MISSON: Uganda Blog Update 03-09-2015

Greetings! OUR CONTAINER HAS SHIPPED!!!

After a year of waiting, the money finally became available to ship our container full of books to Uganda. Thank you to everyone who gave books to our library. Thank you to everyone who gave money for the container and the shipping. And the biggest thanks goes to our church family, who worked so tirelessly to get this thing prepped and shipped. There is only so much I can do remotely from Uganda, so without their hands working on our behalf, we could not have brought our dream of a public library in Nakivale refugee camp to fruition.

According to the shipping company, our container should reach South Africa by the 30th, then Mombasa by April 9th. From there, it begins making its way overland to our home in Mbarara, Uganda. Exciting!

The people at Sangano are looking forward to this library with great anticipation. Currently, there are no libraries of any type out in Nakivale. They are working hard putting the finishing touches on the building that will house the books. We have to get some benches and tables made. Once the container comes, we have to sort and organize the books, load them into metal trunks for storage, and begin hauling them out there (we can’t put them on shelves because the termites will devour them). We have people ready to man the library and manage the books. It’s all coming together.

I have been burdened with the need for a public church library for some time. Our church will be doing something very practical and of direct benefit to their community through this library, and it will allow us to reach refugees from all over Africa with the Gospel, including Muslims.

Pray for the transition through customs, that we don’t get harassed by the customs agents and our container just comes straight to our house without issue.

I have finally reached 1 Corinthians 14 in my preaching. This means I can, at last, lay the axe to the root of the many Pentecostal/Charismatic cults operating in Uganda. Pentecostalism is appealing here, because it bears such similarity to traditional tribal religions. You have people getting possessed by spirits to receive secret knowledge. You have wild, emotional, frenzied “worship”. You have pagan rituals designed to coax favors from the spirits. All disease is caused by demons, so those have to be cast out, with more pagan rituals and lots of shouting. Slap a coat of pseudo-Christian paint on that, and you have the majority of the Penticosmatic groups at work in Nakivale.

The modern Signs and Wonders movement mines the third world for money and resources, and Uganda is no exception. I am quite weary of these thieves and charlatans, deceiving and exploiting the desperate and the poor. They deal in lies, but to paraphrase the great Steve McQueen from The Magnificent Seven “We deal in truth.” And the truth makes us free.

Pray for us as we continue educating our people and sowing the truth of God’s eternal word among them.