Yesterday a group of 23 students and young adults  called SWITCH from the Church of the Highlands arrived in Port Au Prince to join us in several ministry projects here in Haiti. Today was our first day of ministry in Jacmel. We spent the morning cleaning 100 filters, that the group raised funds for, in preparation for distribution we did later in the day. It was awesome to see 100 different families fill the church waiting to get their filters that would provide safe clean drinking water for the next five years. The most exciting thing was to see people give their lives to Christ, as they learned not only about how these filters provide clean water but  heard about the Living water found in Jesus. Tomorrow we will be hosting a soccer camp for over 200 kids. Please check back for daily updates.

Blessings In Christ,

Global Effect Team

It’s been a while since our last blog, but for good reason. The past six weeks have been a flurry of activity. Here is a brief update.

A New Project
In early May we were in Haiti building the new Global Effect Filter Factory in Jacmel. As you can imagine, it attracted some attention as Jacmel was also devastated by the earthquake. Local community officials were curious about our new factory and engaged us in conversation about the possibility of assisting them with their community revitalization plan. The conversation progressed to the point that Global Effect began assembling a coalition of strategic partners to pursue a master-planned community project that supports Jacmel’s community revitalization plans. The master-planned community project would include homes, a medical and vocational center, a school, industrial factories, a civic center, a market place and more.  The coalition we assembled includes experts in a range of fields from various industries, builders and land developers, town planners, health care and education specialists. We also included a sociological professional with experience in developing world communities. Our goal is to assist the city of Jacmel in creating a self-sustainable community by creating jobs, enabling families to purchase homes, to provide for themselves and to break the culture of dependency on the outside world for survival. Global Effect, our partners, political and business leaders from Jacmel believe this is the exact help that Jacmel and their country needs. It offers them an opportunity for self-dependency as opposed to dependency on charity.
Later in May the project partners met in Miami, Florida with officials representing Jacmel to dialogue further about the project.  And we just returned from meetings in Jacmel where we met with the regional governor, senators, congressmen, the mayor, the Chamber of Commerce president and many local leaders of commerce, education, health care and others. The meetings went well, and the city leaders proposed a site to build what is now being called The Village of Jacmel. This is an ambitious project, and it will have challenges. Yet, all partners believe it is worthy of pursuing. What a privilege it is to think that Global Effect could be play a role in fostering a new culture in Haiti by creating a community model that champions self-reliance, opportunity and pride. Haiti is not beyond changing, and we believe it can happen — one community and one city at a time. The Village at Jacmel is an ideal project fit for Global Effect.  It permits us to serve the impoverished community of Jacmel, Haiti by equipping them to transform their socio-economic, physical and spiritual well-being.

Men’s Conference in the Dominican Republic

One of the greatest problems in the Dominican Republic communities we serve is a lack of leadership from the men.  Many lack moral integrity, and do not serve as positive role models for the younger generation.  This leadership vacuum is, without a doubt, a major, contributing factor to the many problems that grip these communities.
In response, we host men’s conferences.  In early May, we hosted 93 men from these communities by promoting a weekend of fun, food and adventure in the mountains.  These men signed up for a weekend that changed their lives forever! For many of them, it changed the lives of their family and friends, as well.

Over two days, we met with the men. Mark, Scott and I shared with them the importance of personal choices and that our life’s story depends on the choices we make.

These men took a journey to the mountains, but it led them to the greatest story ever: The Gospel. By the end of the weekend, most of the men made heart commitments that changed their lives. Since then, we have received many positive reports from our country coordinator, Ambiores.  We are encouraged. Please pray for all these men.
Project Trips Set to Begin
We plan to take three teams to the Dominican Republic and Haiti during the next 6 weeks. These teams will help us distribute filters; work in the schools, orphanages and tent cities; help at the filter factory; and sharing joy and hope with people who are hurting and needy. Please pray for safety and that all will be used to share Christ’s love during these trips.
More E-Updates Available
I want to encourage you all to subscribe to our free newsletter to keep you informed about our community transformation projects. It offers more details about our economic development, community revitalization and education projects.
Thank you so much for your emails of encouragement, your prayers and financial support. Our work does require funding from generous folks like you.  Please know that thousands of desperate lives and families are being impacted. How do we put a price tag on changing lives forever?
God Bless You!

