Thy Kingdom Come

In February Kyle and I were accepted to be full term missionaries with Africa Inland Mission.  We spent a week at their current headquarters in New York and we learned many things about Africa and heard about several things that we should expect as missionaries.  We learned about how grieving becomes a large part of a missionary’s life.  When missionaries first move overseas they say goodbye to family and friends that they have known for years, they say goodbye to all things familiar and they grieve.  Then years later when they have made a home in a foreign land, grief comes again when they go back “home” to visit or to stay.  We were told from veteran missionaries that a cycle of grief can become a reality.  This is just one of the difficulties of overseas missions work, but it seems to be the one Kyle and I struggle with.  We have to get good at saying goodbye, and this is something we don’t really want to do.  How can you get good at something you don’t want to do?  But it is to this that we were called…

I do not write these things to gain pity or praise. I write them because I was reminded today of what we heard back in February.  This morning at church we were both processing feelings of grief here in Mesa.  We love our church, we love the college age people we get to life with, we love our friends and family.  This morning our hearts were grieving a bit over the friends we have in Uganda that we had to say goodbye to.  But oddly enough at the same time I look ahead to the deep grief we will feel when we say goodbye to our families and dear friends. 

And so, it seems we are stuck between grief and a sad place.  Not that life is that dismal, it is just how I am processing right now.  We are glad to be home, glad to see those that we love, glad to know that we can just drive 5 hours to see my mom and brother and other family.  We are also glad that the Lord has put on our hearts his people in Uganda and that, if he wills it, we will get to live with them as well. So, if anybody can tell us how to be in five places at once, let us know.  We are brainstorming the possibilities (yes, Kyle has it up on the white board). 

As I process these things I am grateful for the Holy Spirit who has reminded me today that the Kingdom is coming. When Jesus returns, we will not have any grief.  We will worship the Lord all together, our family in the United States and our family in Uganda, we will be together with all the saints and we will be together with Jesus. 

Speaking of when Jesus returns... with all the hype about May 21st being the day Jesus was coming back; my mom and I made a plan to find each other in heaven... it wasn't that complicated.  Basically we agreed to grab our loved ones (I grab Kyle, she grabs Chris and my grandma) and head towards Jesus, on the way, look for dad or anyone else in the family and bring them too. I know I know not that sophisticated... we also agreed it would be good to live in the same cul-de-sac in heaven, anyone who reads this blog is also invited to live on our street too, I am sure spaces will go fast.  Not sure how this will all work out, or if we will even care about these things in heaven... it is better to be safe than sorry right? 

An Overview

We got home on Tuesday night after avoiding an ash cloud coming from an erupting volcano that extended our flight an hour.  We had a 23 hour lay over in London which was really fun and we got to do a bit of debriefing with our team in Hyde Park, it was gorgeous. 

Kyle and I really enjoyed London and it was a nice way to break up the trip back home.

Our time in Uganda was really a blessing; we so enjoyed seeing familiar faces, having people remember our names, meeting new people and seeing how Yahweh works in bringing his Kingdom to earth.  We got to experience fellowship with the church that we partner with, University Community Fellowship (UCF) led by our good friend, Micah Rwothumio whose house we stayed at (all 18 if us). Our team consisted of 12 college age students, the 2 of us, our friends Matt and Adrienne Gibson as leaders, and we were joined by Kyle’s parents a couple days after we got there.

We wanted to give you some highlights (and a few lowlights) of our time and maybe in the next few days spend more time writing about our time there:

- Micah had constructed a guesthouse on his property that was not there last year when we visited. We were so surprised to see it and very spoiled to be staying in such comfortable accommodations. Micah's wife, Grace, Grace's two sister's and their daughters spoiled us with their cooking and by taking care of us.  These women are wonderful and I am glad to have friendships with them.

-  6 people got sick within the first 24 hours of being in Uganda. Neither one of us were among the fallen but it made for a challenging couple of days.

- One of our first days there we spent a day doing "Random Acts of Kindness" around the church. We picked up a bunch of trash, helped clear up some of the grass field, and trimmed some hedges, trying to clean up some of the area around UCF. 

