Pastor Luc Deratus, the founding minister of Harmony Ministries, was born to a single mother in a remote mountainous region of Haiti where there were no schools or churches.  His mother sent him to live with relatives in Port-au-Prince where he got his first long pants, shoes and an opportunity for education.  He excelled in school, got involved in church, became a teacher and then a principal in a church-supported primary school.  With the help of an American missionary, Pastor Luc did his formal ministerial training and graduated from Christ of the Nations Bible School in Dallas, Texas, then attended Dallas Baptist University and assisted in starting a Christian radio station broadcasting to Haiti.

In 1981, feeling God’s call, Pastor Luc returned to Haiti and started his first church in Port-au-Prince.  By 1985, with the help of some American friends, he built a church and school in Cite Militaire, one of the poorest slums in the capital.  He subsequently began satellite churches in the mountain town of Thoman and a coastal area of Leogane.  Led by faith, with no denominational or organizational support, he trained lay leaders, grew congregations and made connections.  With the assistance of a few churches in the U.S. he established primary schools in Thoman and Leogane.  With the help of his wife Ronide, a trained medical assistant, he set up a medical clinic and pharmacy at the Port-au-Prince location and hired a part-time physician.

Throughout this time there was constant political upheaval, from the ouster of Jean Claude (“Baby Doc”) Duvalier through several presidents and then United Nations intervention.  His church in Port-au-Prince grew to over 1,000 members despite gang activity and bullet holes.  Facing personal threats, in 2006 Pastor Luc moved his wife and young children to safety in Miami where they lived and attended school.  Since that time he has spent most of his time in Haiti, leading his churches, developing programs, training teachers and principals, and building a church and school in the area of his birth.  He returns to Florida periodically to visit his family and tend to administrative and financial matters.  His children are now in college and his wife Ronide is able to spend the majority of her time in Haiti where she leads many of the churches’ programs and events.

Pinnacle Presbyterian Church has partnered with other US churches to support Harmony Ministries since 2008.  In 2010 the devastating earthquake that rocked Haiti destroyed much of Port-au-Prince and Leogane, including the Harmony Ministries churches and schools.  For years hundreds of people attended church and school in temporary, makeshift facilities.  With help from PPC and others, a huge new church was dedicated in 2015, and the rebuilt school was completed in 2019. Construction is currently underway on a new church and school in Leogane where the original ones were destroyed.  But political and economic upheaval continue to create hardship for the people, whose resilience and faith is incredible.  Our help in providing food, medical supplies, teacher’s pay, other support, and prayer allows Pastor Luc and Ronide to carry on with God’s work.