Archive for category: MISSION: Uganda Blog

Greetings!

We are enjoying our time in Florida very much. Being here means we get to see a lot of our kids, since most of them live down here. James (our eldest) is in Tennessee now. He recently started his new job in his chosen field as a Mechanical Engineer. He will be getting married later this month to a beautiful Christian lady he met at college. John and Ethan are both working for a big HVAC company. As you can well imagine, air conditioning is big business in Florida. Ethan has taken on his first apartment and is making preparations to marry his own beautiful Christian lady, in August. We got to assist with moving him in, which was very cool. John took some time off from school and has been working very diligently. He will be returning to finish up his education in the Spring at PCC. Meanwhile, Elizabeth and Gaelin are working for the college in their grounds department, working outside, doing landscaping, and earning money for the Fall semester.

Brennah went to The Wilds, a Christian camp in North Carolina, last week. She had a great time. Our kids, by virtue of being the children of missionaries, tend to miss out on things that kids who never have to leave their country get to do and take for granted. Like going to Christian camps, for example. Now, missionary kids get to do loads of other things that kids who stay in America will NEVER get to do in their lifetimes, so it kind of balances out. Nonetheless, you cannot help missing out on some things.

We have been attending Faith Baptist Church in Pensacola, FL. Those people took it on themselves to send our daughter to camp. We never asked for it. We weren’t expecting it. They just stepped up and said “We’re sending her to camp.” As a father, it means a lot to me to see people show love and care to my children. Brennah is doing very well in their youth group. The church has been a great blessing to us. I am accustomed to always having to be the teacher and the Pastor, so it is nice to get to sit in church and just suck up all the high quality teaching and preaching, as well as the fellowship with other believers. I sure do love the folks at Faith.

After Ethan’s wedding in August, we are going to be on the road pretty much non-stop through the end of October. If that sounds exhausting, it will be, but my goal in all of it is to raise our support back up to where it was before COVID. As it stands, I am pastoring FOUR churches at the Nakivale refugee settlement. Anna and I are doing the work of two missionary couples, but we are not being compensated for it. This greatly limits what we can do, because we simply do not have enough funding. I want to remain on the field for the foreseeable future, doing this work, but I won’t be able to keep doing that at our current support levels. I am trying very hard to resolve this problem by barnstorming as many meetings as I can fit into the Fall. Please pray that we will be able to raise new support in these churches, sufficient for our need.

I am also trying to raise $80,000 to fund numerous Outstanding Projects at the refugee camp. If you visit that page, you will see that we are not doing anything extravagant. These are merely quality of life improvements designed to give our churches decent places to meet, clean water, and assist with food, medicine and education. Please pray I will be able to raise sufficient funds so when we get get back to Uganda next January, I can put my contractor (and lots of other Ugandans) to work on these projects.

We had some difficulty with the motorcycle. I needed to get the title transferred into my name (long story). It also needed a new license plate, as the old one was stolen. This process, of changing the title and replacing the number plate, took nearly TWO MONTHS. It also needed one additional repair, which our mechanic went all the way out to the camp to do. Now it is working like a champ, and our deacons are using it to visit our churches, encourage the believers, and do the work of the ministry.

Some of you may have heard about Uganda’s recent passage of their infamous Anti-Homosexuality Bill. The Western news media is making it sound like Uganda is rounding up deviants in the streets. This is simply not the case. All Uganda has done is amend existing sex crimes legislation in their country to include HOMOSEXUAL sex crimes, in addition to regular sex crimes against women. If you rape a kid, or rape an adult, or intentionally give someone AIDS, they can put you to death. They also have levied substantial fines against any foreign NGOs who come in and attempt to groom children with deviant, homsexualist propaganda.

I fully support Uganda in their decision to exert their sovereignty in the face of the godless, pagan West, which wants to export sexual deviancy to countries who do not want this for their citizenry. Right now, the United Nations is cutting funding to Uganda over this, which means our refugees are not getting their food rations. They are being made to suffer because the UN, and the International Monetary Fund, and the United States think that sending aid means they have the right to tell a more or less Catholic / Anglican country that they have to accept sexual deviancy, or else. And our refugees are paying the price. It’s wicked. I am ashamed of my own country’s involvement in this.

If any of you would like to assist with food and medicine, please make use of the Donation link on the main page. Remember to designate what this is for. I will get that into Deacon Zizi’s hands right away to buy food / medicine and distribute it to people in need.

🇺🇸 HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY! 🇺🇸

God bless America.

I am now the parent of a college graduate.

I am about to be the parent of married children later this summer.

Kind of boggles the mind.

The graduation went great. It wasn’t that long ago that we dropped our eldest off at college, and were planning to return to Uganda. It tore my heart out to do it, but it had to be done. Children have to grow up. Boys have to become men. Our culture, when it isn’t destroying babies and children and families, has a serious problem with maturity.

We always focussed with our own children on the general concept of “We aren’t trying to help you be better children – we are preparing you to be adults.” Sure we had fun, but gaining maturity, developing into a responsible, useful adult has always been the primary goal. It makes me proud to see my young men being men, assuming responsibility, taking their places in the world.

Immediately after graduation weekend, we were off to Shreveport for a Bible Conference at Louisiana Baptist University. Thank you Dr. Maddox and the folks at Central Missionary Clearinghouse for inviting us! The sessions were a great encouragement and source of useful training.

I’m going to fanboy here a bit, but I GOT TO MEET DON AND CATHY MINGO IN PERSON! Don Mingo has written several books, including “The Cross-Cultural Worker’s Spiritual Survival Guide: 14 Survival Tips to Help You Thrive in Your Calling“. I read that book back in 2019. I had been struggling with what turned out to be extreme emotional fatigue and burnout. I was discouraged. Yet I was working hard, because that’s what you do – don’t quit and work harder. COVID hit and trapped us in America. So I had no choice. I had to stop and focus on myself and my family. That book encouraged me to get counseling. It saved my ministry. Probably my family too.

It was also good to stop in for a visit with our supporting church, Shady Grove Baptist Church in Bossier City. That church has faithfully supported us since 2008. I remember I went to their missions conference way back when we were still attending Baptist Bible Translator’s Institute in Texas. They have faithfully stuck with us all this time. Like the parable goes, they were with us through everything, through the heat of the day. I am very grateful for churches like that. You all encouraged me to keep going back when I was still a newbie, struggling to raise my support. You helped get me where God was leading us, and you helped keep me there. Thank you!