all would like to hear that Keith and Jan are safe and might like to make a contribution to the CVM relief fund that is set up.  At the end of this e-mail collection there is a web site where you can donate to help the relief efforts Drs Flanagan and Crowdis are involved in at this time in Haiti.  Appreciate your consideration of this request for help. God Bless,

Carolynn MacAllister     

Dear friends, We first heard of the earthquake in Haiti on Tuesday afternoon as Dr. Keith Flanagan wrote: “We just had a strong earth quake here in Haiti. All the phone service is out.  I don’t know about Kelly, but are praying that all is okay.  Will keep you posted.  The house is still shaking every now and then. All the back wall and some of one of the side walls went down. Better run and get wire up for tonight.” With you, our hearts have been broken once again for Haiti and the people we have served since the early 1980’s.   Currently we have Dr. Keith and Jan Flanagan and Dr. Kelly Crowdis serving as long-term workers and have had hundreds of short-term volunteers serve in Haiti over the years. We have trained over 1000 village level animal health workers and have been blessed to serve the people of Haiti in many other development and ministry inputs. Communication has been a challenge, but I did want to share with you this string of communication we have had over the last 24 hours. Keith and Jan’s son Brian also serves in southern Haiti Les Cayes and wrote:  “We are fine in Les Cayes, small quake.” We were relieved yesterday to hear this report from Jan: “Kelly is fine.  She just came by the house.  She had been doing a training and was on her way back in.  She is headed to her house to see how everyone is doing.  She saw lots of destruction coming in." We praise the Lord for the safety of these CVM fieldworkers and yet keep them in prayer as they begin to work with the Haitian people to assess the damage, respond to the immediate needs and understand how to help once again. Today Keith, Jan and Kelly are out looking for their Haitian friends and co-workers. Keith wrote early this morning, “We are still without any telephone communication so I am not sure how many of our friends are. I went to check on Berlinda and her family who live in a ravine and they were all fine.  We went to another area to check on a friend of theirs and we are sure that he didn’t make it. The house totally collapsed.  There is lots of damage, but I am surprised at some of the big buildings that are still standing. Will keep you posted.” We also heard from Jan today: “It is still hard to get thoughts going, but wanted to let you know that we did make it through the night.  Keith has left this morning to see what all he can find out.  John Claude came this morning (co-worker with Keith).  They lost everything, but praise the Lord all his family are okay.  Just where to start now?  He said everyone in his area are just out in the streets.  No one wanted to come in last night and I must say there were two or three times I was ready to go back out side. Keith went by Kelly’s house last night, but didn’t go in but looked like everything was okay.  We were thankful that she made it in okay.” We were able to connect by phone with Kelly and found that her house has some damage with everything a mess as things fell off of shelves.   She found out that one of her staff members has lost a family member and so was off early this morning to go and help in the response. Pray for strength and wisdom as they grieve the loss with their friends and co-workers and begin to discern how to best respond. We have established a Special Projects fund to help generate funds for them to use in this response. If the Lord is leading you to give, please click here to donate to this fund. We will keep you posted with regular updates on this time and how God is at work to empower His people in serving the people of Haiti. Keep Praying, Kit Dr. Kit Flowers Executive Director Christian Veterinary Mission