Love you all,

Bart

We flew into ATL last Thursday evening at midnight. Already planning the return trip for the next week. We leave on the 8th, we have a Mens Conference scheduled for April 10-11. We have scheduled this conference for 100 men we could have had 200 if we had the space and the funds available. Many have never heard the word of God or been challenged to be the man that God has called each of us to be as a father and husband. We had three cookouts on the last trip in each of the communities that we are working in. We used each opportunity to challenge the men as they prepare for this upcoming time. We also ask you to be praying for this time that God will speak through us and that he will move the heart of each man involved.We know from our last retreat that many lives were changed. While we were in the DR this last trip we were told that one of the men from our last retreat (a year ago) had died…we were shocked, we thought we knew who the man was and were even more devastated when we were actually able to go to his house and found out that he had been one of the men who had received Christ as his savior. His wife is actually on our video, she talks about how his life was changed!! She said that for the first time in their marriage he had “the kiss of love”. She told the pastor that the last year of his life with her since the retreat where he came to know Jesus as his savior and lord was the best year of their life together. Joselo his pastor said that his testimony had reached many of the men in the community and they also have come to know the Lord, PRAISE GOD!!!

We ask that if you have the ability to help financially with this retreat to please contact us. The live lives that will impacted will be immeasurable as we have already seen. The total cost of this retreat is $6500.00 you can make donations online at www.globaleffectministry.org or mail a contribution to our address at

Send Check payable to:
Global Effect Ministry Inc.
P.O. Box 611635 Rosemary Beach
Florida 32461

Thank you so much for your many prayers and financial support. We could not do what we do without it…

Mark

You can also reach me at 205-612-7945 if you have questions.

MARK—–What a trip! So far we have been blown away by the amazing grace of God and his direction in everything that we have been involved in so far…The doors that have been opened. We have been allowed into schools where evangelical groups have never been allowed, and invited to speak in other  High Schools with the same history. So, for the first time we have shared the gospel with these students at their school.

Our Baseball camps have been unbelievable, the Coach said this is the first time in his 23 years of coaching that he has had any help…he was very encouraged, and motivated to continue work with the boys. We left him some equipment and told him that the next time were here we would have more for him, SO, if you have equipment we can have there is also another league in the same community of kids that are even more underprivileged and have no equipment at all. To be apart of a league you have to have your glove and shoes etc. I will be posting again soon, Thanks to all who have been praying and have been supporting us financially this would not be possible without your involvement!

MARK

SCOTT—–Dear Ministry Partners,

I wanted to give you a update of time in the Dominican Republic and Haiti and thank you for your prayers and ask you to keep praying as we wrap up our time on the island of Espanola.

Here is a recap of  Highlights from our trip so far:

* God opened the door for us to be the first evangelical groups to go into the public High School of Soto. Not only were we able to share about the importance of developing Character traits such as, Trustworthiness, Respect, Responsibilty, Fairness, Caring, and Citizenship but we were also able to share about the love of Jesus.

Praise the Lord for this incredible opportunity to share Jesus in the Public Schools in the Dominican Republic.

* 2 day baseball camp in Soto were we had around 200 kids. The director of the league shared with passion and emotion that we were the first group in the 27 years that he had been in charge of the league to come and offer help. He shared that our coming and the way we work and the message we shared with the kids really encourage him to keep working and sharing with the kids. God used us in a mighty way as we saw many kids put their faith in Jesus.

*We had our men’s cook out in Los Relies. The church in Los Relies is the only evangelical church in the community with only 4 men involved in the church but for the cook out over 100 men showed up and it was such an awesome time of fellowship and sharing  with these men. Many of these men will be attending our upcoming mens’s conference in April 10th – 11th.

* In Los Relies we handed out 100 water filters and shared the Gospel with each person. It was such a powerful time as we were not only providing a source for safe clean drinking water but sharing the living water of Jesus.

Please continue to pray for funds as we strive to provide safe clean drinking water to each of the 600 families in the Los Relies community.