- The first Saturday there, we had a “Leadership Summit” which our team was responsible for. About 45 students from the UCF came to learn about “How to read your Bible”, “The importance of discipleship”, and “The importance of community in the Church.” Our students taught each session, they did great, and Kyle facilitated the entire day.

- On Sunday, Kyle’s dad preached at both services while our team was involved with the Sunday school time for the children. In one of the services Micah announced that Kyle and I would be relocating to Uganda next year. The cheers that followed that announcement humbled us and made us both a bit emotional.  We look forward to moving to Uganda, it is touching that some Ugandans look forward to our move as well. 

- We were tourists for a day and took a trip to Jinja, a town on Lake Victoria where the source of the Nile is. 

- We also had a "Kid's fun day" at UCF.  UCF invited churches in the area to bring children for this day and 440 kids showed up. It was crazy! There were so many kids at church. We played games and sang songs, painted faces, listen to Bible lessons and played some more. It was great and we were all so tired at the end of the day. 

This little girl was hilarious and is very spunky, if you can't tell. 

-We got to celebrate as UCF is turned 10 years old the second sunday we were there. It was a huge celebration and they also had a ground breaking ceremony for a new building they will be constructing. 

There was a lot we got to see and do while we were there. We are confident that the Lord was working and we are humbled to get to be a part of that. The trip was not easy and we know that we failed at times as leaders and as a team, but through it all we are grateful to have been able to go on this trip and to see all the ways that Yahweh is working. 

More to come in the next few days....

Going to Work

I had every intention of going into the office today.

After going to bed at 8:30 last night I woke up at midnight, 2:00 am so when I woke up at 4:30 I decided to just go into work early cause I was awake. I got ready, ate breakfast, kissed Kyle goodbye and got in the car but it wouldn’t start. That wouldn’t be such a big deal but our other car isn’t working right now either. While I was going to be at work today, Kyle was going to fix our Jeep. Now we have two cars to fix and I am not going to work today. So I am going to start writing about our trip……

Less Than a Week Away

We are supposed to be leaving for Uganda on Monday, May 9^th.   I say supposed to because of some recent events in Kampala, where we would be spending all of our time.  For those of you that follow international news you may have seen that Kampala was recently getting some attention.  It all started a couple of weeks ago when some opposition leaders decided to start peaceful protests over the cost of gas and food. They started “Walk to Work” and on every Monday and Thursday people would, you guessed it, walk to work.  Well in these peaceful protest there was one man in particular who seemed to be causing a little more trouble than the police thought he should.  In the last 2 weeks this opposition leader has been arrested 4 times.  One of the arrests was video taped and made it all over the news.  The opposition now has been responding also to the way their leader was being treated when arrested.  This last Friday there were several violent riots around Kampala due to the treatment of the opposition leader, the police and military shot rubber bullets and live fire, as well as tear gas and pepper spray,  sadly people were killed.

As a result we are making every effort to figure out what is going on in Kampala.   At this time we have spoken to our friends at the AIM regional office that live and work in Kampala.  We have also spoken to Micah, the pastor of the church we partner with.  They all agree that the media is not helping as they are showing things that cause an increase in emotion.  All of what we have heard from them is inconclusive; no one knows what is going to happen,  nothing could happen  or  the unthinkable could happen.  We wait with many Ugandans to see what happens tomorrow; President Museveni is supposed to meet with the opposition leaders.  If they do meet many people think that there will not be any further protests or disruptions.  If they do not meet then there is uncertainty.    

So we wait and pray for the people in Uganda, and for Yahweh’s will.  We groan because the kingdom of God is not fully here yet and we witness the pains of evil in this world.  Please join us in prayer for Uganda.

This is our team of 16:

 

We also have some understandable nervous parents and a few students.  We will not be leaving for Uganda next week if we know that it is not the Lord’s desire for us.  We seek out wisdom.

A list…

 1.    My mom and brother were in town this last weekend. We had a blast together and we laughed a lot … we all really needed a weekend like that. 

2.    We will be on our way to Uganda in 18 days, dang dude dang. 

3.    My brother is turning into a young man. His hands and feet are bigger than mine. 

4.    Our neighbor’s tree’s roots found our sewage line. I will spare you the details but let me just tell you there was some dry heaving. 

5.    God bless the inventers of bleach. 

6.    And God bless plumbers, and rubber gloves, and mothers and husbands that have stronger stomachs than me, and candles, and soap, and Clorox wipes…sorry I keep thinking about the mishap, the backup, the pure nastyness that we had to witness 

7.    I think I am going to start swallowing a tablespoon of cayenne each day for the next 18 days so that the lack of spices in Uganda may come as comfort to my tongue. 

8.    Maybe I shouldn’t swallow the cayenne, not sure what effect that would have on my digestive tract

9.    I need to go to the store to buy more bleach cause we used it all

 10.    Puppy dogs and flowers – try to think about happy things, plumbing issues are not happy   

God Raises the Dead!

“For we do not want you to be ignorant, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again. You also must help us by prayer, so that many will give thanks on our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many.”

(2 Corinthians 1:8-11 ESV)

One of the things that my dad passed on to me is the importance of a personal habit in Scripture. In my current youthfulness, I am trying to develop that habit, although it is frustratingly slow development! And so, right now, I am trying studying my way through 2 Corinthians. It’s a fantastic book filled with expression about living in the New Covenant initiated by Jesus our Lord. One of the things that the Lord keeps bringing to my mind is the passage 2 Cor. 1:8-11. There, Paul talks about some of the affliction he and his companions experienced that brought them to the point where they “despaired of life itself.” After this statement however, comes Paul’s vintage way of expressing hope and redemption in the midst of impossible situations. As he reflects on their affliction, he finds the purpose of God in it and says, “But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead.”

Sarah and I, as we live our lives, find ourselves in seemingly impossible situations. Although, I don’t think its as bad as the affliction Paul went through, they still can bring despair and hopelessness. Sarah and I have a hard time with these situations because we are the type of people that want to help ourselves out on our own. “We don’t want anybody else to care for us, we got it,” is usually our thinking. And while this can be a good thing, it can turn sinful very quickly because we don’t want God to help us or deliver us. Or if he does help us, it needs to be according to how we think the help should be done. God’s deliverance should be done according to our agenda and plans. God breaks us of this sinful thinking by bringing us into impossible situations where we have no control and no ability to do anything. And while this is hard and frustrating and can bring despair, we take encouragement from Paul’s words here in 2 Corinthians. All of this is to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us and will deliver us again. On him we have set our hope.

As we serve him now and prepare to move overseas, God continues to remind us of these verses and of the truth that he is the sovereign ruler over all things and all things find their completion in him. Our ongoing battle is to believe this and to believe its a good thing.

Disneyland!!

We successful surprised my brother by first of all being with him on his birthday and secondly by going to Disneyland.  The look on Christopher's face when we walked into my mom's house last Wednesday was priceless! He was so surprised and so glad that we were there (at least that is what he said).  Rain was threatening on Thursday so we put off going to Disneyland till Friday.  On Thursday we got to meet with the pastor of the church I grew up at about being missionaries in Uganda.  We were encouraged because of that meeting and Kyle will be preaching at all 3 of their services one weekend in August.  At that time we will get to share with many long time friends about what God is doing in Uganda and what he is leading us to do there.  So that is good!

But back to Disneyland, here are some photos:

 

I just love this lady

Here we are waiting to see the new water & light show “The Wonderful World of Color”

It was amazing!  If you get the chance to it is totally worth it!

We also got to meet up with my cousin, Lian and her husband, Brynnen (for some reason I did not get a picture of them) who live in Costa Mesa and both have season passes.  They are great and we had a bunch of fun hanging out with them.

Our weekend was wonderful and now that I have been out of town for the last three weekends we will not travel again until our trip to Uganda in May with the college students!

When we got back home we were also able to see two of Kyle’s cousins and their families that were visiting from out of state.  It was too short but really nice to spend some time with them.  The Lord has truly given us great gifts in the families that he has set us in.