Ironside Tribe Chronicles

2009-12-28T17:33:00.000-08:00

Christmas 2009

Our Christmas celebration was exceptionally special this year for obvious reasons. We were so thankful to have Pamela and Innocent home to celebrate our first Christmas as a family of eight. I have no doubt that it was the prayers of the saints that brought them home. I am extremely thankful for the prayers and the emails letting me know that you were praying. Pamela is just starting to read through them and could not believe how many people wrote. It has been extremely meaningful!

Pamela was gone for 35 days, 11 hrs, and 24 minutes.

The last week in Uganda was grueling for her as she battled to get a Ugandan passport and a US visa for Innocent.

We had to buy new plane tickets when she could not keep her travel arrangements with British Air.

She spent 108 hrs getting from Uganda to Knoxville.

She was on one airplane for 25 hrs without getting off.

She was stuck in a snowstorm in New Jersey for two days.

And without a doubt, it was all worth it!

This temporary struggle for our family will change a life forever. Adoption is really an amazing thing and gives us a great picture of the Father’s love for us.

I think Pamela and I were both so tired for Christmas that it was difficult to have outward excitement to match the inner joy. She was still struggling with jet lag and I was still dealing with Mom-has-been-gone-for-5 weeks lag. I was emotionally prepared for her to be home on Dec 11^th and as it lingered on (and on), I began to wear down physically and emotionally. The last few days of trying to get Pamela home were the toughest. She was already tired and the last week there was very demanding physically and emotionally exhausting. Once she was here, we kept looking at each other wondering if it was real. It just had seemed as though the journey home would never end.

All the boys were more excited to go to the airport than they were on Christmas Eve before opening presents. Collin was so excited to greet Pamela at the airport and was the first to hug her. They worked really hard while she was gone, and we had the household in good order for her arrival. We had been working diligently in the yard removing trees, trimming shrubs and raking leaves. The house was clean, and they had all played a part. We had purchased and put up Christmas decorations, including the tree. Each boy had purchased Pamela a Christmas present with his own money. I was able to replace her pearl necklace after the one that I gave her for our 10^th anniversary was stolen while we served in Uganda. I believe she felt very loved and appreciated.

We have had time with all of our family over Christmas. We have had somewhere to go or people at our house everyday since their arrival. We will have to wait to rest, but are thankful for these special celebrations with family.

Everyone is doing great at home. Kai has been so sweet with Innocent and has been sharing his room, toys, and Mommy very well. They are almost identical in size, though Innocent is 11 months older. Innocent seems to be fitting in so quickly. He sleeps and eats well and acts like he has been here a long time. He is still a little timid, but it diminishes more each day. Communication is going fine, too. He understands English pretty well but does not speak fluently yet. He is obviously a bright boy and we expect that he will be speaking fluently in just a few months.

Innocent is into EVERYTHING. Pushing buttons, opening doors and drawers, flipping lights on and off, getting out every toy in the house, turning on the television, spilling juice, and activating the emergency alarm that calls the police and fire department. He is very curious and exploring his world. He is so different from Kai. Innocent is much more demanding with his messes but less demanding emotionally. We have to keep an eye on him pretty much all the time, which I wasn’t really expecting since he is four and a half years old. He obeys fairly well so it should get better soon.

I cannot imagine what Christmas would have been like if they had not been able to come home.

All of the seats at our kitchen table are occupied. The once empty bed in Kai’s room is no longer empty. Our 8-passenger Yukon is filled to capacity. Our hearts are full and our home is blessed.

It has been a very special Christmas to close out a very challenging 2009.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Kevin for the Tribe

I have posted pictures on previous blogs, too, so look through recent posts to see them all.

2009-12-24T08:22:00.000-08:00

A few more pictures that were taken while still in Uganda. Kai and Innocent are doing very, very well. Kai has been very patient and loving. It has been a great blessing to see them together.

2009-12-24T08:03:00.000-08:00

Sorry for the delay in posting some pictures. These are pictures from Innocent and Pamela while still in Uganda, plus some from the airport. I can only post a limited number of pictures and will update a few each day.

Merry Christmas!

2008-04-15T06:10:00.001-07:00

A few pictures from Addison's school play for chapel and of a recent fun day for the women from church that was held at our house. See pictures of Collin and Blake below.

2008-04-15T06:06:00.003-07:00

Pictures from Collin's birthday party last weekend. His birthday is on Friday this week.

