MISSION: Uganda Blog Update 09-17-2007

Hello, folks! No more tarantulas to report this time around (yeah, I know. You’re full of disappointment. :D) Our language studies are progressing well. We’ve moved from consonants to vowels. How you pronounce your vowels determines what accent of English you speak, and the same for all languages.  I have always had this secret habit of mimicking accents, due to my ongoing fascination with the many varieties of English spoken in America and around the world. Now I know WHY these accents are different. We’ll be doing drills, practicing the various vowel glides, and one moment, we’re from Brooklyn, the next from Piccadilly, and the next we’re all Aussies. It’s very cool. This means, when we learn French, or Luganda, or Tooro, or Swahili, or whatever our ministry requires, we will be able to say it like the natives. Some cultures actually look down on you if you speak their language with an accent. This training will eliminate that problem entirely.

We were in a missions conference this past week at Friendly Lane Baptist Church in Haltom City, TX with Pastor Bill Howe.  Pastor Tim Booth (Haughton Baptist Temple, Haughton, LA) was the main speaker. He did a tremendous job preaching. He was representing the Midwest Christian Boys’ Football Camp, run by the First Baptist Church of Dwight in Dwight, IL. It uses football to teach discipline and character to boys aged 12-19. They get solid scriptural preaching in a camp meeting format twice a day, in a “girl-free” environment where the preachers can be very direct to the young men. It’s a great ministry, and one we’ll probably take advantage of when we come home on furlough in a little while. On Friday night, the church voted to make us one of their missionaries, so we have gained some support from this meeting, which was a blessing.
Pray that every church we’re in from here on out supports us. Pray that churches where we’ve been who haven’t already done so will support us. Pray that we will learn our phonetics training well so we can be well prepared for speaking Ugandan dialects when we get to the field. Pray that the rest of our deputation will continue to go smoothly.