153 and Everything

Well, I find myself again in my hotel, no power and hunkered down in my bed with the mosquito net pulled  down.  Having no power is a common thing down here.  But that’s not important – really!  What IS important is the work that God is doing through us here.  Every day is new and truly life changing.  I thought that I would find that I had over-hyped the trip in my mind and that it couldn’t ever meet those expectations.  Well, I was wrong.  We, as a team, decided that we aren’t the same and can never be the same again after what we’ve experienced here in Uganda.  It’s not just seeing the poverty and need, not the love that we are being shown, but rather experiencing the power of God.  Nobody who has seen what we have or done what God has done through us these past days could ever, nor would ever want to be the same.  Let me get right to it – we have a lot of ground to cover today.  Oh…you will have to read clear to the end to learn what today’s blog title means!

We started the morning teaching the children’s classes.  One of the classes they have every day is a bible study time that consists of memory verses, bible reading and a devotional.  We taught in teams of 2 with an interpreter.  I had the pleasure of working with Isaac and we taught about Zacchaeus and how Jesus saves that which is lost (remember this for later).  At the end of the class, we handed out little sweets to each child in the school.  Boy, were they excited!  Below is a picture of Renee teaching under the trees!





The children enjoying their sweets!  This beautiful child is named "Pleasure" - you can see why!

Later in the day, Renee found some children by the road and handed out some extra sweets that we had left over from the school.  The child is bowing out of respect and gratitude.  None of these children had shoes and probably didn't own any.


After teaching, we went to the church building where we met with all of the sponsored children in the school to hand out the gifts that you sent.  It was very hard sitting in the church with the chosen few, while hundreds looked in the window. The children approached the front of the church as their names were called, most bowing at our feet in gratitude for the gift they had been given. 


One of “our” children receiving her gift and so excited!


Two of the unsponsored children looking in, but unable to be part.  We were all reminded yet again of the tremendous advantages (not just gifts like this) afforded to sponsored children.  Tomorrow there is a medical team coming in to the village to treat the sponsored children.  We ARE making a difference, though, in the lives of the children we sponsor.  There is a great need though!  As Ken said while we were talking about this tonight, when there are such overwhelming problems, we can have one of two responses:  we can not do anything because it’s too much, or we can do what we can for the ones we can help.  We choose the latter and pray hard for the rest.



After the gifts were delivered, we went on a couple of separate paths (literally). Several people went to deliver food they had purchased to sponsored families and Ken & I were invited to Pastor Sylver’s house.  The pastor lives in one of the nicer houses around the village and is about 500 square feet.  This pastor and his wife have 6 children and are caring for 5 additional children in their home.  Their living room was about the size of an average sized bathroom in America.  We don’t know how they managed, but they have been there for about 10 years.  We were so blessed to hear the Pastor share  his story of faith.  You can read about on the ARM web site under his testimony – I won’t repeat, but would highly recommend that you check it out.  He is amazing man of God serving the people of this poor village.  Below is a picture of us in front of Pastor Sylver’s house with his wife and two of his sons.




Bryan hugging (he does a lot of that here).  He had provided some food for a family of a sponsored child.  He had a similar response to what you are just about to read.

EVERYTHING

While we were visiting with the pastor, Ralph and Isaac went to visit their sponsored family and take them some food – rice, cornmeal and some other basic staples.  I wish I would have a picture to show Ralph’s face as he described what happened, but unfortunately, that is a moment in time that will have to be captured by word and emotion.   However, here is a picture of the inside of the house and the family.

Ralph described going to the house which is the typical mud hut for the villagers.  They literally had nothing there.  When the mother saw the food that they had brought them, she broke down in tears thanking them for their love and provision for them.  She wanted to give them a gift, but had nothing.  She did look and found that she had a couple of eggs and an old basket – she put the eggs in the basket and gave them to Ralph.  She said “this is everything I have and I want to give it to you”.  Please just stop here a  minute and consider what this woman just did.

If you haven’t seen people who have nothing, it is hard to comprehend.  Of course, he was respectful of the woman’s generosity, but as he told the story, he had to stop many times from the tears as he thought of this woman’s gift and God convicted his, and all of our hearts as we contemplated our own lives.  There was no greater gift that could be given, than everything. 