2008-04-15T05:19:00.000-07:00

A few pictures of the boys from recent events. I can only post 5 pix per blog so I will add a few more each day. The gross picture is Blake's leg from a spider bite.

2008-04-02T12:00:00.000-07:00

The Day After April 1st

What is that old saying…fool me once, then shame on you. Fool me twice, then shame on me. Well, most of you were not fooled this time. All of the blog was true except for the pregnancy part. I thought that by posting on April 1st, it would be a clue as to the validity of it. So, I will provide you with another true tale. I promise to refrain from foolery for at least 364 more days.

A True Story
We have rats, rats, and more rats. We have battled these pests before, and I thought that we were rid of them. But alas, they have returned. I have been able to kill two, and one of them was huge. He had been living in my gas grill and storing up dog food. I opened the grill one night, and there he was. He met his end when he was met in the head with a 32-inch, 20 oz, aluminum bat that happened to be handy. I would get a cat to keep away the rats, but our dogs would kill the cat (it has happened already once). I set several traps before bedtime tonight so we can hope for success.

The biggest problem right now is that the rats appear to be nesting. When they get in this phase, they start looking for paper and/or fabric to make their nests. Somehow, they manage to get in our cars and chew up papers, socks, or anything that they can find. Twice now they have built nests inside the air condition vents of my Prado. The worst part is that I think one died in the ductwork. My car smells horrible. When I turned on the fan yesterday I heard a lot of noise, and now today it smells. It is growing worse, too.

The rats are about 6 inches long, minus the tail, so they are not so easy to catch. I am using that glue stuff that just catches them in the glue. The problem is that I have to put my traps in a place that the dogs cannot reach because I don’t want them to eat glue-covered rats. The glue is supposedly non-toxic, but it terribly messy and sticky. I really don’t need dogs with half eaten rats stuck in their mouths. Yuck!

Until next time....

Kevin

2008-04-01T11:29:00.000-07:00

March Madness
Just some random events from the past month to give you a taste of the cultural experience in Kampala….with a surprise ending!

Night on the Town
When we are meeting new people in Uganda, they will often ask, “how do you like Uganda?” We often tell them that we love the Ugandan people because they are so friendly, but that we do not like the city because of the horrific driving conditions. Tony Gibson, the ministry director of Heart of the Bride, just finished a visit with us, and our last night out was one of those nights when the traffic was crazy. It was Thursday night, which ordinarily would have been a fairly calm time to drive. However, it was the night before Good Friday and in Uganda Easter is a 4-day holiday beginning on Friday. Thus, the traffic was very heavy as people prepared for the holiday and were moving about. We went out for dinner at a restaurant about 6 miles from our house and traffic was fine getting there…getting home was another story. When we left the restaurant traffic was bumper-to-bumper and barely moving. We had not gone but about 0.5 km when my car was rammed in the rear twice. I was able to pull to the curb and immediately got out of the car to assess the damage and find out what happened. I was confused because we were moving so slowly that it did not seem likely that someone would hit us from behind. The driver of the car behind me also exited his vehicle and began explaining to me that the taxi, or matatu as they are called here, had pushed him out of the way in order to get through a roundabout. The taxi, which is a minivan, had placed his bull bar on the rear bumper of the car behind me, and then pushed him out of the way. When he did this, the car behind me rammed by car. The damage was restricted to the rear bumper and is only cosmetic, fortunately.

Well, that was just the start of a wild adventure home. It took us two hours to drive the 6 miles to our house, and almost that entire time was spent just navigating the first three miles. There was so much traffic that much of the city center was in gridlock, with traffic unable to move in either direction and preventing either from being able to move. It is not uncommon when traffic gets heavy for people to create their own lane by pulling out into oncoming traffic. This is an extremely annoying habit that I have yet to have patience with. On this particular night, it was occurring in both directions and two-lane roads could not support the newly established four lanes of traffic, which resulted in gridlock. At one particularly bad intersection, civilians had gotten out of their cars and were directing cars one-by-one through the intersection. They even had whistles! If not for them, then we would probably still be sitting there. There was a car full of Dutch people directly in front of us for most of the drive home, and one lady passenger was furious with the events. She got out of her car on multiple occasions and yelled at the oncoming cars blocking the way. It was great entertainment. At one point when we had totally stopped, she got out of the car and bolted for a small grocery store. Tony joked that she was going to get some beer to calm her nerves. He was close…she was getting cigarettes. Once we finally got through the jam we stopped at another small store to get some groceries, and we saw her buying wine. Hopefully, she has calmed down now because she was close to a nervous breakdown or heart attack.