We are now in Haiti to begin the construction of the water filter plant that will hire Haitians to manufacture these filters that will be distributed through out Haiti to provide safe clean drinking water.

Please pray as we try to get this up and running in the next 45 days.

Thank you so much for all your prayers and support.

Scott Steelman and the Global Effect Team.

Bart… Just wanted to say a big ‘hello’ and ‘thanks’ from the Dominican Republic to all of our Global Effect Ministry partners.  I came down on a short trip with a couple of board members, Bony Barrineau and Brandon Agee, as well as some new friends to the ministry, Bordon Ray, Walter Grant and John Hisey.
While short, the trip has been fabulous.  In three days we have been able to visit all of our ministry locations and projects.  This could not have been possible without the generosity of Bordon Ray and the use of his plane!  We visited Port-au-Prince, met with some of our filter distribution partners there and visited an orphanage where we gave them 10 filters to supply safe clean drinking water for the children there.  We also toured the destruction; spoke with many earthquake victims accessing needs and locations for water filter distribution.
We then flew over to Jacmel, where we will be constructing a filter factory.  We finalized negotiations on the lease of the property from an organization named Friends of The Children of Haiti (FOTCOH), which is an incredible medical clinic that treats sick Haitians.  The site where we will build the factory is right on the ocean!  It’s really beautiful.  The director of FOTCOH, Richard Hammonds, and his wife Barbara are very dear people and will be a delight to work with. They treat 2-3 thousand people during the 8 days when volunteer teams come in every 8 weeks.  They have dormitories there where the medical teams from the U.S. stay on their 8 day projects, and Richard will allow us to use the dorms when we bring teams into Haiti on mission projects.
Yesterday we flew to Santiago and went straight to visit our friends at Los Reilles.  We walked through this small very impoverished community and promoted the baseball camps and men’s meetings we will be holding there next week.  They are very excited.  We met a gentleman who had a very infected foot that looked really bad.  Without some strong antibiotics to stop the spread of infection, this man could potentially die.  Fortunately, Bony was able to check him out and Walter had the exact antibiotics needed, PTL!
We participated in a church service in El Ranchito and presented Pastor Joselo with a computer he has needed.  We had a great dinner with our Filter Pure Partner, Michael Ballantine, last night and a great night’s rest.  Today we will be visiting the DR filter factory in Mocca and the retreat center we will be using for our upcoming men’s retreats before heading home.
It has been a lot for our team to absorb in a short period, but it’s been totally great. God has kept us safe, and these guys were blown away with what God is doing there.
Thank you for all your prayers and support. The needs are so great, but we serve a Great Big Lord and through him, nothing is impossible!!

Blessings,
Bart

Dear Friends,
We have been extremely busy since we got back from our last trip.  Our desire is to communicate well with all of our sponsors and donors so that is taking some time. We are also following up on the many inquiries and media requests we’ve received.  We’ll be in Dallas Monday and Tuesday of next week to meet with a group of supporters.  If you know anyone in that area that would like to attend our meeting Tuesday night please call us to get the location, we would love to meet them.  We’ll also be visiting other cities and will let you know the dates and locations.

I want to sincerely thank each of you who have committed to being prayer partners with Global Effect.  We feel your prayers and God is blessing!  He is opening one door after another which is enabling us to improve our ministry efforts in the DR and Haiti.  We are establishing many key partnerships and relationships with other organizations and non profits.  We all understand that many times we can accomplish much more by working together and we are experiencing that.

We have trips planned for just about every month for the rest of the year.  We will be publishing the exact dates and prices very soon so hopefully you and/or your group could make plans to join us.  Our short term trips are loaded with intense life changing ministry, but we also have a lot of fun!  You will never be the same after a mission trip with TEAM GEM !! Our trips include baseball camps, men and ladies ministry, speaking in schools about morals and values, distributing water filters, children’s ministry, small business consulting, micro-financing and more.  There are ministry opportunities everywhere as the communities we work in are very very poor.  But they are beautiful loving people who want to be loved and receive our help with tremendous gratitude.  With beautiful mountains and deserted beaches with coral reefs nearby, we can always slip off for a little group fun as well!