This was one of  the most blessed moments of the entire trip – even for those of us just hearing the story.  Before coming on this trip to Uganda, I was afraid that this talk of  “life changing” was just a bit over hyped and that I wouldn’t ever truly see my life changed.  Hearing of this woman who gave everything did it for us though.  I had been given eggs and a pineapple by families while distributing mosquito nets yesterday (was it yesterday?) and was moved that people with so little would give me eggs – the key food for their families.  Humbled, honored, blessed, amazed, loved, . . . there just aren’t the right words to describe it.  I hope I was able to honor the experience here – this changed our lives in a way none of us could imagine, but are so blessed by God’s love, mercy and grace that He would teach us this lesson. 

153

We were wiped out.  After days and days of God working amazing things around and through us, we were exhausted.  We had walked miles through banana fields in the noon day sun to get to our last home visits and were emotionally exhausted as well.  God had one more stop for us today, however.  We were scheduled to visit another high school from 3:30 – 5:00.  There were many delays and we didn’t end up getting to the school until 4:45pm.  We talked to the headmaster and he told us that he wanted us to preach the gospel to his students (can you imagine this in Canby?)  and that we could have 40 minutes.  We were making plans to have a similar program to the one we had at the high school yesterday (was that yesterday?).  However, as we walked to the area under the tree where the students (probably 400-500) gathered, we learned that we only had about 15 minutes to spend since the students have a long way to walk home and it was getting late.


Ken sharing the plan of salvation with the students of the high school.

We quickly altered OUR plans and went with GOD’S plan instead (we find ourselves doing that a lot down here).  Isaac wanted to share his testimony again, but we didn’t have time – just enough for him to sing a song.  There was a generator running right behind us and the sound equipment was not working well at all.  It was frustrating that we couldn’t even take advantage of the few minutes we had.  God, is awesome though and after Ken shared the gospel and path to salvation,  Pastor Sylver talked with the students.  We were all completely unprepared for what happened next.

Nobody moved for a long time.  We were standing waiting for students to come for prayer, and still nobody moved.  I looked and there were a few students starting to mill around and started to make their way to us for prayer.  Suddenly, there was a flood of students pouring to us wanting to accept Jesus as their savior.  We were all surrounded and praying for as many as we could.  Many were wanting to be saved, many wanting healing, help with school and other needs.  It was overwhelming.  I looked at our people and each was literally surrounded by students and  praying for as many as we could.  It got to the point that we would be praying for groups at a time.  I particularly remember one young man.  I don’t remember his name, but he told me that he wanted to repent, know Jesus and go to heaven.  I prayed with him and when we were done, I looked at  him, he had tears flowing down his cheeks and a joy in his face that could only be explained by a new life in Jesus.  He looked different – probably because he was.

Altogether, 153 students raised their hands at the end of the movement of the Holy Spirit (how else could we explain it) saying that they had prayed to receive Jesus Christ as their savior.  We had stopped for a short visit at the school, exhausted and ready for rest, a weary team from Canby and God used us to add 153 young people for His kingdom.  All I can say is Praise God!!!  (The response down here to this is “Amen”).

When we were back at the hotel praying in the hallway for what had just happened, Ken was reminded of John 21:11.  This is the passage where Jesus tells this disciples to throw the net on the right side of the boat after they had caught nothing all night.  They did and pulled in a net full of fish so full they could barely pull it in.  John 21:11 says “Simon Peter went up and dragged the net to land full of large fish, 153; and although there were so many, the net was not  broken.”    Isaac wondered if God didn’t put that number of fish in the net just for today’s work….hmmm.


Isaac prayed with this young man to be saved.  This was the first time Isaac has done this and was “blown away” by the experience. 


I was overwhelmed by the blessing of God pouring out onto these youth through prayer and His Spirit.


Renee praying with a young woman.

We ended up leaving the school at 6:30pm.  Most of you were waking up and I am sure that you were praying for us in your morning quiet time.  This is the answer to your prayer!  Thank you.  We went back to the hotel excited, exhausted and honestly overwhelmed at what we had just been part of.

We truly do serve an awesome God and He is glorifying Himself and changing Uganda.  We are part of it because of your support and prayers.

