When Haiti’s earthquake struck January 12, “The whole earth swayed like waves of the sea,” remembered Barb Lataillade. “Then everything under me was gone; there was nothing to hold onto, nothing to grab.” Barb and her husband Patrick were on the second floor of their Port-au-Prince home when suddenly, a tremendous roar resounded from the south. Patrick stood to look, and half the house instantaneously collapsed. In its place, he saw open sky; then, all was dark. As the shaking subsided, Barb called out to Patrick. “I heard his voice,” she said, “so I knew he was alive. But he said, ‘I can’t come to you; my arm is pinned.’ I couldn’t move either—I was trapped, with my foot barely attached,” she said.

Patrick spent the next 18 hours buried by the collapsed concrete roof. Meanwhile Barb, with coaching from friends, made a tourniquet for her leg and managed to crawl out. Neighbors found a vehicle, but the first two hospitals the group visited were destroyed. Finally they found an operational hospital; there Barb was laid on the parking lot and left, with a friend, amongst the waiting crowd. When staff eventually looked at her, “They said they couldn’t help me because the surgery room was gone,” Barb recalled. All night she lay outside; Patrick remained under the rubble, his arm pinned by an iron rod. “The pain was unbearable,” he said. “Many times I prayed, ‘Lord, take me home.’” He repeatedly sang God is So Good, alternating between English and Creole. “It’s best to lift up to God any challenge,” Patrick said. “We need to glorify Him no matter what, and singing helped keep my spiritual sanity.”

You can find the complete article in the Summer 2010 issue of Calvary Chapel Magazine. To subscribe click here.