In order to get through the heaviest part of the jam, we had to drive on the sidewalk and squeeze through spots that could not have had more than 2 or 3 inches of clearance on each side of the car. It was definitely our craziest driving experience yet, and one that I hope is never repeated nor topped.

Pests at School
We recently had our class schedules interrupted for some unplanned inspections. Each class, in turn, was told to report to the school nurses station to have their heads checked…for lice. There have been three outbreaks of lice since Christmas and several boys have had to shave their heads. On this particular day, one girl in my class had them, as did girls in Christian’s and Blake’s classes. Fortunately, none of our boys had lice, (nor me!) and we all kept our hair. They said this is not uncommon, but that this was the worst year in recent memory.

Witchdoctors
We are always hearing witchdoctor stories and you never know what is true and what is just legend. They definitely exist here, and some of them have real spiritual power. During the recent violence in Kenya, we heard multiple reports of weird events. During the violence, looting was rampant and the witchdoctors in the coastal city of Mombasa decided to take action. We are told that many of the witchdoctors gathered and put curses on anyone who stole things so that they could not steal or would return items. The following events are accounts that we heard from many Kenyans. Some of them said that they even saw some of the events on TV.
• There were stories of people who stole bikes who could not get off of the bikes and had to keep pedaling until they collapsed.
• People that stole TVs and carried them on their backs could not remove the TVs from their backs until they returned them.
• People who stole cell phones would hear the ringing of the phone coming from their stomach.
• People who stole timber could not release the timber until it was returned to the place it was stolen from. They even said that the timber was speaking to the people and would tell them to put it back in its original place in the warehouse.
• And some tales that are not related to the post-election violence…some Tanzanian men were speaking to the students recently about marriage and were warning them of the dangers of impotence from being “bewitched”. They said it was very common in their village.

Too Much of a Good Thing
Some recent activities reminded me of an event several months ago that I don’t think I ever related. We often go swimming at a local resort that hosts large conferences. Just over a week ago, Anwar Gaddafi, political leader of Libya, was attending the conference and so security was very tight and included metal detectors. Several months ago, security was high, and we also had to pass through metal detectors and be inspected. During one those inspections some police officers asked me if I was married. When I told them yes, they then asked me if I would like to have another wife. I explained to them that I was happy with one wife, and that my current wife would not approve of another wife. They explained to me how sweet Ugandan women are and how all men need more than one wife. They told me that my wife did not need to know about another wife because I could keep her in another town and visit her while on “business trips”. They were half kidding and half serious. They told me that if I got them 10 cows that they would arrange the whole thing. After about 5 minutes of trying to convince me that this was a good thing, I noticed a female officer off to the side listening to the whole exchange. So, I asked her, as a woman, what she thought about what they were trying to talk me into, thinking that she would take the side of my wife and say it was a bad thing. However, she caught me totally by surprise when she responded, “yes, you should take a second wife and it should be me!” They all got a good laugh at my expense and I have since avoided being baited into such conversations.

Could It Finally Be a Girl?
We have been pursuing adoption for several months now and it has gone much slower than we anticipated and is much more complicated than we would have thought. We have often wondered why it is taking so long. Well, maybe we have our answer. As part of our adoption process, we have had to undergo medical testing for various diseases, including HIV (we were both negative), which involves a fairly comprehensive blood screening. I guess they just want to make sure that adoptive parents are not going to die soon. Anyway, they called us back in last week to get our test results and Pamela had tested positive on one of her screenings….yep, the one for pregnancy. This was quite the shock for us! So, now we wonder if we should continue to pursue adoption or not. I have heard many stories about people getting pregnant right after adopting, but I did not know that just pursuing adoption could cause such things.

Blessings from the Tribe,

Kevin

2008-02-06T07:09:00.000-08:00

February 6, 2008

Scooby Doo – Where are you?

