Stepping Stones Presentations

One of the programs that KMDP (Pentecostal Assemblies of God of Kaberamaido's development organization) is working on is one to combat the spread of HIV in an area near Lake Kyoga.  I've mentioned before how they have groups that are going through the Stepping Stones curriculum, which is a great one.  I had the opportunity to go along and visit the community with some KMDP staff.  They had a big community gathering with all the people participating in Stepping Stones where each group shared about what they're learning.

Completely unrelated to HIV was the random Grey Crowned Crane (Uganda's national bird, by the way) which was living(?) in the area and wandered around through the crowd all day.  See if you can spot it in the picture below.

Here's a more obvious one.

Anyway, the great thing about these presentations was that every group did a very entertaining skit to show things like: the importance of knowing your HIV status, the dangers of risky behavior, and the damage HIV can do to your family.

This guy really enjoyed pretending to be weak and sick (his co-actors literally carried him over on a bicycle) and then flopping around on the ground until he "died" and was carried away at the end of the skit.

Everyone enjoyed the skits immensely and the participants displayed excellent acting abilities.  But not only was it fun, it was also really good to see what they had learned through their groups.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We may be eating chicken instead of turkey, but it's still Thanksgiving here in Uganda.

We actually got to celebrate Thanksgiving twice this year!  Once, in Arusha, Tanzania, with many friends we worked with at WHRI last year.

And then a second time, on the actual day, with our current transitory Soroti family member, Emily.

This Thanksgiving, among many other things, we are thankful for family - family in Christ and family by blood.  We are thankful for all of you who faithfully pray for us and communicate with us about your lives.  We are thankful to be here in Uganda, doing work that we love with people we love.  And we are thankful for the chicken who gave her life for our dinner.

Soroti TLT Graduation - Ministry is not done alone

Christian Reformed World Missions (sister organization to World Renew within the Christian Reformed Church) started a Timothy Leadership Training program in Soroti a few years ago, doing one manual every 6 months.  The students finally finished, and we were able to attend the graduation a couple Sundays ago!  This was a special day for me, not just because I care so much about TLT, and not just because I preached about the book of Job for the two morning services before the graduation service (with the power going out so I had to yell for most of the sermon). 

This was a special group to me for two reasons.  First, I taught this group their 6th manual and it was the first time I taught TLT in Uganda.  See my old post on that training here.   Second, I personally know most of the 35 graduates.  They are some of my closest friends and colleagues in Uganda.  I know you won't remember all of these names, but I have to show you some pictures. Ministry is not done alone.  Without these people I could not do all that I do.  If you come to visit us you can meet some of them!

Below is Martin and his family.  Martin is my colleague who teaches TLT with me in Amuria.  He has been so helpful in my ministry.  He was the first one from the Soroti TLT group to volunteer to help me teach.  And now he is a master trainer like me!

Here is Francis below, who has volunteered to help translate the TLT manuals into Ateso.  Because of his faithful work, the people I am training in Amuria, Katakwi, and Kaberamaido should be able to train leaders in their villages using Ateso manuals by the time they become master trainers.  Francis is working with one other man and I think they might be receiving some small support from local Soroti churches.  You can praise the Lord with us that they just completed the first manual in Ateso and it is already being passed on to others in Teso!

Below is the very joyful Betty, one of my co-trainers in Kaberamaido, now a master trainer.  I'm so glad to have women in leadership giving their unique perspectives during trainings.

Below is Joseph.  We have known Joseph for a long time as he was one of our best students five years ago at the Pentecostal Theological College in Mbale .  Now he is the pastor of the PAG church we attend in Soroti when we aren't traveling around.  We love having him as our pastor, and I still get a chance to teach him a bit as he is in my Soroti pastors learning group.

Below is Lazarus, my fellow trainer in Katakwi.  He might miss our next Katakwi TLT however, because he will be on his honeymoon!

Below is our friend Baker.  He does not train with me, but we really appreciate the work he is doing.  He goes around training women and young girls how to make sanitary pads in an inexpensive way, and teaching them good health practices.  It might sound like an odd ministry for a man, but he is doing a good job.   Unfortunately many girls do not get taught in a healthy way about menstruation and feel shame.  Some think menstruation is part of a curse from witchcraft.

Below is Agnes and her husband.  Agnes is one of my fellow TLT trainers in Kaberamaido.  She has been a huge help.  She is the women's leader in the Soroti PAG main church, and has also been working with Sara to plan baking trainings and demonstration gardens to train Soroti women.