A quick update on the Haiti Filter Factory:
We are awaiting word regarding a land lease where we will build the factory.  We hope to have that settled within a week.  We need to raise $40,000 for the land improvements, building and equipment. Once the construction of the new water filter fabrication facility is underway, we will raise funds for the purchase and operation of two delivery trucks .
We have qualified persons ready to oversee the construction as soon as the money is raised and the location is set.  Global Effect is partnering with Filter Pure in this plant.
We have several organizations that are committed to distributing the filters to orphanages, tent cities, medical clinics and the most needy areas.  Please pray that we will be able to raise the needed money as soon as possible.

Again, thanks for all your prayers and financial support.  We could do nothing without you!!
Please share our website and the videos with your friends, families and churches.  You never know when you’ll share with someone who is eager to help in some way and we need all the help we can get!!

Love you all and God Bless You,
Bart Smelley
Executive Director

After several days of very hard physical and emotional time in Haiti

we made it back to the Dominican Republic were we are trying to wrap

up a few things here before we leave. My time in Haiti is so hard to

put into words as I saw, smelled, and experienced things that I have

never experienced before. To say that there is devastation, despair and

destruction is such an understatement.  As we handed out water filters

in tent cities and orphanages the need for water, food, and most

importantly hope was so prevalent on the faces of men, women and

children as they waited in crowds to receive what represented life to

many of people.  Outside the Gospel I truly believe that providing

clean safe drinking water to the people of Haiti is of major importance

to saving lives. Your help in this project has been a key source to

help in providing that clean safe drinking water.

Our plan to place a filter factory in Haiti with our partners Filter

Pure Filters is our top priority at the moment and we hope to begin

assembly in the next couple of weeks.  When completed this factory

will not only provide jobs to the Haitian people but will have the

capability of producing up to 3000 filters a month.  The cost of the

factory will be 40,000 us dollars. Through this factory we hope to

provide safe clean drinking water to the entire nation of Haiti.

Please go to our website and join us financially in this project.

www.globaleffectministry.org

Blessings in Christ,

Scott

I am writing this post from the Dominican Republic, where we are staying until we leave Wednesday morning at about 3 am. It was a 45 minute flight from Haiti; the drive was 12 hours, in my mind it will only always be a thought away. I hope that the reality of despair and need of the people I met,  just came in contact with if by only a touch or a smile, a hug or a handshake will never leave me.  It seems different than anything I’ve seen before in the sense that there seems to be such a sense of hopelessness. But, I truly believe that God has begun to work in lives of many people in Haiti, we saw churches holding rallies, they were marching through the street singing and praying that God would not forsake them, that he would take Haiti into his arms. People were coming from out of the tent cities to join them in prayer. This is their hope, that God can put people in their lives that can share with them the love of Jesus. I can only try to imagine living in the conditions they are now in. Imagine as you sit reading this your surroundings, walking into the kitchen turning on the water filling a glass and drinking without one thought the water being safe to drink? It really is so hard to put into words the needs that we saw, the emotional and physical desolation among families. One of the things that broke my heart the most was being in one of the tent cities to distribute filters and we had to limit the filters to only women with small children. Looking at the line of mothers with their babies each one hoping there would be enough filters knowing that this could actually save the life of their child.  Some of the babies were only days old, some were severely malnourished and dehydrated. I had to break away several times to regain my composure and come back to try and maintain some order to the crowd of people fighting to get a filter, hope for their child. Some people were picking up small children that were not their own trying to get in line, just to get a filter for their family. I cannot write about this without a resurgence of emotion that challenges me to do all we can to convey the needs and our willingness to work and do whatever it takes to continue this ministry. Please continue to seek Gods guidance as you pray for us and the many projects that we have already taken on and the many new opportunities he continues to introduce to us. I know without a doubt God has brought me to this place and I know that he has placed this desire in my heart that will not go away…we need your help, right now the biggest need in funding. We are putting a factory in Haiti with or partners Filture Pure. The cost of this factory is $40,000.00, the capacity of this factory would be 3000 filters a month. Thank you so much to each and everyone who has partnered with us so far, and we look forward to the many new partners and relationships God is bringing to us.

Mark