Wow…that was a full day.  I wonder what God can do to top that?  I do have one personal thing that I’d like to include at the end though.  Below is a picture of one of our sponsored children – Gorreti.  She gave me a bowl she had made by hand and it is one of the most beautiful bowls I have ever seen.  Undoubtedly, she spent many  days working on this and was so proud to give it to me.  OK…lets pause again to consider young Gorreti’s life.  She lives in a mud hut in Uganda, walks many miles to school each day.  When she goes home at night, she must haul water, help prepare supper and do other chores at the  house.  This is planting season down here and all family members work hard out in the fields.  With all of this in her life, she took the time to make us this bowl!  Wow…

When I told her that Debbie had asked me to bring her home a bowl  from Africa and this was just exactly what she wanted, she just beamed.  The bond I have formed with our sponsored children and the gratitude for what we do for them, with just pocket change for us, is humbling.  I have learned about love, generosity and God in ways that I would not have imagined.  And this picture of a loving young woman a world away just makes me  cry – with absolute joy in my spirit.



God bless you and thank you for reading.

In Jesus Christ we pray and believe.

Dave

Our God is an Awesome God

Until today, I found that finding a catchy title for the daily blog post has been somewhat easy.  Not today though.  As I said yesterday, we were all convinced that God was going to stretch us all in ways that we couldn’t imagine  and He delivered – plus some!  I am going to include a few additional pictures tonight as images can show far better what happened today, than my words ever could.

Let me start by saying that we are incredibly blessed to have Ken Harvey as our pastor.  I have had the honor of watching him respond to God’s challenges, not just by getting the work done, but fully submitting to the Holy Spirit to minister to the church in Kachungwa and beyond.  Today, Ken held a pastor’s conference.  It was supposed to start at 9:30 this morning, but that time came and went and there were only a few of the area pastors that had arrived. Then they started arriving on bicycle and on foot – 133 of the pastors from the surrounding area.  I was able to listen to part of the session and was impressed with Ken’s ability to guide, educate, encourage and enable the pastors.  He responded to questions we normally don’t hear.  For example, one pastor said that he “was struggling with people in his village who were uneducated, did not understand the word of God and were going to witch doctors for healing – what can we do about this?”  I know for a fact that this was not a question that Ken had anticipated (who could have?) – yet he spoke with power and authority.   Another thing that happened in the conference today, a girl of about 20 years of age came up to Ken and asked him to pray with her to be saved. 
Because of our pastor’s work today, the church in Uganda will be a different place.  Please continue to pray for him!  Below is a picture of the group of  pastors attending the conference and the next one is Ken praying.  One of the special moments of today for Ken.





While Ken was holding the pastor’s conference, the rest of us went out into the surrounding villages distributing mosquito nets and sharing the gospel with people who had not yet heard it.  All the people I visited where Christians, but among the others, 4 people were saved in the villages today.  We basically split up with each one of us paired with staff from the Kachungwa church (except Ashley – who we don’t let go anywhere by herself – she was teamed with Ralph).  When we all got back to the church after distributing the mosquito nets and sharing with the villagers, there were SO many stories. I couldn’t even begin to share them and hope to get to sleep tonight.  Bryan was awestruck, Ashley and Ralph were able to meet their sponsored children’s family and go into their homes – an experience they both say was amazing.  Isaac came back just busting with stories of how people had given him Jackfruit, a basket of eggs and a woman who was so excited to receive the mosquito net that she was literally dancing under the net and praising God for providing this to her.  Can you imagine seeing that when you were Isaac’s age? 

Let me share a couple of short experiences that I had.  I’ve been spending so much time on the blog that I don’t get to journal, so am trying to make sure I record some of my own personal experiences in addition to sharing  those of the other members of the team.  The first mud hut I stopped at, an elderly woman opened the door and sank to her knees.  My guides told me that she said she was honored to have us there to see her and that she was showing respect.  This woman was wearing basically rags and was dirty from head to toe.  She had  nothing inside of her hut.  She was not able to communicate very well, but we were able to get her the mosquito net along with instructions on how to use it and learn that she was a Christian.  This woman  literally has nothing.  But, she was so thankful that we had stopped to see her and delighted at receiving the net.  As we walked away, I had no idea how she was going to hang the net up or if she even had a bed.  As I was thinking about this, I looked up and realized that we were walking on trails through banana tree fields and there were the same little mud huts scattered throughout.  I was kind of numb when I realized that these were actually people’s homes and they lived here.  It sounds dense I know, but I never could have imagined.   A picture of one is below to give you an idea of what they look like:



We visited home after home, giving them mosquito nets and praying with the people who lived there,.  They were sweet, loving people who worked hard in the smothering heat to farm their land and survive.  I don’t think I saw anybody who  had shoes and the children had little or  no clothes to wear.  Below is a picture of a couple of children I saw sitting in the doorway to their home.  They had no toys besides a tree leaf to play with.  There is still something beautiful in the eyes of these children though.  I am utterly captivated by them.  While their conditions seem unbearable to me, they are truly the image of God.


Meanwhile, in a lighter moment, one of our other teams were practicing a local method of carrying bulky or heavy items (nice work Jaja – I mean Ralph).  God loves for His children to have fun doing His work and rejoice in Him!



Ashley seemed to catch right on, while Dalton was still struggling a bit.  While it was hard, God gave us an unusual joy to go about His work.  I can say that we are all experiencing God’s love and the power of His Holy Spirit in ways we never have before – and it is………right!



There was a moment when I found myself completely awestruck.  We had come to a home and talked with the people there, provided them a mosquito net for their children and prayed with them – hand in hand in front of a mud hut in the middle of a banana field with people I had never met and we didn't even speak the same language, but we share the same Lord.  As we were turning to leave, one of the women who had a baby strapped to her back called to me and asked me to come back.  She unbundled the most beautiful baby girl from her back and held her up.  She told me that this precious little child was sick and needed special prayer.  So, here I am in the middle of a banana field in Uganda 9000 miles away from good old Canby, Oregon, with my hands holding the face of this child praying to God on her behalf.  Who am I to do this?  That the woman would ask and expect  confidently that God would answer her prayers and had sent me to pray for the baby was a moment that will remain permanently in my mind.  Only God could do this and I was humbled to think that He put me there.  I do have to admit that I feel completely unworthy to pray such an important prayer.  In spite of all of this, they were overjoyed to receive the gift of the mosquito net and were beaming with smiles at their gift from God.  In the picture below, the woman and child are the ones on the left, though you can only see the baby’s feet poking out.



The final image I wanted to share with you is the one below with Ralph praying – I can only imagine that he felt the same as I did.



Well, this was only half of the day.  After lunch, we loaded in the van and were headed to speak to a high school in Mubende.  We had absolutely no idea of what to expect, how many students were going to be there or anything.  Since Ken was going to be at the pastor’s conference all afternoon, I was going to be delivering a message to the students.  The only time I had to prepare was after my blog last night. I had put together a fine plan on what we were going to talk about, the order of the program, etc.  We were to have 1.5 hours with the students.

I should know better by now.  My plans just don’t work.  God had something totally different planned for the afternoon.  For starters, our time was cut almost in half.  In Uganda, religion is not banned from the school, in fact it is encouraged.  I was going to provide an overview of the history of the USA, form and branches of government, etc.  What God wanted was different than that – when will I learn?  What ended up  happening is that we were ushered into a room with 100-150 high school students and they were told that we were here to share the gospel with them.  Sooooo…our plans rapidly changed to God’s plan.  We did a quick introduction of ourselves and I told the students that we wanted to share some personal information about ourselves and that a couple of us wanted to share their personal testimonies.  We were already anticipating this, so Isaac, Ashley & Bryan all stood up in front of these young people and were amazing.  Isaac followed the Spirit’s guidance and slightly altered what he was going to say to be a full gospel presentation.  Ashley stood up in front and had them all smiling and cheering at what she had overcome.  Bryan probably got the loudest applause from the youth when he told them how God had granted their request for more children in a way that he could not have possibly imagined when all seemed  hopeless.

