Vision Update Pt 1

I want to share my vision, or at least pieces of it for those of you who want to know what my plans are.  I don't know all the details, but I can share my heart and my passion.

Kids are my main focus at first.  I want to be able to provide a home for children who have no one to look after them.  It would be great if I could also have a school.  Education is so important in Uganda, but I also want to be able to focus on helping the kids find their identity and then pursuing their own passions.  I want them to be able to be kids, playing and not worrying about their next meal, or their futures.  I want to encourage joy and personal freedom in who they are.

I will have lots of sports related activities of course, as that is a great way to build relationship and just have fun!  Alex is the town soccer coach and has an amazing ministry already with the kids.  His wife Violet is great at volleyball and other sports too.  The kids love them!!  Some may scoff at sports being a ministry, but solving practical needs is as important as anything "religious" might be.  Tell a man about Jesus and leave him starving, what do you think will happen?  Nothing.  Alex has been such a good coach, his players have been receiving scholarships to better schools.  Basic education need provided by what Alex is giving them.  It's a great thing!  I mostly want to have fun, but if there are other opportunities to be had, that's awesome!

  I want to train up local people to love on the kids and become the teachers so that I work myself out of a job.  I have watched as the teachers hit the students with sticks for stepping out of line.  I hated seeing that!  I want to share what I have learned from Danny Silk's book "Loving Your Kids on Purpose"  - I want to see the kids grow in freedom and responsibility in the way that God grows us up.  Fear of punishment doesn't lead to a lasting life of good choices.  Once the fear is removed, they're free to do a lot of things that we  thought that we'd convinced them not to do.  I want to teach them how to make good choices because of love and understanding of natural consequences.  Freedom is what Jesus came to give us, so why shouldn't children have that same right?

I recently heard of a place in South Africa I think where they housed orphans in homes of 8-10 kids with a set of parents in each home.  Multiple homes made up a little community and the children had a chance to be a part of a family!  I love this idea!  I would love to find local couples that want to pour into the orphan children and love them into wholeness.

There, that's a good start.  I will post more in another update.  My vision covers many arenas.

I have created a GoFundMe page to begin collecting startup money for my long term life in Uganda.  If you're interested in donating now... here's the link.
http://www.gofundme.com/7vv030
Thank you so much!

To update anyone still following this.... I am still moving toward a goal of full time life in Uganda.  I'm currently in Redding, CA attending Bethel Church in order to get as much growth as possible in a short time.  I have had an incredible year and a half of encountering God and learning to receive His love and in turn, to trust Him more and more.  He has proven Himself so faithful in this process.  I'm getting involved as much as possible in all the classes available to me here so I can fill up my toolbelt.  I still don't know the exact timeline, but I feel it is soon!!

My in country contact, Alex, is still my ministry partner.  He is an amazing man of God who just recently had opportunity to prove how trustworthy he is during a difficult adventure he found himself on in Turkey.  I am so proud to call Alex my brother and look forward to what God has for us as we join forces in the future.

October 29 - Heading home

Today we got a new breakfast! After 2 weeks of eggs and toast, we got pancakes!  Everyone was so excited!  And that is all my journal says.  LOL  We had to say goodbye to the interns first, they were heading out for a short vacation to Jinja.  Lots of hugs and tears as we said farewell to this amazing group of ladies.  : (

We left at 11 to go to the airport, had some odd food as we waited.  The airport is where we first heard about Sandy, so there was some wondering if we'd make it home.  One of our team was from New Jersey, so we weren't sure if she would be able to make it or not.   The guys were still up for ministry and had opportunity to pray for this UN soldier from Ghana.  We had to say goodbye to 3 more of our team here who had later flights.

Finally boarded and flew to Ethiopia.  It seems that our last stop there landed us in the ghetto section of the airport, cuz where we were this time was really nice.  As we headed to our gate, we suddenly heard a familiar voice!  Chris O!!  His flight the day before had been cancelled because of the hurricane I guess, so he had been put on our flight.  That was fun running into him.  This was the long flight, so it was awesome that it wasn't full and a few of us had the chance to stretch out across 3 seats and get some rest.  We touched down in Rome for a re-fuel, so I can sort of say I've been there.  : )  Not quite the way I wanted though. There was an autistic kid a few rows back that kept vocalizing loudly, so that was hard, but I understand.  I had headphones to help me sleep.

Landed in Toronto finally and a number of us didn't get our bags.  A guy took our luggage tags and went and found most of them, so we headed on through the US Customs (in Canada?)  and got some "real food" - The final flight to San Fran and we were almost home.  Our ride was waiting for us, so we hopped the Bethel van and headed north.  We stopped in Vacaville and ate at In-n-Out.  I'm not a huge fan, but a real cheeseburger was wonderful after 2 weeks of Ugandan food!  I finished my double burger before the boys, but then they went back for seconds, and I did not.  They were sick after that.  : )  Here is a pic of the aftermath.  We fell asleep in the van after that, arrived at the church after 8 and went our separate ways.

It was a beautiful trip, sad to see it end, but I know it won't be my last.  I know without a doubt that God has built me for Uganda, everything makes sense there and it feels like home to me.  I will be back.  Thank you Papa for this amazing opportunity, what a precious gift You have given to me!

October 28, 2012 - Sunday

Sunday's crusade was a morning and evening session.  Chris preached again this morning, more to the church this time, not to the unsaved.  I remembered to bring my earplugs this time, so I was able to handle the noise much better.  After the meeting, a few of our team had to leave.  It got pretty sad from here on out.  This group has become such good friends, it's hard to start saying goodbye.  Chris and Stefanie had to head out to get back to Bethel for a conference, and Maggie, Karen, and Kristy left us as well, and then Ruby.  So before everyone left, we got team photos of our 3 smaller teams.  That was a lot of fun.

Team Richard / Sarah

Team Jacob / Juho

Team Michael / Charlie

What a fun group!!  So, with our fearless leader headed to the airport, someone else had to speak at the evening crusade meeting.  Richard led the meeting, and Jacob, Juho, and Brittany spoke.  They all did so awesome!!  Jacob was funny as he started yelling like Chris.  He shared his testimony and we just all had a lot of fun!  That's a cool thing about Jacob, he's all about having fun with Holy Spirit!  The crowd was loving it, joining him in jumping around and having a blast!  Poor Pastor Bob finally lost his voice and had to be replaced as translator in the middle of Juho's speech.  He was the best translator we had, so it was sad to see him have to step down.  After we finished we headed back to the Field of Dreams and just had a fun last night.  

October 27, 2012

Today we did Say No to Hunger again.  Last time they had combined two groups into one for the day, but this time we just had the one, a small group of about 10 kids.  Some of our team did a lesson on the armor of God for the kids, it was pretty funny.  The interns have been teaching this group things like - I am special, I am valuable...  It's neat to see them so eager to learn, and so excited to hear that they are worth so much to God, and to us.  This picture shows the makeshift armor.  It was funny, but you use what you can.  I personally liked the baseball bat sword.  :)  We fed the kids again and then headed out.

In the afternoon, half the team went back to Kampala for more street ministry, and I stayed back at the base and our group met with the teens again from last week.  We wanted to do a follow up and see how things were going since their experience with Holy Spirit last time.  A couple people from our team shared some thoughts, then we briefly took them into small groups to talk more.  The first girl who shared with us was very talkative and told us all sorts of awesome stories about her week!  She told us she used to be a problem kid (which was later confirmed by the interns who know her) and how now she is doing good and being nicer to everyone!  The finniest part was when she said, "I used to only be able to pray for 2 hours, now I can pray for 5!!"  We were blown away by that, not too many of us can even pray for 2 hours!  She was so thrilled with her new relationship to Holy Spirit, it was awesome to see her excitement and passion.  I think that girl could be a preacher!

Another Crusade night.  I went into this one with a dehydration style headache coming on, so I was pretty miserable with all the loudness.  This was the night of the biggest most tangible miracle we saw though.  A crippled girl crawled up on stage, she seemed to walk on her hands and feet, totally doubled over.  I looked and saw that her foot was twisted up and curled inward.  Chris prayed for her and told her to stand up and walk across the stage.  She did it!  She was staggering, but what do you expect for someone who has never walked upright?  I watched her feet and saw that twisted foot straighten out!!  That was crazy amazing!! The smile on her face was so big as she walked back and forth, back and forth!  The crowd was going wild, obviously they knew this girl, knew her handicap, and were seeing an awesome miracle!

October 26, 2012 - Crusade

In the morning we went out into the local village with our list of needy individuals again.  We had a little 7 yr old boy named Joshua as a guide this time.  He took us to the home of an elderly woman who was caring for her grandsons.  We were taking a mosquito net to her.  She told us her hands hurt all the time, and her knuckles were all swollen, so we were guessing it was arthritis.  Lori asked me to pray for her, and I did.  Some others prayed as well, and as the time passed, she said her hands were getting better!  Richard gave her the gospel story, she had not heard about Jesus, only His name before.  She liked what he was telling her, but she said she was afraid to make the choice because others in the village might hurt her.  (the Muslim neighbors)  Her two grandsons were there too, listening, and they decided to give their lives to Jesus.  (See before and after pictures)  

Later that day, the Crusade began.  They started worship around 3 or 4 I think, we could hear it back at our place.  We showed up around 6 in time for Chris O to preach.  We walked in through the crowd like a pack of celebrities, it's a very strange feeling - all eyes on us, kids rushing in to grab our hands and be the ones to walk us in...  We got up on the stage and took our seats behind the worship dancers.  I love African worship so much!!  It's so filled with joy!  I was kinda bummed we only got to be there for a couple songs.  Chris preaches like an African preacher, screaming the whole time.  Add the translator working at the same intensity, it's comical, but I don't handle the loudness too well.  Chris preached an awesome gospel message and many people came forward to get saved at the end!