Below is pastor Moses from Soroti PAG main church.  He is a very good pastor, but I don't know how he handles such a busy schedule taking care of a 2,000 member church!  Compared to his schedule, my life is so easy.  Moses helps me organize the Soroti pastors learning group.  He also is one of my fellow TLT trainers in Kaberamaido.  He is my go-to person for organizing anything in Soroti.

Below is Emmanuel.  He was a degree student at Pentecostal Theological College while were there.  Now he is ministry coordinator for PAG Soroti pastorate.  It is an important position and a very busy position.  Emmanuel has helped me organize some events, and he also hooked us up with Paul who works for us watching our animals.  He is a good friend.

There you have it.  A few of the friends God has gifted us with.  As I said before, ministry is not done alone.  I thank God for these people all the time.

25 things I love about life in Uganda

(Not in any particular order)

1.  Singing.  Ugandans sing all the time.  If you take a walk, every fourth person or so will be singing and almost always it's a Christian worship song to God.  And the people here in church sing in perfect harmony effortlessly.  It is breathtakingly beautiful.

2.  Avocados.  I love them, and they are fresh and local, not shipped thousands of miles.  I can get about 8 for $1.00.

3.  Animals at home.  We are allowed to have goats and chickens and a dog and chameleons and really whatever animals we want, right in town.  Two of my favorite things are: 1. catching cockroaches in the house and throwing them outside to watch the chickens eat them.  2.  Throwing food scraps from the kitchen out the door and watching a feeding frenzy ensue between goats, chickens, guinea hens, a turkey, and a dog.



4.  Greetings.  There is something fun about going through a whole series of ritualized greetings, especially when you are doing it in the local language.  It's fun to see how long you can get the series of greetings to last until you run out of Ateso.

5.  Weather.  It's hot at first, but once you get used to it, it's nice.  It's kind of like living in a tropical paradise all year long.  I never have to worry about scraping snow off my car or shoveling snow in the driveway.  It stays a nice consistent temperature so I don't need that many different kinds of clothes.  We can leave the door open any day of the year to let the breeze in.  The mornings are my favorite time of day, when it is very cool outside, and the birds are chirping, and it's just beautiful.  I also appreciate knowing every day what time the sun will rise and sun will set.  Here I never have to check the weather online.

6.  Garden.  I let Sara do all of the work in the garden, but I can to still enjoy the proceeds.  It seems there is always something we are eating from the garden year round.  We have a steady supply of greens and vegetables every day.



7.  Fruit trees.  I sorely miss not having an avocado tree in our yard at the moment, but there is nothing like being able to pick oranges and bananas (and if you're Sara, mangoes and soursop too) right from our yard to immediately eat.

8.  Internet.  Somehow, as rustic as things are here, I am able to have good internet.  I have good connection for skyping with family, and good enough internet even to play games with my family online.  This is such a blessing.  I can't imagine the missionary life of years ago with no email, and not talking to family for years at a time.  We are so blessed.

9.  Driving is interesting.  Driving here is never boring.  There are always people on the road (which also is scary since I don't want to hit them).  But you never know what you will see.  You may pass by circumcision rituals or cattle herders.  You may pass by hilarious signs like - "God is Able House of Drinks."  You pass by people selling all kinds of things.  You get to see trucks carrying more people than you can count.  If you are lucky, you can see a motorcycle driver with a goat or cow on his lap.



10.  Ugandans' soft spoken nature.  People here tend to be calmer and speak more softly, gently, and quietly compared to Africans of other countries.  I appreciate this as it makes it easy to talk to people and not feel threatened or intimidated.

11.  Death.  No I don't love or appreciate death.  However, facing the reality of death all the time by hearing about people dying, seeing people sick, and seeing accidents on the road does something for me.  It makes me think about the shortness of life and it reminds me to live a serious life of following Christ until he comes again or until I go to be with him.

12.  Ugandan Fast Food.  Ugandan fast food is truly immediate unlike American fast food.  You pull over your vehicle to the fast food area and instantly you have 20 hands reaching through your windows with chapatti, water, meat on a stick, roasted bananas, or roasted maize.  There have been many days we have gotten home late and tired, and we simply stopped on the way home to get an avocado, popcorn, maize, or samosas.  Makes for an easy dinner!



