Participatory Rural Appraisal

By Sara

One of the things that World Renew has recently done to help some of their partner organizations improve the work that they do, is to train them in Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA).  This is a technique for meeting with and hearing from a community itself about programming to work there, rather than designing a project and then imposing it on the community.

The facilitators for PRA guide the community members to divide themselves into groups (like younger women, older women, younger men, older men, community leaders) and then guide them through various activities that give everyone a better picture of what is going on in the community and what resources are there.  For example, a group may walk in a straight line through the community, taking note of anything that relates to a topic, like food security, then draw a map of that section of the community.  Or they might brainstorm the changes throughout the year and make a calendar that shows how much work, how much food, how much rain, etc. at different times of year.

In one particular training, I sat with the group of younger women and observed the activities that they did.  The first one was to create a map of the places they go to most commonly in the village, looking at which ones they visit the most.  They made a map on the ground and used various items to symbolize each location.  For example, a water bottle represented the well.  They also used different sized sticks to show how often they go there - the twigs meant they went there maybe once a week and the big logs were for places they went to at least once a day.  So you can see below that they go to the well frequently.

Then, they transferred the map onto a piece of paper.  This little kid was very interested in the process.

Then, they made a daily calendar.  This showed the different things they do every day, when they do those things, and for how long.  They organized their daily tasks in a circle, from morning to evening.  Below you can see all the items that symbolize the activities.  For example, they used a hoe to represent garden work, three stones to represent cooking, and a handkerchief for washing clothes.

The next day, the community got back together so each group could share what they had discussed the day before and think about what important issues they need to address in their community.  It was very interesting to compare the daily schedules of the younger men and the younger women.  (note that most of them were married and had children).  You might not be able to see the chart below very well, but this is the daily calendar for the younger men.  They made separate charts for the rainy season and the dry season.  They are busier in the rainy season working in the garden, so they wanted a different chart for that.  Nevertheless, even during the rainy season, they are eating or resting from 11:30am-3pm (during the dry season they can rest from 10am-the end of the day)

The younger women, on the other hand, said that they sometimes have time to rest from 1-1:30pm, but other than that, were busy for the rest of the day.  This difference in workload was definitely an important issue to them and it brought up a lot of discussion among the community.

Below are two activities done by the older men.  The one on the left is a resource map of the community.  It shows where different resources can be found in the community.  The one on the right is the seasonal calendar I talked about before.  It shows things like the amount of rainfall and the amount of work available throughout the different months of the year.

At the end of the presentations, the community seemed satisfied that they had come up with important issues that they face and had some discussion about a few ideas for addressing those issues.  This is a great way, also, for the development organizations to know how to plan their programs to address the needs that actually matter to the community, rather than needs perceived by the organization.

Pray for us to be patient

By Anthony:

At times, I feel ashamed of my character.  I have an incredibly easy life, and yet I get frustrated about very little things.  Just because we are missionaries, we are not perfect.  We are far from it.  There are so many things that Jesus needs to change about our character.  Particularly, I need to learn patience.  Things that have been trying my patience in the last few months:

- People demanding that we give them our dog, or give them money, when they see us walking or see us in town.  Often they demand this rudely without even greeting us first.  What would be extremely offensive to do to another Ugandan, they seem to think is okay to do with us because we are foreigners.  Sometimes we try to communicate how what they say is rude, but it's difficult to do this with love.  Sometimes it's hard to balance turning the other cheek with explaining how someone could speak to us more politely.

- Ants getting into anything and everything not tightly sealed down.  Our one safe place to let food cool, the inside of the microwave, is no longer safe as we found a horde of ants inside it.  We are now used to drinking our filtered water filled with ant carcasses.

- Dusty roads.  As we bicycle to church and a vehicle passes we get smothered in dust.  It's hard to breathe or open your eyes.  The rain delayed this year so the dust got pretty bad.  We had to dust our desks every day.  Thankfully it seems that the rains have finally come.  We heard that the last time it took so long for rain to come during this time of year was 1955 (according to local elderly folks).  So we are hopeful that the rainy season has finally started!
 

- Power outages.  We had a good streak of no power outages for almost 2 months for the holidays!  But now things are back to normal with frequent outages, making it hard to do work on the computer.

- Internet problems.  We used to have a pretty amazing internet connection considering we live in Uganda.  But lately the connection has gotten worse and worse with frequent disconnections.  I've been speaking with the company looking for a solution.

- Water outages.  When the water goes off for over a week, our tank gets empty quickly, and we end up needing to get water from the borehole.  That means bathing with a basin and no shower.

- The heat.  It's now 88 - 91 degrees in our bedroom each night.  We are thankful to have a fan.  But the heat + no power = lots of sweat. 

Sure these things are annoying, but in the scheme of eternity, they are beyond insignificant.  Jesus put up with a heck of a lot worse and he did so with patience and love.  And he calls us to strive to do the same.  The Pauls and Stephens of the world had to put up with more than simple annoyance; they had hunger, persecution, thirst, poverty, and even death.  If they could have patience for those things, surely I can learn to have patience through these minor annoyances.  I need to not let them trouble me, but to say, "Lord, I'm not going to get angry about this power outage, but I'm going to praise you, and thank you for your grace, and instead of whining, I'll go read a book with a flashlight."  Pray for us that we can develop this type of patience!  Thank you!

Kaberamaido TLT - Overcoming Family Violence

By Anthony:

This last Timothy Leadership Training in Kaberamaido was special in that my good friend, a missionary from Soroti, Steve Tiesenga, came along with me because he wanted to complete all the manuals himself before he begins to facilitate TLT in Soroti in the future.  It was fun having him there, as he also helped the pastors write their action plans, and he was able to get a lot of great pictures for me.  I hope you enjoy them!

I told the group that I tell our friends back in the US about how God is using them and TLT, and they were very happy and glad that you are standing with them in prayer.  The bishop of PAG Kaberamaido said to send to you all their greetings and love!

The most encouraging part of every TLT session is when we have the privilege of hearing the pastors report on what God has done, how he has used them in the implementation of their action plans.  These plans were based on the Stewardship manual we studied in December.  Here is just a small sample of what I heard:

 

Reports

1.  A pastor taught his church about stewarding the time that God has given to us.   The church listened to what he taught and they began to keep proper time management in their worship services.  Before, people came at all different times, so they would start late, and that meant they would get home late.  Some women had stopped coming to church in the past years but when the church began keeping time well, these women returned.  The reason is that they are married to non-Christian husbands, and when they would be gone from home for so long, the husbands would get annoyed or suspicious and yell and beat these women.  But when the church began to keep time, the women could more easily come to church again!  Even better, some of their non-Christian husbands have begun to come with them in the last months, and some of these husbands got saved!  What a strange but beautiful example of how being good stewards of time has resulted in the salvation of these men!

 

2.  Many people had planned to plant trees.  However, their plans have not been accomplished yet because it is so dry and the rains have delayed.  But they have prepared the ground and the seedlings and will be ready to plant as soon as the rains come.

 

3.  The manager of KMDP (PAG Kaberamaido's development organization), the pastorate secretary, and the pastorate accountant teamed up together for an epic action plan.  They succeeded in training 54 church treasurers and secretaries from all over the district in two days.  They were trained in budgeting, record keeping, reporting, financial transparency, and accountability.  Since the training, they report that giving by Christians is increasing in all of the 22 assemblies (assembly is a group of 5-10 PAG churches) now that people can trust how the money is collected and used.
 

Video of worship time in the morning

4.  Similar trainings to #3 happened all over in smaller ways in the local churches.  Some churches have made sure that it is not one person alone who is counting the money each week.  Other churches began to give accountability and reports to the congregation each week about the offerings.  Many of the TLT pastors gave reports that the average offering amounts are now higher, so many that I could not write them all down.  In some churches, they are higher by 30,000 shillings a week, in other churches they are higher by 100,000 a week.  One pastor reported that in previous fundraisers they would get around 80,000 shillings but after teaching about stewardship, they raised 1.4 million in fundraising.  Another pastor noted an increase in fundraising from 100,000 shillings, to 800,000 collected. 

 

For those of you that might feel uncomfortable with this, realize that this is not a case of pastors manipulating Christians to give more using the false prosperity gospel.  This is actually the proper stewardship and generosity Christians are finally starting to show after being taught about giving, and seeing that they can trust that their leaders are handling money well without corruption.  I cannot understate how important this change is.  Pastors in PAG usually make about 3,000-6,000 shillings ($1-2) from their churches in a month (they have to garden to support themselves).  And it's very tough to do ministry or do maintenance on church buildings when so little money is given.  Many people cry that they are desperately poor, but that is not the case for most Ugandans.  People have money, they just weren't giving it to the churches.  I am so encouraged by these changes.

 

5.  My former student at Pentecostal Theological College in Mbale, Emmanuel, went out and undertook one of the most difficult action plans.  He trained 9 committee members in the entire stewardship TLT manual.  This is quite a feat in time and energy.  It spreads the good transformation that TLT brings.  He also plans again to teach these same people all of TLT manual 3 in the next three months.

 

6.  Many TLT participants went home to form committees to regularly clean their church compounds of trash.

 

7.  After hearing teaching about stewardship and giving, Christians in the congregation of Otuboi PAG formed a committee to look after the welfare of their pastors, to make sure they are properly cared for and financially supported.

A picture of me praying a prayer of thanksgiving for how God has used them in their action plans.

In this TLT week, I was again joined by Betty and Anges who have come with me each time to Kaberamaido TLT.  But Pastor Moses was not able to come as he moved to pursue further education. So Pastor Joseph (who happens to be our former student from five years ago, and now our local pastor), came and helped facilitate with us.  All three of them are master trainers like me.  Their service and sacrifice is amazing and I don't know what I would do without them.  Their pictures are below.  Betty is on the right here:

And then Agnes and Joseph:

This manual was Overcoming Violence in the Family.  I have many interesting things to say about our discussions in this manual, but I don't want to be too repetitive as I already blogged about this manual in a previous post - Amuria TLT - Violence in the Family.  So please read that post if you haven't to see the main topics we addressed.

As usual in Kaberamaido, we had many participants, so we divided into two groups.  The weather during this week made things difficult.  It was very dry, dusty, and windy.  We continually had to shield our faces from huge dust clouds.  It's hard to describe if you've never been in Africa in the dry season.  We couldn't discuss in the church because then we would have all been baked as if we were in an oven, so we had to endure the dust continually getting into our eyes.

Breakfast Break!

Pastor Joseph helping another pastor with his action plan:

Pastors and leaders working on their action plans:

I spend 75% of the last day correcting, advising, and finally approving action plans.  With between 50 and 65 participants each time in Kaberamaido this is a lot of action plan analyzing (some people's plans I have to look at multiple times).  By the end of that day my mind is fried.  Sara is already making fun of me because TLT has so strongly shaped my life.  I'm always talking to Sara about making action plans at home.  Below is the line of leaders waiting for me to approve their action plans.  First they get initial approval and correction from Joseph, Betty, or Agnes, and then they come see me with what they hope is their final draft.  They think I'm pretty tough but they appreciate it!  They are learning how to make good plans, with properly articulated goals and detailed activities.



Putting final drafts of action plans on the church walls so others can read them before we pray over them:

Here are a few action plans I am excited to see them carry out over the next three months:

1.  Most of the plans involved counseling families who are experiencing conflict or abuse or marriage difficulties, and they want to see an end to the conflicts and reconciliation.

2.  During the week, we had a discussion about the problem of alcohol addiction and how it contributes to violence, and it must have touched them because at least 8 people had a plan that involved alcohol.  In their different villages, they want to reach out to the drunkards in their town drinking joints, and counsel them.  Each plan involves a certain number of people they want to see quit drinking and come to know Christ.

3.  The bishop has a bold plan that takes the alcohol issue one level deeper.  He wants to talk to the owners of the drinking joints in Kaberamaido town and he hopes to see at least two of the breweries willingly choose to give up their businesses.  It's a difficult goal, but attainable by God's power.  I imagine it would be difficult to continue what they are doing when the bishop lovingly confronts them about the destruction they are contributing to in families and in the larger community.

4.  Another pastor was touched when we talked about how the church does not always care well for widows.  His goal involves building new houses for the widows in his church.

5.  A pastor plans to teach teenagers a biblical view of sex and marriage and afterwards give them an exam to make sure they've really understood.  As in the US, too often the message the church gives about sexuality is only, "Don't have sex before marriage!"  This pastor wants to make sure they have a biblical, positive view of marriage and sex.

Pray that God empowers these leaders through his Holy Spirit to carry out these plans in an effective way.  Thank you to my churches and supporters in the US for sending me to do this very enjoyable work here in Uganda!

March 2015 Prayer Letter

Thank you for praying for us!  Here is the March 2015 Prayer Letter.

ECHO Conference in Tanzania

By Sara:

I had the opportunity in February to go to the ECHO agricultural conference in Arusha, Tanzania.  You might remember that I went to an ECHO conference in Florida in 2013.  ECHO has centers around the world and the one in East Africa is located in Arusha.  Every other year they have a conference there too.  It was a very enjoyable conference and I think that I learned a lot that will help me with my work in Uganda now and hopefully in whatever work I do in the future.  I appreciated that this conference was focused on East Africa as a region, so all of the speakers and topics were relevant to the context where I work.

One of the fun aspects of the conference was meeting up with a lot of people I know from around the region.  Many of our colleagues from World Renew in Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania were there and also people who work for organizations that partner with World Renew.  I also got to see a former fellow intern from Texas, Geoff, and both of us stayed with our friend Neil (also formerly from World Hunger Relief) and his family.  It was great, even though there was no water at Neil's house during the time we were there!

Neil was also a speaker at the conference, on the topic of conservation agriculture and green manure/cover crops (gm/ccs).  I've talked about these before, but just as a reminder, they are plants that keep the soil covered during the dry season or in between your main crop, and which add organic material to the soil.  You can see Neil speaking below:

I heard about a lot of different ideas for intercropping different gm/ccs with each other and with main crops and I am hoping to try some of those things out in my own garden when the rainy season starts again.  I also learned some good ideas for what to look for as indicators of success in an agricultural development project, which will enable me to better help our partner organizations, KIDO and KMDP, as they write project proposals.

Another really interesting session was about motivation for change in development.  The speaker made the point that trying to do development in sub-Saharan Africa without basing it on a religious worldview (like using the Bible) is neo-imperialism.  What he was saying, was that since a large percentage of Westerners have a secular worldview, they tend to think that this is the most appropriate way to approach development.  But if they come to Africa, to a place where the majority of people have a Christian worldview, and try to impose a secular idea of development on people whose worldview is Christian, it is very similar to the attitude of colonialism and imperialism.  It was very thought-provoking.

He also discussed the difference between incentive and motivation for doing something.  Money is an incentive to make people change temporarily.  But when the money is gone, the motivation to continue with a project has to come from somewhere else.  For example, if a person is a Christian, they want to serve and obey God, so obedience to God's commands in the Bible is good motivation for that person to change or to do a certain thing.

On the final day of the conference, a Masai choir sang before dinner.  They were excellent singers and very beautiful!

 

So overall, it was a very good learning experience.  I learned much more than I shared with you in this post, but I don't want to bore anyone with too many agricultural details :) 

The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness - Book Recommendation

By Anthony:

The most important book I've read in this past year for my spiritual growth was also the shortest book I read.  It is called: The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness, by Tim Keller (who happens to be my favorite author).  It's short, but profound.  It's less than 50 pages so you have no excuse not to read it!

Like all of us, I am a sinful person, and part of that sinful nature is a warped heart.  In a surprising way, I both struggle with pride thinking I am better than others, and other times I feel insecurity, feeling like I'm not good enough, not doing enough, not pleasing people enough.  I've been this way since I was a child, and I'm guessing I'm not alone!

This book powerfully explains what true gospel-humility should look like.  Most people realize that feeling we are better than others is prideful and sinful.  But in the book he argues that it is also not good to critique ourselves, feeling like we don't live up to others' expectations.  Instead the answer is not to focus on ourselves at all.  Because of the Gospel, we have been excused from the courtroom, Jesus took our place, and we have been justified.   There is no more need to critique ourselves, and no need to get upset at other people's criticisms.

Because of Jesus, now we don't do good in order to build a resume, we don't do good to please other people, we don't do good to prove we are better than others, and we don't do good to get affirmation from others. Now we do good things out of real enjoyment and wanting to follow Christ.

In the book he also totally takes apart the cultural idea that giving people more self-esteem is the answer to society's problems.  We are not to exalt ourselves, or hate ourselves, we should not focus on critiquing ourselves at all.   I found this book very convicting, and a good message to what is perhaps my greatest spiritual struggle.  It was truly the beginning of more freedom to read it.