We got our second dog on January 10th. Scooby, a 16-month old female German shepherd, is now part of the family. Our other dog, Paska, has not been too happy about it, which has resulted in some skirmishes and one pretty nasty fight. If you look at the pictures you can still see the cut on Paska’s left eye. Scooby is much bigger than Paska and beats her up badly, but Paska keeps picking fights (and keeps losing). Scooby still has a lot of puppy in her and always wants to play with Paska; however, Paska is rarely in the mood. It has been good for Paska because she will soon be 8-yrs old and she was starting to get too lazy and inactive. Scooby keeps her up and about much more. Speaking of keeping someone up…Scooby has been doing that to us as well. We noticed that the first two weeks that she was here that she never barked. We were concerned that something was wrong. Well, I wish she still didn’t bark because now she does it all night long. I don’t think she knew how to bark and has just learned. Sometimes she just barks at nothing while she is lying down. It reminds me of a young puppy when they are first learning to bark. I hope she gets over this soon because she is greatly disturbing our sleep.

Scooby is a sweet dog and the boys really like her. We are being careful not to ignore Paska and pay extra attention to her too. It is interesting how much Scooby likes Christian and how she immediately took to him. I think it is because her previous owner had a teenage son and she relates to older boys.

Kenya Crisis
I hope that you are keeping up with the crisis in Kenya so that you will know how to pray. I have not written about this for a while, but it is still very serious and could easily grow worse. The news media is reporting over 1,000 dead and 350,000 displaced. Our Kenyan friends, who witnessed much of this first-hand, believe that the number of dead is probably 2,000 to 3,000 and possibly more. One man told us that he was in Eldoret the first day of the violence and saw at least 300 people that were killed. He said that the bodies were stacked in the back of a large truck like firewood, with one layer of bodies stacked in one direction, and the next layer turned 90 degrees and stacked in that direction. He saw two trucks of this nature. One was filled with women and children and a second truck was filled with bodies of men. He also saw many bodies still in the streets. On this particular day the news media reported that less than 250 people were killed in all of Kenya. There were also three churches burned in Eldoret that day, yet only one was reported in the news. The Kenyan government is controlling what the media see and report. It is a horrible tragedy and tensions do not seem to be easing even with all of the recent attempts at mediation. The 350,000 people who are displaced likely do not own anything now except the clothes that they are wearing.

One friend of ours knows a very rich Kenyan man. Because this man is from the Kikuyu tribe but was in a non-Kikuyu area, they burnt his home and his business. He lost everything, which was worth over a million dollars. He now owns one shirt and one pair of trousers. This is happening all over Kenya. Another friend of ours has a father who is an attorney. They burnt the home, the law office, and even all of the law books. They also lost everything but the clothes they were wearing. It is tragic and sad. The people in the refugee camps don’t have enough clothes, food, or blankets. There have even been reports of killings within the refugee camps between tribes. There is some deep-seeded animosity between the tribes and especially against the Kikuyus because the Kikuyu tribe has been very influential in government and business. Kikuyus are known for being hard working and good businessmen. Most of what the have was not just given to them. However, the animosity is still there and the election results have spawned all of the violence. Most people believe that the election was not the cause of the violence but rather the spark that ignited fuel that had been built up for years. Tribalism, or ethnic violence, has long been a problem in Kenya, which almost any Kenyan can explain to you. None of them seem surprised by what is happening in their country, though very saddened.

At our campus church, it is about 80% Kenyan and many tribes are represented. Please pray that there will be unity in the Body and that their love for one another will be an example to the rest of the campus. They are trying to help refugees who have come to Uganda and made a mission trip last weekend to the Kenya-Uganda border town of Tororo.

Blessings from the Tribe,
Kevin

2008-01-15T05:51:00.001-08:00

MTN Marathon

A few blogs back Kevin mentioned that I ran in the MTN marathon held in Kampala. Thanks to all of you who congratulated me on finishing the marathon; however, I am ashamed to admit that I was only running the 10K portion of the marathon not the full 42K. I am also ashamed to admit that the winner of the 42K finished only a little over an hour of my 10K finish. The winner was a Kenyan who finished in 2hours and 17 minutes. Unbelievable, except that I saw him cross the finish line. The second man to finish was from Uganda. He was being greatly criticized for even entering this race as he had just competed in another marathon only four weeks earlier. Two months time is recommended for full recovery of a marathon. The MTN Marathon is a huge event drawing many participants, including international runners, and huge crowds of spectators. There is an amazing amount of publicity all over the city and the race itself brought out over 6,400 runners. Being an international race and having so many participants made for a very exciting morning. I met up with my friend, Alice, who had signed me up to race and off we went. I have participated in many running events but never one of this magnitude. It was absolutely amazing.