13.  Shopping is so easy.  Food or basic necessities are never more than a hundred meters away it seems.  Even out in the countryside, trading centers are common.  Instead of having to travel to a big department store or big grocery store, you can walk a few meters from your house.  Much of the time we do all of our grocery shopping on the way home from a trip, just by stopping at any of the hundreds of stalls of fruits and vegetables that line the side of the road.

14.  Sense of community.  People here do things together.  If there is a wedding or funeral everyone is invited.  My friends went to Kenya recently for the funeral of a friend's sister.  We just don't do things like that in the US.  I love the sense of togetherness and caring for one another.

15.  Transportation.  There are certain things I hate about transportation here.  But I do enjoy being able to bicycle to town and to church and to be able to walk to most places in town.  It keeps me in better shape and is better for the environment.  I also appreciate that if you get stuck somewhere, anywhere, public transportation is simply a hand gesture away, either by bicycle, motorcycle, taxi, or bus.

16.  Meat.  The meat here is tough to eat, but tasty.  And I appreciate that I can eat meat here that has been well raised outside and not factory farmed.

17.  The markets.  There is something exciting about going shopping at the market here.  It's so colorful and so vibrant and so alive and so fresh.

18.  Animals in nature.  You never know what cool animals you will see.  Even in our region away from all the national parks, we regularly see chameleons, cool birds, bats, crazy big beetles, and swarms of flying termites.  And sometimes we get lucky and see monkeys, skinks, baboons, mongooses and snakes.



19.  Power outages.  This is one of the most frustrating parts about life here.  But I include it here because it has a good side.  I am on the computer too much, I do most of my work on it, my music, my games, my email, etc.  The power outages force me to diversify, to go outside and play with Caleb, to read a book, to take a walk, to play my hand drum, to play board games, or to practice throwing knives with Sara.

20.  The smell.  Every time I go to the US and come back to Uganda, I step off the airplane and take a deep breath.  The smell is full of good memory and its a very pleasing smell of a tropical land, full of the aroma of burning fires (cooking fires and burning rubbish).  Unfortunately I don't get to enjoy this smell all the time because I am now used to it, but I always love stepping off that plane and smelling this country.

21.  Fresh fish.  We are close to Lake Kyoga so we get fresh fish for cheap and it's so tasty.  We have tilapia, Nile perch, mudfish and others, but right now my favorite is Nile perch.

22.  Kids.  There are kids everywhere since half the population is under 15 years old.  They keep me smiling and they are so cute.

23.  Well dressed people.  I know Sara would love to be able to wear trousers more often, but I have to say I appreciate the distinct dress of men and women here.  There is something cool about men always dressing up wearing buttoned up shirts, and ladies always wearing skirts or dresses.  Everyone tries to dress "smart."  I would always dress like a slob were it not for this culture which helps me to try to look a bit nicer.

24.  Beauty in nature.  I love the rock formations.  I love the trees. I love the red soil, and the reddish roads.  The national parks are amazing.  Truly Uganda is the pearl of Africa.  There are tons of varied climates, plains, mountains, lakes, and forests.

25.  Appreciating things more.  Since we lack many things and many choices that we might otherwise have living in the USA, I think we appreciate things more.  Since we have few books, we cherish the ones we have.  Since we have few rare food items to purchase, we cherish the random finds of certain treats - for example molasses (for Sara), and Doritos (for me).  Since we don't have Netflix or television, we enjoy re-watching our old movies.


There are things I don't like about life here too, but you can probably guess those things already and you probably pray about those things for us.  But you need to know that not all of life here is hard, and that is why I wrote this post.  For us, it does not feel like a sacrifice to be here.  I thank God, and you, our supporters, for the privilege of being here.

Field Visits

Like I mentioned before, while Edward, our supervisor, is in North America, I've been helping out with some of his work in his absence.  One part of that is visiting the programs that KIDO and KMDP are doing to see how things are going and actually talk to the community members who are participating in the projects.  Here are some of the things that are going on.

Allen, one of the World Renew staff from Kampala came for a few days and made the visits with me.  She is so good at her job!  I loved hearing her ask all the right questions of the community members to draw them out and get them talking about what they have been doing.

The first day, we visited community groups in Amuria where we heard about the livelihood skills that the people have been learning through KIDO, like improved methods for caring for pigs and chickens and running village savings groups.  Ben was with us that day and amused people by deciding he would be more comfortable sitting on the floor of the church (which is made from cow dung, by the way).

