Day 7

Morning (Guest House)

I love waking up here to crazy bird sounds. So beautiful and rare. Also, the 30 minute drive into Kiburara is enchanting. All of the women and children are walking along the roads with bananas and baskets on their heads and the mountains are standing majestically in the morning fog. Many of the trips we would pick up people and drop them off later on our route. I'm not sure what Sunday would say to them, but they'd be waiting for us by the time we came back through hours later! We also have picked up several people who will be attending the youth conference. What strikes me is that they don't bring anything and really can just jump on the bus without any other apparent thought. No thought given to the fact that they won't be home for a couple of days! They live life so simply.

Evening (Guest House)

Today started the youth conference, and the pastors from the pastor's conference were in with us for the morning. Robin & Drew both preached and we worshipped. Oh do they worship! They sing and they dance and they smile and they pray. There is really no explaining it! Some of the songs we could pick up lines and some had a bit of English, but others we just had to smile and sway!

We went up and sang some of our worship songs that are quite different from theirs, but we had a guitar and did try to dance a bit, so it was still worshipful! The day wasn't what I expected in that the conference was literally mostly preaching like all day. In between sermons, you don't break, you sing! I can't believe Robin has done this all week! He was preaching like 8 hours a day to the pastors! PTL.

We broke for lunch around 1 and Pastor Moses decided to have us do a bit more village outreach. Some people stayed back so we just had a group of 4 and a group of 3.

We drove for about 30 minutes and dropped off Lani and the Foster's after visiting a work site (I can't remember if I explained this before, but in years past the work days were very long at the widows homes because they were doing like 4 houses each day or something ridiculous like that. This year, we did 2 each day and then hired the masons to do 8 more by the end of the week. It was neat though, because the village evangelism often took us by way of the work sites, so we could chat with the masses :)

Next, our translators took our team (Gavin, Jess, Jeff, and me) to another work site that Sunday had to work wonders to make it down those narrow paths. We still walked even further in, so we were really back in the bush!

This site was pretty cool because it seemed that everyone was their to help. It was like a good old fashioned barn raising with the men flinging on the cement and the women preparing the food.

This was in the form of a giant pot of millet over a fire with women working hard to stir.

I don't recall who gave me the honor, but someone asked me to try...SHEESH! It was not an easy dish to stir! These were broom sized mixers that I essentially had to put my entire body weight into stirring. To make it even more humbling (they are already laughing at my attempts), the smoke was so strong from the fire, that I was completely crying. I tried to quit (I couldn't see!), but Simon kindly gave me his sunglasses so I could keep at it. Oof-dah!

As per usual, we picked up a posse of children who followed us to our next few stops.

This area was particular stunning. It was more lush than most of the villages and tall green trees lined each path forming mysterious walls around turns begging to be discovered.

The first house we came upon had a bubbly old woman who was thrilled to have us in her home. Again, they would not allow us to sit on the dirt, so they pulled out a bench and a straw mat. Jess and I sat on the bench, but the woman immediately shooed us to the floor and Christopher informed us it was custom for the women to be on the mat. We found out her husband was a Christian and he said he had been praying for her for years. She was eager to have us explain the Gospel and then accept Christ.

I realize that we have a platform here like Tim Tebow has in sports! It all seems so easy, but I think that their hearts are open and we are highly regarded simply because we are so different. It is neat to see how God moves between the nations, even using the nations to share with each other! Also, I should just mention how thankful I am for the translators. God is truly speaking through them and I am so blessed by their wisdom, enthusiasm, and sacrifice to be with us this week. I pray that God will continue to bless their lives and that they would never stop serving Him.

The woman was so happy as was her husband who joyously took her hands. They followed us to the next group of young guys probably about our age heading home from work on the road. The boys were Catholic and interested in hearing what we had to say, but ultimately asked if they could be born again but remain in the Catholic church. Gavin assured them that they could so long as their church was preaching that Jesus is the only way to salvation. We also added that it is by faith, not by works, that they are saved. It is a free gift, not something we can earn. All grace. I shared my testimony with them and mentioned that my parents were raised Catholic and also talked about Ben and how much we had to trust in God during his epilepsy.

Anyway, they promised to try Pastor David's church on Sunday, so it is in God's hands...not that it was ever in ours...

Another man wanted to wait and attend church with his family on Sunday and he asked that we pray for him to have strength to come. After we were walking away I watched Gavin hold back and trade shoes with the man. The man was shocked. It was pretty cool to see and who knows the impact it may have on that man.

Another man asked us to pray that the evil spirits would leave his home.

The other group had a pretty neat experience when an old old woman asked to pray for them! She is a widow, her children are grown, her home needs repair, but she has Jesus and her prayers were powerful as she laid her hands on Paul and prayed for him and our work both here and in the United States.

Back in Kiburara the rest of the team was also seeing God work. The guys went to the prison and Andrew shared his testimony with about 130 prisoners and they could understand and relate to the things he had done in anger and sin and he was able to explain to them how radically God changed his life from one of violence and hate to love for Christ. 25 men came to the Lord. Awesome!

Robin also unexpectedly asked some of the girls to lead worship. Oh yea, this morning Pastor Moses asked Gia and Yvette to share some info about HIV and Aids. Again, they stepped up and were flexible and many people asked questions about the prevention and things like getting tested before getting married. Obviously this is a major problem in Uganda and it was great for people with medical knowledge to share with them!

We headed back and felt full. What a day! Oh, I ran into Janta Maria and Solivia again, she ran up and gave me a huge hug :)

At dinner I decided to go back to meat after a two-day hiatus from goat. It looked like steak so I figured I should give it a try. As I chomped the strange meat (that did not taste very good) Frank was across the table from me talking to Sue about liver. I promptly stopped chewing and looked at them as Sue hushed Frank and didn't want anyone else to know what it was. I willed myself to swallow and thanked God I hadn't taken more than I should have so that when I left it on my plate I wasn't being AS rude...Yuck. Why on earth would I ever think it was steak?

We went to our room and many followed and we had another enjoyable evening of laughter. I decided to take Motrin PM again and slept beautifully.