I talked with them for a while about them being the next leaders of Uganda, what leadership meant and how important God’s love is to an effective leader.  They then heard the plan of salvation and were given an opportunity to come forward if they wanted to accept Jesus as their Lord.  Isaac and Ralph were playing guitar and singing while we waited.  We could all tell that something was going to happen, but nobody was moving.  We made another offer for them to come forward, but nothing happened.  Dalton stepped in and made another plea and nothing happened.  Then we offered to pray for anybody with a special need.  For about 30 seconds it was still except for Isaac playing, then one brave young man, Peter, slowly walked forward to me and asked for prayer.  He wanted to renew his walk with Christ and was having temptations that he was struggling with.  As I prayed for Peter, others started coming forward.  Below is a picture of me praying with Peter:



I can honestly say, and all of us present agreed,  that we have never felt the presence of the Holy Spirit like we did in this small school room in Uganda.  Students streamed forward for prayer.  Again, I found myself awestruck by God’s grace and love for his children.  Standing in a run-down school room in Uganda praying for His children in need of prayer – and he had brought us there at that time for His purpose.  All we could do is pray.  We prayed for students concerned about their grades, those needing healing (legs, eyes, brain), those whose families are struggling and they don’t know where their next meal is going to come from let alone how they could afford to continue sending them to school without sponsors.  I could not begin to put into words what happened there, so will stop here.


Bryan praying for a student, while Ashley prays with another.


Ralph, CCC’s elder on this trip, praying for a student.

So, where is Isaac in all this?  He told me that while was playing his guitar, he wanted to get up and pray with the students, but God told him that He had brought him there to minister through music and that he was to continue playing – so he played.  Later, several of us related stories of praying and right in the middle of a prayer, the words and music that Isaac played were exactly what was needed and did indeed do the work that God asked him to do.




In front of the school with the students.

Let me just add one personal note – I am humbled to be traveling with this group of people.  Every one brings a gift and we are working in unity to love the people of Uganda as God has asked us.  I am so proud of both Ashley and Isaac for the spiritual maturity that they have shown, the joy and personality that they bring – everybody loves them and are instantly drawn to them.  The parents of these two young people should be proud of them and know that they are representing their families, the church and God in the best possible way.

It is very late in Uganda.  I have been awake for almost 24 hours now, and it is time to get some sleep.  We have another day similar to today ahead of us tomorrow.  We aren’t exactly sure what God has in store, but will find out.  Please continue to pray for the Church in Uganda, the children, the villagers we met, the students needing continued prayer and whatever God puts on your heart.  I apologize if this was a little long, but God is doing a lot here and I want to make sure that our family, church and anybody else watching see all the great things God is doing.

In the name of Jesus we pray and believe!

Dave

Sunday in Kachungwa

Greetings from all of us in Uganda.  Today was a day of worship and celebrating God in Kachungwa.   As we expected, we need to be prepared for the unexpected.  We drove to the village this morning expecting to go to church, but instead learned that they have all of the children attend Sunday school before the adult service (which, by the way, the children also attend).  We were ushered to the school building and watched the children sing a couple of songs and as they were breaking up into small groups, we were told that we were going to be teaching the children this morning.  We had not even thought that this might happen and were all caught completely off guard.  They broke the children into groups by age and assigned a pair of us to each group.  Eventually, there were so many in some classes, they even broke those up into smaller groups – which meant some on the team had to teach alone. 

 

I was blessed with teaching with Bryan!  When we got over to the classroom, we talked with the teacher and asked him what he had been teaching.  He told us that they were currently studying David & Goliath. Bryan and I stepped aside to pray for God’s guidance.  He put on both of our hearts to teach about how God helps those afraid and facing big challenges to overcome them with faith.  So, we added discussion about Daniel and the Lion’s den, talked about Jesus’ love and shared how He will help them to not be afraid.  Finally, we opened the class up for questions and had a lot of interesting questions like “what does Abraham’s name mean?” and “what was God’s promise to Sarah”, “How did God make Jesus in Mary’s [womb]?” and soon.  Bryan and I both felt like we were  being quizzed rather than teaching!  These children are very well schooled in the bible!  Below is a picture of Ashley teaching a class.

 

 

After Sunday school, we walked down to the church building.  All of us had children holding our hands as we walked.  The service was unlike anything I have ever experienced before.  It went about 3 hours or so, with worship, Ken preaching a very powerful message (God was definitely speaking through him to our  brothers and sisters in Kachungwa.  There were some challenges with the translation, but it all worked out.    Below is a picture looking back over the congregation of the Kachungwa church.  They reserved the seats in front for their guests (us).