Another day, we visited Kaberamaido, where KMDP is doing a project to help prevent the spread of HIV.  They have community groups who meet in a fishing village right next to Lake Kyoga.

I got to sit in on a Stepping Stones meeting of married men.  Stepping Stones is this really awesome curriculum for training people on HIV and communication between men and women and in the family.  That day, they were talking about what love is and how you can/should show your love to your wife and children.

Our vehicle got overrun by sheep while we were away.

The last day was also in Kaberamaido, but visiting people who have been learning about conservation agriculture, especially green manure/cover crops (gm/ccs) for improving their soils.

They showed us the organic pesticides and fertilizers that they learned to make from local materials.

And the different techniques for kitchen gardens near their home.  One lady said she loves just being able to stick her hand outside her house to pick greens for dinner!

Here's another kitchen garden.

And the seeds from two of the gm/ccs (mucuna and jackbean) drying in the sun.  The groups started with a small amount of seed and are multiplying them to share amongst the members.

It was good to see and hear the ways that people are being impacted by KIDO and KMDP's work.

Katakwi TLT - Caring for God's People

Last week I began the first week of Timothy Leadership Training in Katakwi.  It went very well, though we only had about 20 participants.  However, there is blessing in this also.  With a smaller group the discussion is much more rich and people get more chances to speak.  It also allows me to really get to know some of the pastors.

Sara and Ben sat in with me for the first day to see what the training is like, but then they had other work to do during the week.  Ben is a friend of ours from the farm we were trained at in Texas.  He was already in Kenya on a trip so he came to visit us for a couple weeks.

Here is a picture of my co-trainer Lazarus, a pastor of Victory Outreach denomination.  He just became a master trainer with the rest of the Soroti TLT group.  God has blessed me richly with passionate, sacrificial, godly, and wise fellow trainers.

I've already written much about this TLT manual in other posts, so I won't mention all the good conversation, but I just want to tell you about the topic of healing this time.  Each lesson takes between 1 and 2 hours.  We spent nearly 5 hours on the healing lesson and that was with cutting the conversation short!

When we began the lesson, most of the group believed that God heals us every time we pray with faith.  I let them hash it out together for a long time before I did any speaking.  After hours of discussion everyone was in agreement that God always has the power to heal, but sometimes may not heal us.  Sometimes suffering in our life is part of his will and plan.  It turned out that at least some of the difficulty was a translation issue.  Some people were thinking God heals every time, and some people thought God heals any time.  Finally we were all on the same page that God heals any time, but not every time!  It was a very good discussion, in which we totally dismantled the health and wealth gospel.  People realized that God's will is important, not just the strength of our faith.  Before, most thought that if you pray with faith for God to give you ten vehicles, he will give them to you.  But now they realize he will only give to us according to his good will and purpose.  We went over many passages of Scripture about suffering in the Christian life, looking at the life of Jesus and Paul especially.

In the discussion, we were all able to agree that God can use medication and doctors to bring us healing, and he gets the glory even in that situation.  This is so important because there are still some preachers out in villages that counsel people to throw away their medication, and often these people die.  One interesting thing was that some people were under the impression that God heals certain things like malaria or sicknesses, but in the case of a car accident, God won't or can't heal, and you need to take someone to the hospital.  So we also discussed and agreed that God can do anything and heal anyone regardless of the situation.

As you can see in the photo below, it wasn't all tense discussion.  We had a good time too!

Another aspect of the healing discussion was about traditional medicine, witchdoctors, and local herbs.  This might seem like an easy issue to you back in the USA, but it is very complicated.  You have witchdoctors who are helping to heal people, truly helping, but doing so with religious rituals leading people away from Jesus.  While they may not be followers of Jesus, they do know of herbs that really work to help with sickness, many of the very same herbs that get used to process our drugs back in the USA.  So what should people do about clinics that use traditional medicine?  And should Christians go collect herbs from the forest to treat their problems?  We might quickly say "yes!" as long as its divorced from the religious rituals, and even development organizations often teach people about such valuable plants that God created.  But there are complications.  Firstly, many people incorrectly dose these herbs and hurt people, or they don't clean them correctly and people end up getting other health problems or worms in the process.  Secondly, this can easily be a stumbling block as the apostle Paul talks about.  It can lead people into thinking that witchcraft is okay.  So it's a tricky process, and most of the pastors were counseling that yes, those herbs God created can be used, but it needs to be a slow cultural change so as not to lead people astray.