Christmas Day

Our last two Christmases in Uganda have been great opportunities to teach our boys that it is truly better to give than receive. Last Christmas, we shared with the Uganda Jesus Village by taking gifts and cookies. This year we decided to share with our neighbors whom we have grown to know and love so much. Amongst four homes very near to our compound, there are twelve children. We invited them to come to our home on Christmas day for a movie, snacks, fun and gifts. They all arrived 1-½ hours late- not unusual, just wished I had remembered when I set the time- in their nice Christmas clothes. They all seemed so happy to be invited somewhere to share in this special day. For many, it is just another day for work because there may not be any money to do anything special. Christmas in Uganda focuses on being together as a family and eating special foods you might not eat at other times of the year – like chicken for example rather than gift giving. The gift is being together. We had a great time sharing the truth of Christmas, snacks, a movie, some gifts and candy but most of all the love of Jesus that beats in our hearts for these little ones. It is truly better to give than receive. The joy and blessings of that day are ours. If you would like to see a four minute video clip of this day, go our friends the Rineheimer’s blog at ugandarinehimer.blogspot.com and follow the link on the left hand side to Christmas 2007. John and Erica are excellent at adding these special touches to their blog. The Ironsides do not know how to do this, so enjoy theirs I don’t think they will mind. You would probably enjoy reading about what is going on up country Uganda in Arua town. Thanks Rinehimers!

Godfrey

Godfrey is one of the twelve children who came to our home for Christmas. Godfrey lives with his Auntie because his mother died of HIV/AIDS and the father is now sick. Godfrey is ten years old and the oldest child living in his home. Because of his circumstances of being the oldest, a boy and a rejected child, he is often the source of much abuse. He walks long distances to purchase food for the family. He goes to school early in the morning, returns around 6, washes his clothes, and begins fetching water for cooking and more. Godfrey does not look at you when you speak to him and he mumbles his words looking down--- signs of emotional and physical abuse. While at our Christmas celebration, I reached under Godfrey’s chin to lift his face up to look at me while I spoke to him and let him know that this was ok. Kevin said that after I touched his face Godfrey reached up and touched his face in the same place that I had touched him and continued to hold his face. It was as if this was the first time his sweet little face and been touched with love and affection. Also, while he was at on our home on Christmas day, I noticed that he had a very deep wound on his knee. I asked the Auntie if I could clean and bandage the wound. The wound was so bad and needed daily cleansing and bandaging. I asked the Auntie if she would allow Godfrey to come for several days for treatment. She allowed him to come and today marks day 18 of his visits to our home. When he would come, I would doctor the knee, pray with him, sometimes offer food and drink and most of all share the love of Jesus while I pushed him on the swing for a while. These visits to our home in the afternoon have become a highlight in Godfrey’s day. Before leaving each day, he would always say “tomorrow at four?” The knee has almost completely healed and I pray that in someway so has Godfrey’s little heart. I realize that the healing of heart that Godfrey needs is far beyond a few days of bandages and affection but it is our pray that in some small way he has indeed felt the love of Jesus for him. We are so thankful for these opportunities to be the hands, feet and heart of Jesus to those around us. It is truly a privilege that blesses our hearts continually.

Addison’s 8th Birthday

Addison turned 8 on January 7th. He choose to the spend the day celebrating with his brothers and a few friends at Didi’s World Amusement Park – the self-proclaimed “Disney World of Uganda”. Their favorite activities at the park are the water slide and the bumper cars. Unfortunately, on this particular day, the bumper cars were broken and the pool water looked like pea soup. Now, for some of his brothers, this would have meant for a very cruddy day, but for Addison his joy is people and in spite of the circumstances he had a fabulous day. We are so thankful for Addison and his love for life. He continues to have such a joyful spirit and is a blessing to our home. He is most loved by our African friends and often they refer to our family as the “Addisons”. May God continue to grow and nurture his heart with a strong love for people and use him for HIS kingdom purposes.

Unrest in Kenya

Thank you for all who have been faithfully lifting up our brothers and sisters in Kenya. It has been two weeks following presidential elections that went awry. Hundreds of thousands have been displaced living in IDP camps with very little food and water if any. The news reports 700 hundred who have lost their lives; however, those returning to Uganda from Kenya are reporting that that number is very low. Please pray for our brothers and sisters who suffer unjustly, who have lost everything they have worked for, and who are being killed innocently. Our hearts are so heavy for this land. Will you carry the burden with us in prayer?

