The Wednesday after we got here, the AHI staff cooked a huge African feast in honor of the school’s 5th birthday – matoke (mashed, steamed plantains), gingery beef stew, steamed cabbage, taro, g-nut (peanut) sauce, “irish” potatoes, pineapple, and brownies were on the menu! We helped scrub and peel and chop and mash a giant mound of food for the 70-something community members who showed up.

I remembered the matoke from last time. The peel oozes a super sticky sap when cut, which leaves your hands black and covered. Water won’t clean it off, only oil and a sponge!

It’s the beginning of the rainy season, but for this day, everyone was praying that we wouldn’t have any showers since all the tables were set up outside! In the end, there was thunder, but no rain. Guests started showing up about 4, and by 5:30 all the tables were full and there was a blanket on the grass, covered with children.

There were speeches from all the local dignitaries – prefects, school headmasters. Isa gave a “brief” story of AHI that had us all laughing, and several of the Eastside team did an improv routine. Then it was time for the mountains of food! I sat next to Jovia, who I remember from when I was last here. At that time she was a teacher at the Ekitangaala Primary School, but is now the headmistress. She told me that many classes have close to 100 kids! Can you imagine trying to teach that many at a time, squeezed into one room? An article I read yesterday said that since the government made primary school free for all in Uganda, the classes have exploded in size…

The next morning we were up early to send off the Eastside team at 7 am, then Maggie left with us for Kampala. Peter drove us the two hours into the city – it would be a lot faster if not for the pot-holed 6-7 miles between us and the main road (takes 20-30min), and the traffic once you hit the outskirts of Kampala. Most of the drive is fast and beautiful, past farms, many little towns, banana and pineapple groves.

We stayed at the Cornerstone Guest House for two nights and went all over town as Maggie showed us the post and immigration offices, grocery stores, market. We bought a phone and modem, found a wifi café, and went to a yummy pizza restaurant! By the time we shopped on Saturday morning, though, and tried to fit everything in the mid-sized sedan, there was barely room for us to fit! It reminded me of traveling to Papua New Guinea; remember the old ladies laughing at you, Dad, as you tried to fit all our luggage in the trunk of the rental car? And that we sat on top of more luggage inside?

Despite our full car, we stopped on the way home in Luwero to buy fruit through the window, and found room for pineapples and watermelons on our laps =)

Before we left the market, though, our driver Peter discovered a flat tire! So we somehow extricated ourselves out of the car so he could jack it up. Off came the old tire, he hopped on a boda boda (motorcycle taxi) with the tire balanced in front of him, and took off to ? It was midday and we were in the sun, until a nice market nyabo (woman) offered me her umbrella. Peter showed back up 30 minutes later, and we were off, back home. =)

Maggie has lots of ideas for us to do, many of them things she’s had to put off for lack of time. Patrick will be designing inventories for the school, teaching Excel and typing, and gathering interviews for the book. I’ll be teaching cooking and baking classes, designing an AHI cookbook (anyone want to help me with this?), and taking photos. Together, she wants us to teach Character Development classes, start staff bible studies, and somehow work on fostering more community on the Ranch. Whew! Lots of ideas are going through our heads - we’d love prayer on what to focus on and how to best use our time here. =)

Check back soon to hear about Patrick’s insect-killing techniques and headlines from the local news!

-- HCD

Patrick and Heather have safely arrived at Ekitangaala Ranch, but their journey is still just beginning! JOIN US this this week for the first prayer meeting in their absence.

We will be meeting Thursday at 7PM at the Rivard's house (email contact@daysinafrica.org for directions). If you have the evening free, it would be awesome if you can swing by and PRAY WITH US, for their health, long-suffering, and the ability to show Jesus' love to the people they meet.

You can RSVP on Facebook.

Remember you can also keep up with them at:

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See you there!

-- Tom

Alive.  That is the word that best describes Uganda. Life is everywhere - whether it be in the green, wild, insect-filled world of the bush, or in the city of Kampala where humanity seems to be bursting out from every crevice as millions wander the streets, there is life and movement from life everywhere. I saw a bicycle with a dozen dirty canisters carrying water latched on every possible way being pushed by three small children up a hill. I saw a motorcycle carrying an entire family of five piled on front to back. Even in the most remote parts along the highway there are people walking up and down the road. Cows and goats wander the streets eating whatever they can find. Even in the pitch of night the world is loud with insects and birds calling out. Uganda is alive.