 

 

At one point during the sermon, a dove landed in the rafters directly above Ken’s head, then turned with it’s tail pointing out towards the audience.  Another first in church for me – I prayed for a bird not too poop on Ken (though, I admit that under different circumstances it would have given me some degree of pleasure and made up for some of the jokes he has been telling on the trip).  Ralph and Isaac had the chance to lead the congregation in a worship song – see the picture below.

 

You will notice Ralph holding the mic for Isaac.  The church now has sound powered off of batteries and a generator (not running during the service), but did not have things like mic stands.  They have a electric piano and are able to play CD’s off of a laptop.  This village has come a long way thanks in large part to Canby Christian Church.  All of the children sat in the front of the church on the floor, just packed in.  They sat that way for almost 3 hours and were incredibly well behaved.

 

At the end of the service the children filed by.  Each of them stopped by to give us a hug, shake our  hand and many knelt before us as a sign of honor and respect to us for being there.  These beautiful children living in mud huts honoring me!  I should have been honoring them for their faith, strength and the joy that they obviously have in Jesus.  When the children were done, all I could do was to sit and weep.  An elderly woman of the church took my hand and I cried on her arm as she stroked my head.  I looked up through my tears to see a smile and she told me, without saying a word, that she was honored by my tears for their children.

 

After lunch, we had some joyous time with the children out in the church yard.  They LOVE having their pictures taken, then getting to see them on the camera.  I was constantly mobbed by children wanting their pictures taken.  In the few days we have been here, we have combined taken over a thousand picture (though the number is probably higher than that).  As I stood up from a mob of children, I looked over to see Ashley, in her usual sea of smiling faces.  She absolutely loves the children and they adore her.  They are fascinated with her hair and she the picture below was just too good to not post.  This captures the essence of how we are connecting with the people here.

 

 

The last part of the day was another joyous and difficult time.  I do want to say that we are all finding that there is a lot of this – there are parts of what we do that brings great joy and at the same time great pain.  We gave our gifts to our sponsored children!  Not all of them yet, just the ones the people on the team sponsor.  The children getting the gifts were overjoyed at the gifts they received, like  the young girl obviously delighted at the first doll she has ever even seen (see picture below), but there was row after row of children outside the door and window wondering if there was something for them.  The sad fact is that of almost 600 children here, only 250 are sponsored.

 

 

THIS IS IMPORTANT – PLEASE READ:  There is an obvious difference between the sponsored children and those not sponsored.  Pastor Sylver told us that it is terribly sad to see the unsponsored children, many of whom have never owned a pair of shoes and their clothes are rags.  They attend school beside the sponsored children, but are not equal.  Often, one child in a family  is sponsored while their brothers/sisters are  not.  You can also see the difference on their faces.  The sponsored children have bigger smiles, they look healthy, they are cleaner and life is better for them.  The unsponsored children are hoping and praying for someone to help them.  The first day we were there, a man came up to me with his son begging for me to sponsor him.  He looked to be about 12 years old and both he and his father tried to dress well, but their clothes were just old, dirty and tattered.  Both were desperate for help.  I could only refer them back to the pastor and the church.  I also found that as I was taking pictures, mothers would shove their unsponsored children to the front so I would take their picture in the desperate hope of getting them some attention.  Please, prayerfully consider sponsoring a child.  We all talked about this tonight and agree that we could never have imagined the dramatic difference it makes in a child’s life and certainly would have had non way of knowing if we had never come to Uganda..

 

 

Tomorrow is where God begins to stretch us in ways that we can’t imagine yet.  We are starting the day going into the village in pairs with an interpreter/guide, distributing mosquito nets that Canby Christian (you) have previously purchased and also sharing Jesus Christ with them.  In the afternoon, we are going over to a high school to meet with the youth there.  We have no idea how many to expect, but could be upwards of 400-500 students..  Several team members are going to share their personal testimony, Isaac and Ralph are going to minister to them in song and I am going to share a message of hope and salvation in Jesus Christ – followed by an invitation to be accept Jesus as their personal savior.  PLEASE PRAY FOR US TOMORROW!  One thing that we are all discovering is that when we absolutely rely on God, He is faithful and powerful in answering.  We have all experienced Him in new ways and tomorrow will be even more.  I could really get used to being this close to God and experiencing Him working through us to reach even one more child.

 

The power is out again here tonight, but thankfully, no more rioting or tear gas…just a little too much excitement for us folks from Canby, Oregon.  I’m sitting hunkered down in the dark under my mosquito net as I write this note.  Please check back for more tomorrow night.  Thank you again from all of us for your support, your prayer and mostly for taking your time to share this experience with us.  We miss you all! 

 

In the name of Jesus we pray and believe!

 

Dave

Welcome to Kachungwa

Before arriving in Kachungwa, those of us who hadn’t been to Kachungwa yet had been asking Ken & Renee what to expect.  All we could get out of them was “you’ll just have to experience it for yourselves”.  Not really what we wanted to hear, but it was all we were going to get from them.

 

As it turns out, nothing that they could have told us would have, or could have prepared us.  As we drove progressively further away from Mubende (the town we are staying in), the poorer the conditions got.  As we got close to Kachungwa, there were mud shacks, children with no clothes on playing in the mud and the roads were hardly passable by car.  Seeing the buildings people are living in are hard to describe.  I will try to get some pictures up in the next couple of days.  My stomach was really beginning to hurt as we passed by progressively smaller and more run down “houses”.

 

Finally, we saw the sign that said “Welcome to Kachungwa Child Development Program”.  We have probably all seen the video that was posted and shared that walks us through the school and heart of the villiage.  Well, that’s about what it looks like.  But more on that in just a minute.

 

As our van drove up to the church building, children and adults came streaming from the building and from other buildings around the facility.  They came to the bus to greet us.  It was at this point that I understood what Ken & Renee were telling us.  There IS nothing that they could have told us that could have come close to possibly describing what we experienced.  In my mind, I imagined that this is what it must be like when we are finally welcomed into heaven.  We could not hardly get out of the van the mob was so big.  They were cheering, hugging us, waving, singing…I am honestly not sure what all happened, but what I do know is that God’s love for Canby Christian Church was unleashed through the smiling faces of children, men, grandmothers, mothers, pastors – I am convinced that Jesus was standing in the midst of us smiling!

 

I couldn’t see for the hugs and mob around me.  I remember one grandmother grabbing my face in her hands, crying and saying “God has blessed us” then giving me a huge hug leaving her tears of love on my shoulder.  It is just impossible to describe - there is no way you could understand because you weren’t here.  I looked around and saw Ralph’s head once in a while, but other than that, the others on the team were likewise being swarmed by a generous, loving people showing their love in a powerful way.   Below is a picture of Pastor Sylvar and some of the children.

 

Here is a picture of some of the women who came to greet us.

 

After feeling the love of a loving people of God, we spent some time with them in worship, praise, prayer and a message from Rose (the social worker at Kachungwa) and Pastor Sylvar.  We then had the very great honor of participating in the graduation ceremony of 4 students from the school.  This was a very important milestone in these young people’s lives.  For graduation gifts, each of the young women was given a brand new Singer sewing machine and table and the young man was given tools enough to become a carpenter.  See their picture below (though we will have some better ones) – they are the four on the left.  We were honored to stand up front with the pastor and congratulate each of the  graduates, followed by Ken giving them a blessing to start their new lives.  It was humbling to be here in Uganda honoring the efforts of these young people starting out as Uganda’s next generation of leaders.

 

 

We spent the next hour (only seemed like about 5 minutes though) mingling with the people of the village.  The children loved  having their pictures taken and then getting to see them on the camera.  I was swarmed by smiling children.  I could ramble on for a long time about this, but it’s late here and we have a long day ahead.

 

Today it rained in Kachungwa – in fact right  now it is pouring rain with a lightning and thunder storm outside.  For over two months, they have had hot weather and no rain.  You may recall that the last time a team from Canby Christian Church visited Kachungwa, it rained.  The people view this as a blessing from God – and the timing isn’t coincidental.  When Pastor Sylvar was welcoming us with the church, we noticed that the church now has a cement floor.  We saw a new, very nice playground as well, and were told that financial donations by Canby Christian Church had paid for both of these amazing things for Kachungwa.  The people couldn’t thank us enough – though we all recognize that we are just being stewards of what God  has given us, helping where he has lead us and give all of the glory and honor to Him!