Demonstrations are planned for Wednesday through Friday of this week, and it could create some horrible violence. The stories that we are hearing from our Kenyan friends that have returned to Uganda are horrific. The killings and lootings are rampant in Western Kenya, and through they have calmed in the past week, the new demonstrations this week could easily rekindle the flames of hatred and violence that have subsided.

Pamela

2008-01-02T06:29:00.000-08:00

Kenya Unrest

The international news channels are just beginning to report on the unrest in Kenya following the elections from December 27th. It is a tragic situation and could easily grow worse. I will not provide all of the details, as those are more easily understood by reading the reports on CNN or other news channels. However, I will tell you that many people are being killed, houses are being burned, stores looted, and there is general chaos throughout the country. Most of the students that we work with are from Kenya and are very concerned. Pastor Kennedy lives in Eldoret, which is where most of the killing is taking place and is where the church was set on fire while people were inside. Because it was the Christmas holidays, the students are still in Kenya and are being directly affected by this. Please pray for their safety and for peace to return to Kenya. Also pray for missionaries in Kenya and for wisdom in what to do. We have some missionary friends from Uganda who are stuck in Kenya after going there for Christmas vacation.

This is having an indirect impact on Uganda, though nothing like what is happening in Kenya. Currently, the Uganda/Kenya border is closed and is anticipated to stay closed for the near future. Because Uganda is a land-locked country, almost all of the goods and supplies come from Kenya, including most groceries and all fuel. Currently, fuel supplies are extremely low and will probably be totally depleted within 48 hours. Gasoline (petrol here) has gone from $6/gallon to $12/gallon and appears to be totally gone. Diesel was $8/gallon this morning, if you could find it. I went to three stations before I found a place willing to sell me 5 gallons. If this lasts much longer, the food supplies will also start to run low. This creates a tension of it’s own and people were driving more aggressively than normal today. I narrowly avoided a bad accident when I fortunately noticed that someone was trying to pass me on the right while I was turning right. Since we drive on the left hand side of the road, this would be like someone passing you on the left while you were turning left in America. This has happened to me twice in the past week. I always try to check my side mirror to ensure that no one is doing this, but it is hard to always remember. Driving is so crazy here!

Happy New Year!

We rang in the New Year with our friends from World Gospel Mission. We had a good time and enjoyed the fellowship. We are looking forward to 2008 and seeking God on how best to order our lives for this year.

One of the reasons that we came to Africa was I felt like I needed to be more involved in our sons’ lives. We felt like being on the mission field together would allow us time together in ministry and that I would also have more time at home with them than I had in America. Well, I allowed my schedule to get way too full the past 8 months or so and realize that I need to be more purposed with my time. Because we are in student ministry, our weekends and evenings get quite busy since that is the time that students are available. Unfortunately, it is also the main time that I can see my sons. I was gone at least four nights a week and usually totally occupied on teaching and preaching over the weekend. We are trying to guard against such a hectic schedule this year.

We are diligently planning to be together more as a family. We have set aside Friday nights as family fun night and a time that we will spend together having fun as a family. This was when I had discipleship group the past year, but I will have to move it to a different night. Sunday nights and Wednesday nights are going to be times set apart for family spiritual nights where we will pray, sing, and study God’s Word. Since our boys are going to Heritage International School beginning tomorrow, they will now be at the same school where I teach each morning. This will also give us more time together.

We know that whenever we return to America that my work schedule will be demanding and that our boys will get involved in sports again. Though we do our best to keep these things in balance, we know that we will never have as much time together as a family as we do now. We need to make the most of it.

Please don’t think that we are pulling out of ministry to be a family. I will still be doing most of the things that we did last semester. It is just that I will try to be home at the same time that my sons are home, and will not take on so much preaching at other churches.

Wishing you God’s best in 2008! I will write another blog as soon as I can about how we spent Christmas. Some of the pictures that I posted are from then.

Kevin for the Tribe

2007-12-22T05:15:00.000-08:00

December 22, 2007

Christmas Greetings from Uganda! I have not updated the blog as frequently as I had hoped to in recent weeks due to an extremely busy schedule. I am happy to report that our internet has performed flawlessly since we had it installed about a month ago. We have been skyping our family and a few friends. We have been using the webcam and have even been able to see Pamela’s dad and my parents. We would love to Skype with others, so please let us know (by email) if you also have Skype and we will make a connection.

I have a few random stories to share with you and promise to update more regularly in the future.

