'OH MY JEHOVAH!"

Friday’s lesson: “Listen to your faithful driver, Chris, when he tells you what time to travel.” Because given the option we always travel in the evening, leaving Jinja about 7pm.  Generally we arrive in Kampala/Entebbe about 10pm.  This time someone suggested we leave mid afternoon and so we did, arriving in Kampala, well you know about 9pm…but got to enjoy so much more of the traffic, road dust and daylight…ahhhh!

We had a quick dinner and settled into Namirembe Guest house rooms for the night.

Saturday, we met with our attorney to hear him discuss the final details of the land purchase including all of the adventurous work he has had to do to find the actual owner, not the representatives we first heard of or the company name that was posing as the owner.  The Lord protected us in all of it, the two years of savings and the sacrifice many of you have made for Chayah.

Sharon, our university girl also arrived to join us for the day and we all climbed into the van and headed to African Hearts primary school and to one of their homes.  We were taking in every bit of building design, material and placement including a kitchen that cooks for masses and a new project that will be a boarding building and provide an area for teaching trades.   

We have learned so many things and I am counting on the idea that as God has equipped each of us with different gifts, each also took some great mental notes in one particular area of development so that when we get home we’ll have a more complete picture of all we experienced.

African Hearts was preparing for a graduation celebration of all of the P7 (7^th grade) students.  Recording 100% success rate of their candidates, we are very interested in their compassionate, holistic teaching methods and curriculum.   So with the ceremony chasing at  our heals, we shuttled off for another larger ministry site African Renewal.

Things took a hilarious turn when we requested an upgrade from a wooden fishing type boat with small outboard motor.  Time was short to get to the site on the tip of a peninsula and we were concerned about seasickness.  BUT neither Janet, Sharon nor Chris had ever been on a fast boat and none of them can swim and as we were pounding along the windblown swells on Lake Victoria, they shuddered, squealed and held on for dear life.  Only, if you can imagine it, with very little confidence. 

 Janet was doing her best to let go with one hand long enough to try to signal to the driver to slow down all the while swinging from trying to give him the stink eye to laughing hysterically in her terror.  We found out later, Chris was shouting to the driver to slow down because “that woman has a heart problem” (pointing to Janet).  She has no such problem but he couldn’t give up the truth that he was the one with the impending cardiac response.  Sharon could not wipe the huge grin from her face because she too was holding on with everything she had.  If you have never heard Kristen laugh uncontrollably, you have missed out on one of God’s greatest gifts and that 20 minute boat ride was very possibly THE most entertaining experience of the weekend spent in the big city.  

We exited the wild ride onto a dock that welcomed us to Bethany village where we were given a tour of their program, projects and homes.  This ministry has been in effect since the mid 90’s having begun when a Ugandan woman began taking in street children, first 12, then 24, and quickly 60.  God has blessed their work and it has grown so very much.  We were especially impressed by their farming technique; including something probably any farmer would know about but was completely new to us. 

Don’t judge me (grin) when I tell you that you can keep pigs in a concrete pen and use bacteria that you’ve grown on dough balls of flour and water and placed in a tree,  to sprinkle in their waste that causes pig droppings to breakdown and assimilate with the sawdust which they then use to fertilize the crops. (I know that sentence broke every grammatical rule but I'm way too excited to redo it)  I’m serious when I say I have never seen or heard of such a thing.  They call it organic farming, but those pigs were so clean that I would have gladly stepped foot inside their concrete rooms without hesitation if I thought they would have allowed me.   Sharon was using her favorite phrase “Wow, wow, wow!” over and over again and I thought "that is exactly what I was going to say!"

We saw a green house type building that held 4 huge tanks containing 500-800 tilapia fish growing next to some specific plant and a water circulation system and some over-my-head description of how the plants benefited from the fish waste and the fish benefited from the plant waste.  God has created everything for himself and his creation magnifies and glorifies Him, it just takes my breath away every once in a while and far too seldom, but Saturday afternoon I felt such awe that I wonder if it wasn’t a glimpse of the Heaven and Earth that will one day be revealed to us.  

We enjoyed every other part of the tour, including the homes that housed each “family”.  We got to visit in one home and asked the kids there to advise us on the most important things to focus on at Chayah.  It took some encouragement, but they made sure we had a list of the things kids need most.

We experienced so much that in some regards instead of looking at our ministry from the ground up, we were looking at possibilities from the top down.  Even as I write this a day later, I think the thoughts and directions to consider are swirling like a tornado, fast and furious and exciting and overwhelming.  We are confident that the storm of what might be ahead will settle with much prayer and plenty of time.   

We are very grateful for the opportunities to see what others have done and with both ministries coming from the hearts of Ugandans for Uganda it is really a perspective we haven’t had much access to.   We are mindful that our language abilities make our speech simple, but that doesn’t mean that hearts or minds on either side are less than the wisdom God imparts to us. 

A simple life, free of material possessions or demands does not represent failure.  We can teach little here, we can learn much and together submit ourselves to the leadership of God.

I should end there…on a lofty spiritual thought…but please hang in there for the moment we were sitting on the grass at the end of our time a Bethany Village when Janet heard and saw the boat coming for us. (Furrowed brow)  “Oh God!”  “Jodi, do you think those drivers are born again?” (Very nervous yet hysterical laughter) “OH MY JEHOVAH!”

….and we got back in the boat for the second most entertaining boat ride of our lives because at that point in time we all thought we were on an island with no other options…it was later at dinner that we were told it was a peninsula… and… I could see the undeniable look on her face…do you people mean we could have DRIVEN? “Oh my Jehovah!”