Last in this lesson, it came out that not only the participants, but especially those in their churches fear death.  They trust in Christ, but there is still fear of God's judgment for sin after death.  We discussed the Gospel, that Jesus took the punishment for all of our sin.  It seems like everywhere Sara and I go, and every sermon I preach, we are continually hitting the message that we are saved by grace, not by works.  Maybe it is the lack of discipleship and teaching in Uganda, but it seems like most people believe that we are saved by faith in Christ, but also we have to make sure we do just enough to scrape our way into Heaven.

Here are some photos of praying over their action plans.

I'm very excited to see how God will use them.  Some are going to begin visiting their Christians regularly.  Some are going to train other pastors in this whole TLT manual.  A few ladies are going to visit the hospital regularly to pray for the sick.  One church is going to clean the grounds, and cut back "the bush" at a health clinic.  Others are going to try to reconcile people back who left the church.

Here are our gracious and joyful cooks from the week.  I ate well!

Testimonies:

“I am satisfied with this training, and especially on the side of healing, I really learned that God heals according to his will, and this has really lifted me up in my faith.”

“Next time when I come back I will bring for you any thing which I am not going to tell you now.”

“I have learnt to share/work together as a team in church ministry.”

“You need to have a plan in whatever thing you do.”

“We need to celebrate with people who have been released from church discipline.”

What we do when we are not doing exciting things

Maybe this isn't something you think about when you read our blog, but on the other hand, perhaps you are wondering what we do when we aren't doing exciting activities like baking trainings, TLT, and visiting churches.  Well, there are all sorts of relatively mundane activities that we do as part of our work, which fill our time, and I want to share a few of them with you.

Both Anthony and I have the normal routine activities like cooking, cleaning, doing dishes, and washing laundry.  But that's just housework.  When I have free time, I read, sew (I've donated some clothes I made to the local church), and work in my garden where I experiment with planting and creating mulch, compost, and organic pesticides.  Although I do this for fun, it is helpful for my work because I am learning what kinds of techniques do well in this region.

But there are lots of "real" work activities we do too.  Our communication with our supporters through our blog and prayer letters is an important part of our work, so we make sure to take good photos and write stories about what is happening in our lives.  

We also spend time doing research and studying various topics to prepare training and teaching materials.  For example, I work on lessons about caring for God's creation (in general and through agriculture) and continue to refine my baking training materials.  Anthony has been writing sermons and trying to improve his When Helping Hurts curriculum.  

We meet with people from different mission and development organizations and from churches to discuss the work we are doing and to plan ways that we can work together.  For example, I have been advising a young man from our church in Soroti who has started an agricultural development organization.  We hope this will help enhance connections between all of us people from different Christian organizations who work in the same place.

I am doing research with one of the Ugandan agriculture field officers on edible wild/local plants in Teso (this region of Uganda).  We're trying to compile information about what plants are traditionally eaten and how.

While our supervisor, Edward, is in the US and Canada, I've been helping out by reading reports and project proposals from the partner organizations and working with them to revise them and make sure they will be understandable to an outsider who might read them.  I've also been making visits to their current projects to see how things are going.

And currently, I am planning with the main PAG church in Soroti to do a variety of trainings and to set up a demonstration garden on some of the church's land.  We want to do some comparison plots of Farming God's Way and traditional farming as well as some demonstration kitchen gardening (vegetable) techniques.  And then, the church wants to emphasize being good stewards of God's creation next year, so the pastor asked me to put together some materials with Bible verses and questions that small groups can discuss about caring for creation.  So right now we are in the planning stages, which means meetings and reading materials I have and writing plans.

So there you have it.  Some of the activities we do that are individually less blog-worthy. 

Food in Uganda

When we lived in Uganda before, we would occasionally share with you some of the foods we had been eating.  So here is one from now.  You may have seen some of these before, but we compiled some of the interesting things together here.

First, the monstrous portion of posho and beans that is common at events:

Termites (actually quite tasty):

Some tasty village food: millet bread, rice, cooked cucumbers, greens, meat:

Home food: veggies from the garden, beans, boiled maize, banana bread (thank you, oven)

A special meal at home: cookies, tamarind juice, fish, posho, and greens:

Tostones (fried plantains):

 Homemade paneer.  This is actually quite easy to make.

A lunch that didn't require a whole lot of preparation: roasted maize, samosas, carrots, and peanuts.

And finally, hummus, veggies, and naan: