uganda – Page 4 – His Grace For The Journey

Yay For Holiday!

The kids are home for their break before the last term of the year starts in September. They alerted so excited to see us and we are excited to see how happy they are. And growing like weeds! I got to hold Elisa (the youngest) during church. He fell asleep so he wasn’t really awake when I took the pic. I won’t be able to hold him much longer, he’s getting big, almost six. And he usually prefers Chris’s lap but he was preaching so I even traded one of the twin babies to hold him. He hasn’t had a mama to rock him, his died right after he was born.

They are all doing so well at school and seem to be developing more of a relationship with their father, which is something we have prayed for. It’s amazing to see such joy in children that have had it as rough as they have in their young lives.

Hope for More Girls!

This week we were able to visit one of the largest government schools in our village. Going in to it I did not know this. There was a big miscommunication and I was given the number of girls as ninety. Salima and I took one hundred kits “just in case”.

They called the girls to come and they came. And kept coming. I start sweating it! After we were all in this thirteen by fifteen foot room we counted 260 girls! I had to run to the car and tell Christian to go to the house and get all the rest that we had!

It is amazing what God does with us. How we are welcomed into what is mostly Muslim students and teachers, the school is right on the grounds with the large mosque. But they welcomed us and were not offended when I gave them the message that Jesus loves them and God has made us just the way He wants us. After I gave them a talk about how they are “wonderfully and fearfully made” we educated them about menstruation. They asked very good questions and were free about talking about things they’ve faced. Shame, fear, terror when they didn’t know what was happening to their bodies. Jenifer threatened them beforehand that this was a safe place and no one should leave that room gossiping about anyone else so I think that gave them the feeling of freedom to talk. We also talk a little about boys (pretty much stay away from them!), safety and self-defense. Salima is so helpful as she is an example of what staying in school and hard work can accomplish. She encouraged them to not focus on boys and sex but in getting an education that will enable them to have a better life.

It was a huge blessing to be there and give out the kits. And as always the boys were fussing that they had been left out of something so we gave the school two soccer balls for them. That appeased them!

We are so thankful we are given these opportunities with open arms and the teachers tell us so many times how appreciative they are for the education part. I gave the head teacher our flip chart so that she and the other female teachers can educate the girls further.

Thank you to all who have donated time and money to help us keep girls in school. A big thanks to ladies in Leesville/Anacoco, Louisiana for their contribution that allowed me to have the extras we needed with that large group because of course the teachers also asked for kits!

We now have two seamstresses that are busy each month making more kits! They are so happy to be receiving a good income every month!

If you feel led to help us help young women stay in school, learn how to defend themselves (which is really important here also) there can never be too many kits. 100% of your donation goes to the kits and to the seamstresses that make them go to https://themandate.com/campaigns/hope-for-girls/

And a great big I love you to Raelee who was my photographer for the day! She has a natural talent and I have been encouraging her as much as possible. She has moved up to an intermediate Nikon camera but still gets reigned in for too many selfies and pics of her kitten! She really stepped out of her comfort zone for this one – that many people makes her (and I!) very nervous but I had coached her beforehand of the specific pics I wanted her to make sure she got. She nailed it!

Preaching To The Forgotten

Every week Christian goes to the prison on the town near us. It’s been almost a year of going every week and there have been hundreds that have asked for salvation. For many it is a true change of heart, accepting the Holy Spirit to come and live in them. For some it is just a hope that going down and saying the words will get them the things they want. And some that come are just there to have a break from the dull everyday life in prison. But for all they hear the truth of God’s word every week.

It is always hard for us with everyone that asks for things, we know the needs are great everywhere and we can’t help everybody but especially in prison. And although most are there for breaking the law it is a lot different inUganda where at times you can be held for years without trial for something minor. Or if you have enough money to pay and families agree on an amount to give them you could have murdered someone and get out. The poverty is so great and jobs so few here so it is really hard for people to feed their families and pay for their children’s education. So many turn to crime.

Of course everyone says they are innocent and beg for help in getting out. It is very hard and very wearying to have to say no week after week to some of the very sad stories. Many of these prisoners families have abandoned them so they have no visitors and no help with things they need. There was one young man that Christian really felt for and finally gave him the little money to make bail and get out. The next week when Christian went back that young man was back. He had only made it on the outside three days before breaking into a pastors home looking for money. So we have to say no to everyone, how does one know who to help, who is going to use the opportunity given them to further their life. There have been a couple of men that were saved on prison and became leaders of Bible study, they were “Pastors” in the prison. They have now gotten out and left a hole there for men to seek guidance. We pray God lifts up more saved leaders on the inside.

What we can do is pray that Gods Word penetrates hearts, and changes those hearts. And provides those who choose HIm a way to live when they get out.

Another Pastor that goes every Week is trying to gather funds to open a type of Christian halfway house with discipleship, technical job training and literacy programs. We are in prayer with him that God will provide the way for this. We were a part of prison ministry in America and speaking Gods words to the prisoners was important, but we also knew that they needed someone to help when they got on the outside. One of the things I did with the women was teach them how to fill out job applications , how to handle themselves on a job interview. Here, they still need skills when they get out, a network of people who can hold them accountable. If there aren’t these type things set up a person that was already living a life of crime is going to go back to the only thing they know.

We ask for prayer for these men and women in prison, that God will touch them, they will accept Jesus as their Savior and He will lead them and their families to changes lives. Prayer for Christian and all of the men of God that go to minister to the prisoners. Prayer that needs are met in the prison and that also guards and workers at the prison also receive and react to the calling of Jesus in their lives.

Jesus said in Hebrews 13:3:

“Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.”

❤️

This Valentines day please give a gift of love to help girls stay in school, build self-esteem and stay safe. Too many drop out of school, sell their bodies for pads or get married just to get the things they need to stay in school.

This week my goal is to raise $5000 so that we can get kits to 500 girls in our community this term of the new school year. 100% of the money given goes to the project. We have one of our girls graduating tailoring school and she will be sewing kits to earn her own sewing machine.

Many times we donate money to causes and never really know where it goes. All money that is donated to themandate.com is used for projects. By clicking on the link below your money will go directly to this project. You don’t have to donate the $10 for a kit, anything you can give helps.

When we bless others we get even greater blessings back. And I wish all that support us could see the girls faces when they receive the kits.

This year besides the kits and education we give about menstrual health we are adding a self defense class.

Please give the love that leads to hope for these girls! Click the heart below to give! And thank you so much for your love!

Prayers For Ndianga

‘Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!’

Ecclesiastes 4:9-10

Many of you know Ndianga, he has been our friend since the day we came to Uganda. He was our personal driver for the first six months we lived here, until Christian started driving. We got the tipper truck specifically for him to drive and support himself and every week he paid us the amount we asked for to go towards repairs and such for the truck. He never missed a payment on time and was always honest about what he made. We love him very much, and even though he speaks very little English (more now than when we met him) we have developed a strong friendship with him. We can get information from him in an honest way, he is very humble and meek. He is held in high esteem in the village; we told him recently when his mother passed that it was a testament to his and his family’s character that one thousand or more people came from all over Uganda to mourn and pay their respects.

When we moved here, Ndianga had his own car and hired out to drive for people. A year before we moved he was in an accident and broke his pelvis and leg. He couldn’t afford the operation he needed so his injuries healed incorrectly. For the past two years he had one crutch and about a year ago our doctor told him that it hasn’t helped his problem at all. We helped him to get new crutches that helped some but with so much damage already done both from the accident and the crutches the pain finally became unbearable. It came to a point that he had to be carried to the car to get him to the hospital, while he cried in pain. That was hard to witness from a man who has been independent, strong and always smiling even with the disability he lives with everyday. He hasn’t driven the tipper and it has been very hard on him because he has always taken care of his family and not asked for handouts. Because of The Mandate’s long friendship and respect for him we have been helping him physically and financially for the past six months or so to get to doctors and physical therapy that hasn’t helped. It has all come down to having to have surgery – a hip replacement. Because the bone didn’t heal correctly and crutches that didn’t help his posture he has disc’s in his back that are bulging and the only way to correct that is to replace the damaged hip. After much prayer The Mandate and friends of The Mandate have generously given the $4600. for the surgery. We prayed that if the money was given that he would go ahead with the surgery, so many fear hospitals and surgeries so they don’t have them when they do need them. But the pain and suffering and not being able to work has gotten him to the place where he knows he won’t have a better quality of life unless he has it.

After about four different hospitals and as many doctors his friend told him about an orthopedic surgery hospital a couple hours away. He went and was very encouraged by the Dr. and the hospital. It is a far cry from the government hospitals and Dr’s. He decided that is where he wanted to have the surgery done but he wanted us to go first and speak with the Dr. and see the hospital. We were going a couple weeks ago and his mother died so it was put off until this week. We went and met the Dr. who is very friendly, articulate and answered all of our questions about the surgery, recovery and rehabilitation. We joked that Christian told Ndianga after he was healed they would race. The Dr. didn’t get it as a joke and asked Ndianga if he was a runner – why is it so important that he be able to run. And that at his age that wasn’t a good idea because he could fall and break it again. He asked him why he wanted to have the surgery. When we explained that was all in fun he high fived us and laughed. Ndianga told him that he wanted the surgery because of the pain and the inability to work. We felt good and at peace with his decision to have it done there, with that Dr.

Ndianga will go to the hospital on this Saturday, August 11 to get settled and ready for the surgery which will be on Monday, August 13. We don’t know the time of the surgery yet but please pray with us that all goes well with the surgery. that God would touch him with His healing hand and give him the comfort and peace he needs to get through. He should stay in the hospital for one week, go home for a week and then go back to be checked. Then over about three months he will heal and have rehabilitation. Surgery for anyone is a big deal, even in America, but so much more here. Over all the hospitals and doctors we have experienced here this one is the best we’ve seen but it is still scary.

He wants to let everyone who has helped to make this possible how very grateful and humbled he is. He is not a Christian and we pray always that every kindness, every example we set before him will be a witness and bring him closer to being a believer in Jesus Christ. Every opportunity we have we tell him that it is not us, it is not The Mandate that supplies all of our needs but our Savior and our faithfulness and obedience to Him.

The surgery isn’t as expensive as it would be in America, by a long shot, but it is still a lot of money and any donations toward that would be a great help to The Mandate so that we can help others who want to but can’t help themselves. Visit themandate.com and donate to any of our projects or the general fund. And God bless all who have helped in many ways to enable us to help those in our community.

Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful. “Judge not, and you will not be judged; condemn not, and you will not be condemned; forgive, and you will be forgiven; give, and it will be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use it will be measured back to you.” Luke 36-38

Off With Their Heads!

We have been harvesting plants and grasses – just this week we cut our first hay and it is drying. I was sad to see them beheading our beautiful sunflowers but the birds had started stealing seeds so we decided it was time to cut them. We cut half of the stalks and dried them but we left the other half so we could give the rabbits fresh leaves for as long as possible. Raelee brought some leaves in yesterday to feed Ted and two baby rabbits we have inside and there was mold on them. We didn’t forsee that or we would have cut it all. We are now checking the rest of the leaves to see if there is any to salvage. If not we may have to either pull all leaves off the stalks if they can be used or just cut it all down and burn it. We have plenty already dried to add to the pellets, the rabbits go crazy over the sunflower heads but one feeding for five hundred rabbits and it would all be gone! We will grind the heads and seeds (of which there were many) and add a minnow like fish they eat here for protein along with another plant and make pellets with the equipment we bought for that.

We’ve harvested a lot of grass that is for the goats and bulls, Christian made a wood box that they pack the dried grass into and make bales. And this week our first hay was harvested. The rains have still been coming a couple times a week so we are debating on planting more sunflowers and hay. We have been communicating with a man that sells solar pumps so that we can put one on a well we have in the back and run drip irrigation so that we can grow during the dry months. It is a lot of work and we are very very thankful for all the help we have!

Our headless sunflowers!

Dried grasses

Packing the grass into bales

Dodo plant

Drying the sunflowers

Busy Days

We’ve been so busy the past few weeks! We had our rabbit cages and some rabbits on display at the National Agriculture Expo – where the President spoke and it was a lot of work getting everything ready. Of course it was kind of last minute that we were asked to have them there. The feed store we have gotten food for our animals asked to have the display since they sell rabbit feed. And to get interest in raising rabbits. We’ve had many calls since from people wanting to buy one rabbit or a pair of rabbits, which was not our intention but we did sell about 20 rabbits. We’ve had calls from people wanting to “partner” with us but for now we are just focusing on our community. It was a good experience to see people get interested in raising their own rabbits. We sold one set of cages but have some other people interested. The cages are not inexpensive – especially since we have to pay the “mazungu” prices on materials so we won’t make money from them but it gives income to the men that make them and gives them new skills. We tell them that if they can get better prices on the materials they can make a pretty good income. We try and explain to them that every time we get gauged on prices, that is money that could be used for other things but they don’t get it.

Our rabbits are growing, we have around 300 babies – that isn’t including the 200 adults! It’s a lot of work, even with our three workers. We have orders for meat and sausage and are pretty excited about it. There are to rabbit breeders that would like to work with us on selling the meat, they already have a couple restaurants in Jinja that order but they can’t keep up with the demand so it would be great to work with them. Our five for five program is to help our community to be able to have meat to eat but also can provide income for them, so helping to open markets for the meat will be a help to everyone raising rabbits. Our village isn’t quite sure about it yet but we plan on having a cook off soon with grilled rabbit to find good cooks who want to open a stand in town and have their own business. We want to help get them started and then they will be on their own with their own business. That will also help our community members that start raising their own rabbits.

We are preparing for guests from the States coming this weekend. Everyone is so excited and working hard to get everything looking good! It’s really not that much extra work – we have great help and they keep the farm looking good all the time. Personally we are excited to have fellowship and people to strengthen us, pray with us and play with us!

We got our car back after two months of not being able to drive it and we are so glad! I was quite nervous in Kampala and the trip home but we made it without incident. We had a crowd come to the house as soon as we drove in, you would think it was a community car as excited as everyone was that we got it back! We were getting congratulated and hugged by everyone! It was a good day!

By The Numbers

Serving The Least Of These

“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left. Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’

In this video I used pictures I have taken, because this is the world I live in. These are the people and places that I serve. God called us out of the blue to come here and serve as His hands and feet to His children, to bring them to Him. People say they admire us and don’t think they could do what we have done – leave everything behind and go to a place where everything is so different. We are just trying to be obedient to what God has told us to do. We have this calling on our lives.

But what about you? God may never call you to a third world country, but He does call you to serve right where you are. To look outside yourself and around at those you interact with everyday. There are those who are hurting and thirsty for Living Water even when they don’t know it, you can point them to the only One that can heal them and quench their thirst. Sometimes just a kind word can change a heart, lift spirits and turn someone around from the trouble they are headed. YOU can be the love of Jesus in their day or even their life.

Those that are hungry and seek to fill that hunger with the things of this world, with drugs, with everything but God. They need the Word of God to feed them, we as Christ followers are to represent Him and share with them His Word, direct them to the places they can be fed.

Clothe the naked has to do (my opinion) with dignity, how we should treat the “least of these”. The down and out, those who people have put aside, deemed unworthy of respect and help. The homeless that have mental illnesses, the veterans that can’t get work because of the things they have seen in war and the injuries that they got protecting our freedom. “And if not for the grace of God there go I”. There are too many people getting government money for free, but there are also too many one step away from that because they can’t hold things together with their minimum wage jobs that they work hard for. Dignity and respect for others no matter their income level, race, culture, religion or sex.

Visit the sick. Do you know how many people are in nursing homes – both young people who are sick and the elderly – that have no one that visits them? We’ve been to many nursing homes through the years and it would break my heart to see the lonely and broken-hearted that have no one to comfort them. The same with hospitals. We should visit the sick, whether in those places or our neighbors and co-workers, help others at a time of need. Many church members just expect the Pastor to do all the visiting. I don’t see that in this verse, I believe Jesus was talking to all of us.

We probably have the hardest time with visiting those in prison. I think that before God moved us here this was a calling God placed on me. It’s not the most pleasant thing to do for me, it breaks my heart to see men and women who really never had a chance from the beginning of their lives end up where they are. Of course there are just evil people in prisons but you would be surprised at how many never had a loving family, came from abuse, or just made a stupid split second decision that changed their life forever. When we were involved with prison ministry the men and women connected with us because we understood that God’s Grace is the only reason we are not where they are. You may not have lived a life like Christian and I have so ministering to prisoners may not be your calling. If you have and God changed your life then I urge you to pray about it. If you have skills that could help someone when they get out, give your time for them. If you know of church groups, half way homes or counselors. I believe it is important to not only share the gospel with them but to give them something they can use when they get out to live a better life. “I will pray for you” doesn’t go very far when they walk out the doors with twenty dollars and nowhere to go but back to the life they knew before.

Everyone has a calling on their lives, serving those around us wherever God has placed us. Where you are right now is not an accident, and the people who cross your path are not coincidences. Ask Him today how He would have you be His hands and feet right where you are. As the scripture goes “Bloom where you are planted”.

*The song is Kings & Queens from the same titled CD by Audio Adrenaline

** The video quality may not be the best, I made it a small file and still took two days to load!

New Fruit

We found out we have an unusual fruit tree out front. Funny after almost two years we are just now finding out about it! It is called soursop and grows on the graviola tree. They are not all heart shaped though! It is delicious but I can’t really explain what it tastes like. Kinda like a mango and kinda like a peach. Maybe that’s why no one has told us about it! It is in the very front corner of our property (now at the corner of the mill) and is not a place we go to. We will now! The tree is about ten foot tall, I think we should trim it so we don’t have to have someone climb up to get our fruit!