“Chen gen kat pat; se yon sel chemen li fe.”
Translation: “The dog has four paws but it takes only one path. meaning, One thing at a time.”
Simon, our go-to local guy, says this proverb almost daily. He is a busy, busy man. He helps us with transportation and locating materials for construction projects and purchasing items so as to get the best price, but he also helps other American missionaries who come to work in Haiti. I think sometimes he tells me this proverb as a mantra for himself, to remind himself to focus on one thing at a time. I’m happy he repeats the proverb because it keeps my to-do list in check as well. There are so many projects that Heart of God Haiti would like to complete in 2014 and sometimes you just want to start tackling them all at once. For instance, we have already purchased tiles for the bathrooms but are waiting until the water tank is installed and hooked up to the toilets before we hire someone to put them in. The water tank project has become a bit delayed and I want so badly to just lay the tiles and have that aspect of bathroom refurbishment done and over. But because I don’t know if the water tank installation will involve securing PVC pipes to walls I don’t know if the tiles will get damaged in the process. So I have to wait. I have to do one thing at a time.
It is very easy to get pulled in different directions here. The list of needs is long and sometimes you feel like checking them off one by one isn’t moving fast enough. But God has His time. He knows exactly what needs to be completed and in what order and when. When I think of this proverb I also imagine the dog with a leash, a leash God is holding firmly, making sure the dog takes the right path at the right time. As much as I want to get the bathrooms looking clean and beautiful I will do my best to remind myself “4 paws, one path, God’s leading the way”.
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