So into this world Heather and I were dropped. When we exited the airport we met with Hakim, one of Maggie’s most trusted staff members and Mathias, a hired driver. Driving in Kampala is like some sort of supercharged version of driving in New York City, a New York City with hundreds of thousands of motorcycles thrown into the mix, and Mathias just rammed his way through the traffic.

Maggie doesn’t get into town often so she had a list of supplies for Hakim to pick up for the upcoming party. So we navigated the labyrinth of streets in Kampala to find Hakim’s favorite street vendors. We also stopped by a “Mzungu” (westerner) grocery store that had armed guards patrolling the entrances and parking lot, so that Heather and I could buy some basic supplies. Once we had picked up everything in Kampala, the SUV we (and our nine assorted bags and backpacks!) were in was pretty much filled to capacity. We drove north out of the city and then stopped at a huge fruit market in Luwero where we bought bags upon bags of fresh fruit and vegetables. Since there was no more room we simply carried them on our lap. Mathias bought us a bunch of mini-bananas that were super sweet and his face beamed with pride as he told us how Uganda had the best fruit in the world (don’t tell Wenatchee). Then up to Kakoge, but wait - Hakim had one more stop in a small town between Kakoge and Luwero.  We pulled off into a small market literally in the middle of nowhere behind a Taxi that had the words “Air Force One” scrawled across the windshield. Hakim hopped out of the car and disappeared into the crowded street market. We sat in the car for a long time eating mini-bananas and talking to Mathias when finally Hakim darted back out of the market (somehow from the opposite side of the road though I never saw him cross) carrying 5 or 6 LIVE chickens.  Hakim threw the chickens on the floor in the passenger seat, completely unaware of my shock, while Heather was bursting with laughter from my wide eyes. We rode off again to Kakoge where we turned down a dirt road full of potholes. Every time we hit a pothole the chickens would squawk and flap and get upset and Hakim would gently kick them until they quieted down.  We drove a long ways deep into the bush from Kakoge, passing mud huts and rough brick houses in various states – nearly all marked in some way by the deep poverty that exists. We finally came to a sign marked “Ekitangaala Ranch” and Maggie came running out with several AHI Staff and students behind her shouting, “They are here”! Indeed we were.

In these first few days it has been a mix of highs and lows, there are times where I think there is no way I can survive this for an entire year and then there are times where I feel so blessed and excited to be able to be doing this. I spent much of these first few days with the short term mission team from Eastside Foursquare, but they are about to leave and I will really miss them.  On the day we arrived, we drove off (hanging on for dear life at 60+ miles per hour on the back of a flatbed truck) to a primary school near Nakasangola and showed a Jesus film to students. On the ride I had a funny conversation with the Pastor who was guiding us. We were talking about Nuns and Monks and he was talking about how he believes it is not biblical because they do not produce. I thought he was talking about witnessing to others and discipleship and we began to talk about it when before too long I realized some miscommunication, the Pastor was not talking about producing disciples but about producing babies!

When we arrived I bounded into one of the classrooms and started talking to the children.  They were laughing and giggling and a few were interacting but for the most part they were quiet. Then one student raised his hand and informed me that I needed to leave because their teacher had told them to be quiet and I was making them disobey and talk. The class erupted in laughter as I mockingly shamed my way out the door. As we watched the film most of the kids stood; I figured if they could do it so could I, but man, by then end of that movie my feet were killing me.

 At the end the Pastor drilled the children with questions about what they saw, and they were quick to answer.  Then he asked me if I had any questions for the children, clearly wanting to demonstrate their knowledge.  Instead I asked them which part they liked the best.  One kid shyly answered “when Jesus calmed the storm.” Then I really confounded them by asking “why did you like it?” He didn’t have an answer but another kid answered “because it showed the power of God.” The pastor asked me earnestly “Was that the right answer?” I said yes but there was no one “right answer.” Then I shared with the class that it didn’t matter how much knowledge you had about Jesus, it didn’t even matter if you memorized the entire bible, knowledge did not make you a Christian.  What made you a Christian was the condition of your heart and how you react and live with Jesus. I don’t know if that made any sense to the children but I hope the Holy Spirit was able to translate what I desperately wanted these children to understand.

The next day we drove out to a village to fix a “borehole” in a tiny village. A borehole is the pipe that brings the water up in the well.   The pump had gone bad and the village had been without fresh clean water for two years.  The Eastside team had already done one borehole so they had some experience. Basically you have pipes - one large one and one smaller inside the large - and you connect each 10 foot piece of pipe, lower it down, vice it off so it doesn’t fall and then connect another section of pipe. Sounds easy enough except that once you have 12 or 13 sections of pipe connected you are lifting a huge amount of weight that you are lowering under the ground. Here I found myself useful with my height, able to stabilize the pipe high in the air while they screwed it on. Speaking of my height, I have found it immensely valuable here not because of anything physical but as an ice breaker - people are excited to talk to the “tall mzungu”. It was a fantastic moment as we sat around the village eating fresh pineapple and jack-fruit while they pumped out the first fresh water this village had seen in years.

That evening we went to a school for young men here on the ranch called Cornerstone Leadership Academy, to eat dinner with the students.  They were all so excited to see us and we spent almost an hour meeting and greeting before we sat down for dinner. I particularly got to know two young men, one named Patrick who was elated by my coincidental name (it means Noble he told me proudly) and another named Eric. They called me brother and insisted I sat at the table and eat with them.  These men eat one meal a day and it is literally nothing more than a bowl of rice and beans.  When I told them all that it was my birthday they sang Happy Birthday to me and I pretended to blow out candles on my bowl of rice.  We shared our favorite verses as I broke out my bible and we had a great time discussing scripture, our testimonies and just life.

For the most part everyone is so sincere that it can be confusing to someone like me who is used to lots of sarcasm.  It makes sharing and opening up with each other so much easier though, and I am starting to really appreciate how genuine everyone is. Every day has been an adventure - I have no idea how I will be able to fit everything in on the blog, but I will do my best. Pictures should be coming as well. Check out the Blog in a week or so when I tell you more about AHI, our Ministry here and the huge celebration we just had for AHI’s 5 year anniversary.

--PHD

“…and when do you plan to leave?”

Heather and I looked at each other uneasy about the answer.

“End of March.” Heather said quietly.

“So you have about 8 weeks to raise $28,000?”

I awaited the doomed diagnosis, already beginning to cringe a bit. Heather and I were sitting across from John Shimer a friend of Maggie’s who had been professional fundraiser before retirement; this was not going to be good news.

“…No problem, you’ll be able to raise that easily, God will provide.”

And with those words John had cured something inside of us, doubt. I think before that I wasn’t 100% sure we were even going to Uganda, but those simple words of encouragement changed something in Heather and I, God WOULD provide, and so we could lean full tilt into this thing and trust that God was not going to let us fall.

John wasn’t done though. He was working hard on a book with a Maggie about African Hospitality Institute. He had asked if we could help on some level as field agents gathering information for the book. My Journalism brain was buzzing with the opportunity, and Heather was excited that she could practice her craft of Photography. If we were willing to help, John offered to support us in a big way. I didn’t know what a “big way” meant but with $0 raised it sounded helpful.

We met with John again a few weeks later to get an idea of what this book was and what our role would be in gathering information. We also spoke with Maggie who was extremely supportive of us being involved. All the pieces were coming together but to be honest I can’t say I was genuinely on board, at least in heart with the project.

Now it’s a well known fact that I hate, on a general principle, Christian books. I can be a bit overzealous in my passions for things and I have been known to go into a rant about this topic or that. Some of these rants my dear wife has had to hear a multitude of times and there are some key topics that I am sure she now winces at when any stranger dares to bring them up. One of those rants if reduced to a sentence would be that Christians read too much Christian living and not enough Bible. Now I’ve been a retail manager for nearly a decade and often we will look at our sales mix, a breakout of what category of product is selling and not selling, and reorganize the store accordingly. Now imagine you walk into any Christian book store, and based on floor plan and space you tell me what the sales mix roughly is for Christian Living books vs. Bible Study. 80/20? Maybe…. If your lucky, and that is my problem.

So I was having some concerns about working on this book, and then Maggie sent us an e-mail addressing her vision for the book. I’ll quote a small edited version for you:

"I have read or pretended to have read, many other self-published books by friends / peers in ministry. Most of them are boring and sit in bookshelves collecting dust. Most of them are so steeped in 'stained glass' 'holy talk' 'christianeze' that no one but friends even try to read them. I want this to be so much more.
I guess what I am hoping for is something that helps to answer the universal questions of 'Is that all there is?" and how does one find true joy and purpose in this life, how does one build a community, how do we dare trust a God that has so disappointed us in the past.

 I believe that there are many people out there looking for the answer to these questions - many that have been disillusioned by the empty promise of financial success, many that are looking for God, but have been so turned off by the Christian community that they can't even imagine that Jesus really is the answer.

I would love for it to be a book that Christian or non-Christian, or least marginal Christian would read and perhaps  see themselves in us as they watch us struggle with these same issues. I think its the 'struggle' to trust - God, friends, strangers with our lives, with our disappointments and the empty promises and then the 'struggle' with stepping out in faith, though that feels like free fall - that in sharing the 'struggle' - my struggle, your struggle, the struggle of donors to support something that seemed doomed to failure, the struggle of even staff to trust this crazy white woman.  It's in the asking the hard questions and struggling through answering them and overcoming huge challenges that this story gets interesting.”

Hopefully Maggie doesn’t mind me quoting her, but the real thing to know is my passionate, anti-christian book mind was dramatically turned by her words. Maggie’s vision for this book wasn't a Christian living book so much as a Book where people’s lives and Jesus are seen, for Christians and non-Christians alike. This was a book I could, and am very excited to be involved with.

So I’m posting this to announce a second part to our mission in Uganda. This is not to distract from our original mission at AHI to support Maggie and build community. In fact I suspect gathering information for the book will better enable us to do those very things. God does not work in confusion, and I am super excited about what He plans for us to bear witness to in Uganda.

As for Christian living books, I am learning from friends not to be so stubborn and have been slowly reading a few Christian books. Some like Total Church and Radical have had a huge impact on me, they opened the Bible to me in new ways that (and I shudder to say this) may not have happened just in Bible Study. Right now I’m reading “When Helping Hurts” in preparation for our mission, and I love the heart of the Author Brian Fikkert.

On the topic of fundraising God WAS faithful. Based on Pledges we have raised slightly MORE than we needed and with 2 weeks to spare! God is so faithful and has made it clear to us time and again that this is HIS mission not ours. 16 days until we depart from Seattle, this blog is about to get MUCH more interesting so stay tuned.

--PHD

I remember distinctly the moment I realized there was something different about this woman Maggie Josiah. A weekly prayer gathering had begun meeting at Jason and my house (before we were best friends we were roommates) in Redmond and Heather, my then fiancée, had been insistent that we let her friend Maggie a missionary from Uganda speak at one of these prayer nights. Prayer nights were usually reserved for, well, prayer, but the idea of a prayer night that was so uniquely focused seemed like a great idea.

I had heard missionaries speak before, after all I grew up Southern Baptist, so I thought I knew what to expect. As Maggie shared her testimony though I began to realize that this was going somewhere deeper, more personal and much more real than a National Geographic article with Jesus inserted somewhere in the middle.

As Maggie kept talking about how her faith in Christ had resulted in a “radical” life I began to realize that there was something very different about her and how she had experienced the Gospel. She said that there was something “radical” expected of each of us in how we approached and lived out the gospel. Now this was before David Platt had brought the word “Radical” back into the Christian vernacular and something about how Maggie used (and continues to use) that word gives me shivers. Why? Because Radical to Maggie isn’t a word used as spice to flavor up what she is saying, when she says it, it feels much more tangible. A “Jump off a cliff and experience absolute terror before a pure miracle saves you inches from the ground” kind of tangible.

I’ll leave Maggie’s story for you to read at www.ahi-ug.org/ , or even better if you get a chance hear it in person. When I think back on where that community was then, and how God grew us and then scattered us all to serve in so many different churches and ministries, the growth all seems to root back to those prayer nights. Brothers and Sisters let me encourage you to come together often and pray as a group. So often we talk about how we are looking for God’s plan but so rarely do we come together in community and petition God for an answer. I find there are two kinds of communal prayer. One where everyone or almost everyone prays once and we close. The other is where someone prays, and then someone else prays, and then someone else, and then maybe the second person prays again and then someone else and then maybe the first person, and it just goes… When I’m in a prayer like that I get all excited and think to myself, oh man it IS ON NOW! God must love when prayer really get’s going like that.

So back to the story of us getting to Africa this year. We had e-mailed Maggie if we could somehow serve and help her in Uganda and she had answered in the affirmative and that she would like to meet with us when she was back in the States. When we finally were able to meet with her I was struck again by how real this “Radical” Gospel was to her. Serving in Africa I assumed we would do some sort of manual labor or fix computers or clean or something along those lines. We were determined to not be a burden, or someone who went on a mission trip for their own growth and didn’t contribute any real value to the actual mission, I think there is a place for that, short term trips and such but I definitely did not think this was it. We sincerely wanted to help Maggie in her mission at AHI in Uganda however we could.

What surprised me was that I wasn’t the only one who had been inspired by those prayer nights years ago. When Maggie started describing how we could best serve her she described building a similar community there in Uganda as we had been blessed to be a part of here in Redmond. Now of course there will be other tasks and work to do, but this was the primary thing she talked to us about. Build Christian community in AFRICA?!?!?! Are you kidding me, that sounded to Heather and I like some sort of dream job come true! It’s all we could talk about the rest of that week, discipling a community group… IN UGANDA! In following weeks we worked out more details with Maggie and by the end of the summer Heather and I were looking at the very real possibility that we would be spending most of 2011 in Uganda!

Here we are at the end of February and its like were on some sort of runaway train, God is moving so fast that all we can do is hang on. Jesus has been solving problems like some sort of kung-fu katana wielding action hero. If you want to see and hear God at work come to prayer on March 3rd, you can e-mail us at days@daysinafrica.org and we will get you the details.

In a future post I hope to reveal some more exciting news about one unique way we will be serving Maggie in Uganda. Thank you for all of your prayers, we really need and appreciate them.

-- PHD

FAQ

Where are you going? Ekitangaala Ranch in Uganda, East Africa. The ranch is a couple hours north of the capital city, Kampala.

View Uganda in a larger map


Why are you going there?
Because Jesus told us to go. We will be working to further strengthen the Christian community on the ranch and then reach out into the region with the Gospel. Our purpose in going is also to learn from African churches as well as offering up practical skills that can be used in the Vocational School. We also plan to be flexible and serve the needs as they arrive, this mission may evolve or change while we are there.

How long will you be staying in Uganda?
About a year. We plan to leave March 26th 2011 and return in the spring of 2012.

What are you doing there?
We will be serving the needs of Maggie Josiah at her Vocational School and Guesthouse. We strongly urge you to check out http://www.ahi-ug.org/ to learn more about her mission in Uganda. In addition to helping strengthen the community there, we will be assisting Maggie in her practical needs such as technical support, clerical needs and even assisting in the classes taught.


What organization will you be working with?
African Hospitality Institute, which is a vocational School and guesthouse on Ekitangaala Ranch.


What is the background of AHI? From the AHI Website:

African Hospitality Institute (AHI) operates a two-year vocational hospitality training school for local Ugandan youth. Students learn professional housekeeping, cooking, and serving skills that provide competitive work skills. In addition, AHI's curriculum uniquely emphasizes customer service and leadership skills, character development and english language fluency. African Hospitality Institute (AHI) provdes six professionally cleaned guest house apartments for international visitors, business and government team retreats and conferences, and weary travelers. All guest houses are clean, well furnished and offer hot showers, comfortable beds, fresh linen and drinking water, and a laundry service upon request.

For more information we encourage you to check out http://www.ahi-ug.org.


How are you paying for this?
AHI is a volunteer non-profit supported purely by donations from others. Therefore we are raising funding from our church, community, family and friends to go and support their mission in Uganda. We need about $27,000 for the year. If you have more questions on specifics, we will gladly share our budget with you.


How can I help financially?
Click Donate at the top of this page or mail a check made out to African Hospitality Institute with Day Family notated in the memo line, to : Jason Buckingham 18010 NE 94th Ct. #3 Redmond, WA 98052 Donations are tax-deductible and qualify for many company matching programs.


How can I help in other ways?

• PRAYER!
• Regular correspondence by letters and e-mail would be greatly appreciated. We will be very homesick and would love to hear from you.
• Spread the word to friends and family about what God is doing.
• Let us know how we can be praying for you!

Will you have a pet Giraffe?
Heather says no but I(Patrick) am hopeful…


What will his name be?
Russell the Giraffe. He is quite fearful of lightning storms.

--Patrick

I wasn’t standing in a stadium with my hands held up high and tears rolling down my eyes. I wasn’t at a Lecrae concert shouting “Send me, I’ll go.” I wasn’t kneeling in the front of a small church with deacons praying over me. I wasn’t taking a walk in a thunderstorm when a bright light shone down on me from the heavens. I wasn’t even surfing the web when an infomercial about the suffering in Africa started playing. No, God’s call for Heather and me in Africa began in a circle of chairs with young Christians like me just reading the Bible… and discussing what we were reading. We weren’t talking about missions, we weren’t discussing the great commission, to be honest I can’t even remember exactly what passage we were on (though I know it was in Luke), when a sudden thought struck me… a Holy Spirit Zap if you will.

What would an American Christian look like who lived in a way that DRAMATICLY adhered to the teachings of Christ? A Christian where co-workers and friends just knew there was something different, maybe even a bit odd about that guy, and the reason was because of Jesus. In the early Church, Christians were weirdos. Why? Because they didn’t go to the pagan religious gatherings, they didn’t worship any other gods, they treated people from differing social statuses as equals and MOST of all they loved EVERYONE. What would a Christian like THAT look like in America? An Amish person? One of those people who has no life outside of Church events? I just didn’t know, but the best I could figure there would be three things that would distinguish that Christian from the American population, much like not worshiping pagan gods and not treating slaves like lesser beings distinguished the early church.

1. Love EVERYONE. I mean really heartily invest in all people that God put in your path; not just the easy ones, not just the ones that work a similar job, or talk like you or grew up on a similar socio-economic level. As Christians we get so focused on “saving” people that sometimes I think we forget that long before that we should probably just blindly love them. Leave the saving for Jesus.

2. Live in community. Jesus hung out with 12 other guys ALL the time, and the early church wasn’t a once a week event, it was a lifestyle! But it wasn’t a closed door either, in fact I’m pretty sure there were many more outside of the core 12 that followed Jesus around most of his ministry and the early Church welcomed anyone who would walk in. The community was fluid but it was also very deep, and how Jesus was affecting lives wasn’t “a topic” around the table, it was in the DNA of EVERY topic that came up.

3. Live without Materialism. I’m going to go out on a limb here and say the “pagan god” of America is stuff. We as Americans LOVE STUFF! Listen, I’ve worked in retail for nearly a decade, I know. In fact, sometimes the MORE expensive you make something the easier it is to sell. Not only that, but *I* love stuff! I have a PS3 and Xbox 360, a Smart Phone, boxes of comic books, a turntable with dozens of vinyl, trading cards, an ipod with hundreds of cds, over a thousand plays and books on playwrites, 3 physical bibles, multiple digital bibles and box after box of stuff in my parents attic and my parents-in-law basement that I can’t even recount to you right now. STUFF!!! I LOVE IT! My friends love it, my family loves it, my employees love it, we ALL LOVE IT! I even make myself feel better about having so much stuff by buying used stuff at Goodwill or Value Village. People say that Money is the American God, and maybe that’s true, but it’s not just the money, it’s all the stuff we can buy with the money. What if Christians lived without stuff? What would that look like? What if we were marked by a lack of stuff, if people thought we were weird because we only owned one TV and it wasn’t even high-def? As much as I tried to get my brain around this idea, I couldn’t fully grasp it. Why? Because I had grown up in the context of being an American and no matter how hard I tried I couldn’t get outside of my own head.

That was when the Holy Spirit Zap happened. Meanwhile Heather was processing all these same ideas, and the Holy Spirit zapped her as well! All of this was going on silently while we sat in a circle in our small group.

As we drove home from Church that night I was thinking about all the times I had heard American preachers rant about how materialism was America’s sin… and then do nothing about it.

“Heather?”

It was common for us to talk about the bible study on our drive home but this night we were quieter than usual, each processing our individual zaps.

“Do you think Maggie would have any use for us in Uganda?” I asked timidly.

The Holy Spirit Zap was this: If I couldn’t figure this materialism thing in an American context maybe I needed to get OUT of an American context and see what it looked like to not have this thing be a part of my cultural DNA. Maggie was a friend of ours who ran a vocational school in Uganda. Now, I don’t know much about Africa, I’ve never been there (Heather has), and I went to public school, but one thing that did seem clear to me was that people in Africa didn’t have an abundance of stuff. Maybe I could learn from the Christians there what that looked like.

“That’s funny, I was thinking the same thing” Heather said.

So we e-mailed Maggie. Because of where she is we normally don’t get a quick reply from Maggie via e-mail (internet is intermittent there at best), but the very next day we did and Maggie’s answer was powerful, and early proof that the Holy Spirit was working.

“This is so interesting - This last year has been one of the hardest, mainly due to staffing issues and just

not having enough people with the skills to really help me. Some one just wrote me and said I needed to find others from USA to come help. My thought was,'yeah right - who is going to come over with the skills I need, someone I know so I can trust and would be fun enough to have here'. God knew!”

God did know, and our adventure to Africa had begun!

I’ll continue telling the story of how God got us to Uganda over the next two months as we prepare for our trip. So far we have raised an amazing $15,000, God is so gracious – we’re more than halfway to our goal! I’m totally in awe and humbled by so many people being so generous for the glory of Jesus! We are having a prayer night this Thursday night at the Rivard’s house and I hope to see many of you there!

--Patrick