Uganda Marathon
Pamela ran the 10K portion of the Uganda marathon on December 9th. She keeps promising to write a blog about her experience so I will not say too much other than she was one of 6,500 runners. She had a great time. Check out the Ugandan version of "where's Waldo" in the second photo and try to find Pamela. Picture number one was taken by Pamela before the race at 5:30 am. I was still asleep.

What Corruption Looks Like
A good Ugandan friend of ours had a terribly disappointing experience last week. He lives in a nice house with a wall surrounding it. Almost all nice homes have a walled compound for security purposes. A car was driving by his house and lost control and crashed into and through his compound wall. They must have been driving extremely fast through this residential area to crash through a block and concrete wall. Five people were in the car and two died instantly, and another was badly injured and screaming for help. The other two passengers jumped from the car and ran for fear of “mob justice”. Mob justice is a common experience here. If someone is injured and the people determine (rightly or wrongly) that it was your fault, then they will beat or kill you on the spot. They sometimes douse people in gasoline and light them on fire. Other times, they put car tires around them and light the tire. They may beat with sticks or stone someone to death. It is a very common thing. They caught a thief in our neighborhood recently and the community beat him to death. Therefore, the two passengers feared that they would be killed because of the injuries to the other passengers, and they fled even though they had a friend dying in the car and screaming for help.

Our friend was at home and went outside immediately after the crash and found the injured woman. One of her legs was almost severed and the other leg badly injured. He was trying to help her and at the same time people in the community were coming to rob the dead victims (another common phenomenon). They stole items from the car and even took the stereo system from the car just minutes after the crash. Because the wall was smashed in close proximity to his gate, he could not drive his car out without first removing some broken concrete blocks. However, people were busy looting instead of helping make a way. He finally was able to get her in his car to drive her to the hospital. When he arrived at the hospital, the people saw him with this badly injured lady and thought that he was responsible. A crowd gathered and they were ready to execute mob justice on him. Fortunately, he was only badly scared and not beaten. They did steal his watch and wallet. Later, the police came and tried to charge him with a crime. This also is not unusual. All of these reasons are why people constantly tell us to NEVER help an accident victim, because it could cost you your life.

The sad part in all of this is that this is a county that is supposedly in revival and where over 70% of the residents proclaim to be Christian. Yet, scenarios like this happen every day. It makes me think of Steven Curtis Chapman’s song where he asks “what about the change…what about the difference?”.

I have had two instances where I could easily have been a victim of mob justice. The first was when we had only been here about three months and I “struck” a child of about 18 months with my vehicle. I was on a very busy street and I still suspect that the mother of the child may have pushed the child into my vehicle. My car was very dirty at the time and it was evident that the contact occurred on the side of my car between the front and back doors. I was going straight, so I did not run into him; rather, he ran into me. I immediately stopped the car and got out to see if he was ok. A large crowd of at least 100 people encircled us within a minute demanding that I pay the lady. It was apparent that the child was not seriously injured and he had already stopped crying. I gave her some money to go to the clinic and I left. I was very fortunate to get away so easily.

Another time I was at a shop and a motorcycle that was traveling too fast struck two pedestrians. This all occurred less than 20 feet from where I stood. The pedestrians had obvious head injuries from striking the pavement and were lying in the street. I was going to help them and/or take them to the hospital. My Ugandan friend warned me not to go. After a few minutes passed and they were still in the street, while traffic just drove around them, I started once again to go help. This time my friend sternly warned me not to intervene. Now, I understand why he felt this way.

Driving is a crazy and scary thing here! We know of two missionaries who were killed in hit-and-run accidents. Three of our friends have been hit by trains while traveling in town. A family of seven was killed a few days ago by a train. There are seldom warning signals at train track crossings. Please continue to pray for our safety as we move about since it is a constantly treacherous thing.

Ebola
I don’t know if you have seen the international news about the Ebola hemorrhagic virus outbreak in Uganda. Thus far, about 40 people have died, which is about 20% of the people who have been diagnosed with Ebola. This is a less lethal strain and the most lethal strains have killed up to 90% of those infected. Ebola is a gruesome disease that seems straight from science fiction. There is no cure and you can only pray that you do not die if you contract it. It causes internal hemorrhaging and destruction of your organs. People bleed to death from the inside out in about 21 days from onset of symptoms. They believe that three men eating infected monkey meat in Western Uganda near the Congo border started this current outbreak.