 

 

Let me just close by saying that there is much good here, but there is also much evil.  When we arrived back at the hotel, we found that the “opposition party'” rally held just a few blocks from the hotel had developed into a full blown riot.  As we got out of the van, the air was thick with tear gas and sounds of cannisters being launched into the air.  The wind was blowing the gas right over our hotel as the rioters ran past.  The power was out and the situation was uncertain.  As we sat in the dark hotel restaurant, we did the only thing we could do – pray!  And did we pray.  Before praying, Renee was having a horrible time with the tear gas affecting here eyes and nose – as were the rest of us.  Within just a few minutes, though, the tear gas was gone and the riot had basically ended.  We can only thank God for His comfort (none of us were afraid) and His protection.  Above is a picture of the opposition rally that ultimately resulted in the riot. 

 

Thanks to God for our safety and thank you for all of your prayers.  I will say that none of us could have seen this coming and I am confident that your faithful prayers provided protection for us.  Please keep praying for us and the work God has us doing as we spend the next 5 days worshipping with and witnessing to the people of Kachungwa. 

 

We have learned a new way to close in prayer while we have been here: 

“In the name of Jesus, we pray and we believe, amen.”

 

Dave

Good morning from Africa

God’s grace shows in so many ways here.  The Ggaba church has an all night prayer meeting every Friday night.  I woke up to drums at 4:30am and was then treated to another sunrise that I could only watch in awe and reflect on the glory of God.  Judges 5:31 says “Let your enemies perish oh Lord, but let those who love You be like the sun as it comes into the full light of day.”



In a short time, we will be boarding the bus and will be off to Kachungwa.  We learned some tragic news yesterday – one of the sponsored children in Kachungwa drowned in a tragic accident.  Please pray for the village of Kachungwa and the family of the boy.  Sherry Linger  was the young man’s sponsor and would appreciate your prayer as well.  We are comforted that he is no longer troubled by the pain of this world, but is dancing on golden streets with the Lord Jesus right now!

Pray for our travels and our meeting the children of Kachungwa this afternoon.

Praise Jesus!

Dave

A few pictures from the day

It is getting late here and we are all exhausted, but before we turn in for the night, we wanted  to post a couple more pictures so you can get a little better idea of what we experienced here.

             
Sunrise in Uganda over Lake Victoria


Worship with Isaac


Ashley sees a spider (BIG spider)


The Operating room in the clinic


Our favorite – the team holding precious abandoned babies at the orphanage! 
What a blessing to us all!!!


This is a kitchen – this is it.  In fact, this one is unusual as it is indoors.


Children leaving primary school at 4pm – Bethany Village.

Good night from Uganda.  Tomorrow we get up and drive to Kachungwa.  More then...

Dave

Greetings from Uganda

Praise God!  We made it safely to Uganda.  We arrived at 10:30pm last night (local time). It was an incredibly long travel day (well, a little more than a day).  All of your gifts arrived in the luggage and we had no problems getting visas, through customs, etc.  We were greeted SO warmly by Michael and others from ARM at the airport. 

Our introduction to Uganda was getting on a bus in 80 degree temperature and driving in crazy traffic on the wrong side of the road (they drive on the left here). 

Let me be brief as we have a lot going on.  Today was our first full day in Uganda and it was a very busy day.  We started with a tour of the ARM office and the amazing program that they have going here.  We then went to a local medical clinic and spent time with the people there and had a wonderful conversation with the doctor there.  After lunch, we went to Loving Hearts Orphan Home.  I will need some time to describe that experience, but one thing I will say is that Ashley said that one of the babies who was there because her mother tried to kill her by stabbing her, “looked into my soul”.  I personally, held several of the children who were so beautiful and soaked up the love we brought there. 

After the orphanage, we visited Bethany Village which is a self-contained community that consists of a medical clinic, school, orphanage, farm (pigs, chickens, vegetables and other crops) and the church.  More on that later as well, but they have a God-given vision and people dedicating their lives to raising Uganda’s future leaders.  To get to the village, we had a 40 minute boat ride to get to the village across Lake Victoria.  Lake Victoria is the second largest lake in the world (do you know the biggest?) and is the source of the Nile River.

I really apologize for the brevity of this post, but we have many things going and I wanted you all to know we are here, safe and blessed by God.  Please pray for us to travel to Kachungwa safely tomorrow and that God will bless the people here in Uganda.

Thank you for your prayers and we will be getting you more soon.  In Christ – Dave