The weeklong ministry adventures into the province began with loading the truck, including dirt bikes and covering everything with a tarp. The men then drove hours over unpaved, rocky roads to remote villages.

When Joel invited me, I interrogated him, “Have you seen the house? Is there a bed? Is it clean? Is there a bathroom? Does it have water?” I stayed back praying from the comfort of home.

Upon arriving in a village, Joel searched out a building to hang the movie screen, two sheets sewn together, usually the Catholic Church when the priest agreed. If there was no building, he hung it from a tree.

Afternoons, Joel and Jeff invited villagers, most who had never seen TV or a film, to the evening service; while, Andy visited churches, announcing his pastor seminar and new convert classes.

Each night as the sun set, Jeff sang and played; Joel preached then aired one of the Creole film’s four reels. Andy prayed with altar call respondents.

In Maissade, after the young men drove the flatbed through two rivers, Hinche and Maissade, the Belgian priest invited them for a cold drink. Joel told me he opened a refrigerator full of beer and they politely declined.

When he shared about a mission that rescued twenty-two infants from outhouse infanticide, I wanted to go see.

Joel said, “They don’t have a refrigerator or stove.” We knew what that was like and found an interested donor to purchase a kerosene refrigerator and gas stove; then loaded them on the crusade truck for Maissade.

After crossing the two rivers, with Wilkerson’s flat bed, the road ended in muddy reeds. We removed our shoes, rolled up our clothing and plodded through calf deep slop while Haitians carried the appliances on their heads.

My new friend Marianne ran out to meet us. “Oh, I can’t believe you are here! I am so glad.”

Rueful I said, “I would only do this for you!”

Not everyone in that Central Plateau village welcomed the crusaders. From his porch, a belligerent man mocked townspeople, children in tow, as they ambled to the open-air services. “You are the blanc’s monkeys! There is no God. You believe the lies of the foreigner. You are stupid and poor.”

On the second night of the meetings, the man again castigated attendees until a bolt of lightning pierced the clear air and struck him dead. Breathless Haitians reported to Joel; the incredible story spread and crusade attendance doubled!

The Jesus movie, on four large reels, aired four-nights, for maximum crowd effect, one reel each night. By the fourth and final night, the crucifixion reel mesmerized crowds and maximized salvations.

In one desolate village, on the paramount fourth night, incensed men pelted the screen with rocks as Roman soldiers took Jesus away.

Joel stopped the film. “This is a movie, a reenactment of what happened two thousand years ago. Christ died for you so you may have eternal life if only you repent and believe.”

The crowd murmured, “Ahh!” And continued watching in reverence.

The three man ministry team by night morphed to dirt bike explorers by day. Again, in the Central Plateau, this time the village of Pignon, a guide led Jeff, Joel and Andy to a cavern etched in Indian pictographs. Awestruck by twenty-foot walls sprawled with ancient drawings, the friends vowed to return the next day with Jeff’s metal detector.

The next day, back inside the cave, Jeff waved the machine’s wand over the cave floor; it chirped positively, outlining a rectangular area.

“Exactly the size of a treasure chest!” Reasoned the explorers.

Propelled by visions of buccaneer’s gold and new equipment, like their own truck, a bigger sound system, and new dirt bikes, the three missionaries dug franticly with their hands. The guide watched as gold fever took control.

Suddenly wary Joel nodded at the guide and said, “What are we going to do with him?”

Pensive, slow talking, slow motion Andy, of whom we said, “Andy is on African time.” Droned, “We’ll just have to get rid of him.”

Joel and Jeff rocked back on their heels incredulous, “Whoa! Andy!”

Resting for a time from digging for a presumed pirate’s chest, they moved farther into the cave, discovering an opening in the cavern’s back wall and bent low to enter.

Inside the cave within a cave, shone a pool of water; coins lay below the surface. Jeff plunged his metal detector into the shallow pool. The machine’s line of red lights flashed on and then off for good; it was not submersible.

Joel fished a coin out of the pool. “These are new coins.”

Just then, a humpback woman, dressed in black, her hair wrapped in red cloth; entered holding high a flaming torch. Long shadows lurched on the cave’s ceiling as she hobbled towards the missionaries. The voodoo priestess’ shadow loomed larger with each labored step and a demon voice snarled, “What are you doing here?”

The young adventurers had invaded the mambo’s sanctuary where she served Satan with money and incantations. “Get out!” she screeched.

Jeff waved trembling hands in the air and blurted nervous prayers. Joel threw the coins back into the pool and the friends retreated the way they had come.

Later the disassembled metal detector, which never worked again, lay drying in the sun. They decided it had been adjusted wrong and bauxite in the soil set it off and of course, Andy did not mean, “We’ll just have to get rid of him,” the way it sounded.

Jeff waved trembling hands in the air and blurted nervous prayers. Joel threw the coins back into the pool and the friends retreated the way they had come.

Later the disassembled metal detector, which never worked again, lay drying in the sun. They decided it had been adjusted wrong and bauxite in the soil set it off and of course, Andy did not mean, “We’ll just have to get rid of him,” the way it sounded.