Experiencing God
I have been taking a group of eight male university students through the study of “Experiencing God” this semester. We have seen God do wonderful things! The testimonies of the students have been amazing, and their increased understanding of the Bible has been encouraging. As a result of the study, one young man from Rwanda had been praying that God would reveal where He was at work on campus. After praying one morning, the young man met a classmate who was drunk from being out on the town all night. He felt led to help the young man back to his room, which caused him to miss class. He followed up with the student the following day after he was sober. He continued to meet with the other student and two weeks later led him to salvation.

We had a great time this semester. We meet on Friday nights at 6 pm, and we routinely met until 9 pm and sometimes 10 pm. They were so excited to share about what God was teaching them that they did not want to leave, even on a Friday night! We had very open and honest discussion and drew closer to God and each other. I am so appreciative of the Home Group in Knoxville for providing us the books for the study.

Earl
You have seen pictures and read about Earl in past blogs. In case you have forgotten, Earl is an African Grey Parrot. Earl got very sick recently and we took him to the veterinarian three times. He even had to get injections of antibiotics. Unfortunately, Earl did not recover and died. We were all really sad and miss him. We hope to find another parrot to replace him. It seems oddly quiet without his whistling and talking echoing through the house. The vet told us that it is very unusual for parrots to get sick but once they do, that they rarely live.

OUCH!!
Yesterday I was at the gym working out. They continue to remodel and work on the gym and things were a mess. While moving some weights around, I accidentally dropped a 22-pound steel plate on my big toe from about four feet up. It hurt like crazy but I didn’t realize how badly I injured it until I got home and removed my shoe. My sock was soaked in blood. It sort of ruptured the toenail at the base, which is separated from the toe. It struck my toe right at the base of the nail and that is where the main damage is. It still hurts and continues to bleed. I am sure that the nail will come off and I just hope that a new one grows back.

Merry Christmas!

Ok, I realize that this is an odd assortment of stories, but it is what is going on in our lives right now. We are preparing for Christmas, but it will be very simple this year. We did not buy any gifts for our boys, though Pamela did bring back some movies and video games when she went to America in October. We gave them those gifts when she arrived returned to Uganda. My parents also sent a Wii game with Pamela’s dad that they received in September. So they are not deprived by any means, though Christmas will be without gifts this year.

We are planning a party for our neighborhood kids on Christmas day. We are going to show a movie and give some small gifts, candy, and cookies. We spent last year at an orphanage, but decided it was better to be with kids that we see all the time. We have some very poor houses very near to our house. We can see them from our balconies. We know these kids and our boys play with them, so Christmas is a good opportunity to give something without creating expectations of us giving all the time. It is a difficult balance trying to help but not creating unrealistic expectations. Some people just stop giving all together because once you give many people will begin to come all the time asking for help. It becomes easier just to say “no” every time than trying to discern when to help or not.

As we enter into this Christmas season, we wonder where we will be for Christmas 2008. If America, where? Or will be still be in Uganda? We really don’t know at this point but we are seeking God as to His will for our lives. We would appreciate it if you prayed with us.

Christmas can be a sad time as we miss our families and our friends. We enjoy being away from the materialism but we miss the fellowship of those we love most. We hope that your Christmas is blessed and joyful and that even in the midst of the American chaos that has become Christmas, that you will worship our Savior in spirit and truth.

Merry Christmas from the Ironside Tribe!

2007-12-04T06:12:00.000-08:00

Random Musings

CHOGM
This acronym probably means nothing to you but to those of us in Uganda it has become a common term. They say it like a word with a long “o”. It stands for Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, which was recently hosted by Uganda. It was quite an honor for them, and they took it very seriously. The Commonwealth is all of the countries that were once under British rule but now independent states. There are 53 countries in all and it includes much of Africa. Most Americans are familiar with the Commonwealth Games held each year, which is also based on the British Commonwealth. They hold this meeting once every two years and so for Uganda to host it was a really big deal. Each country sent their respective Head of State and many delegates. Queen Elizabeth and Prince Charles were also in attendance. Security was super tight for obvious reasons.

We were directly affected by CHOGM because the road that takes us to our neighborhood is the only route to the venue where the meetings were held. We were limited on our travel for several days due to road closures, brigades, and many practice runs. Some country (I think Britain) sent hundreds of new BMW motorcycles and cars for the police and dignitaries, respectively. I think that the officials were so excited about their new “toys” that they had extra practice runs, which involved driving up our main road at high rates of speed with sirens blaring. This is extra scary here because of the massive number of people on the road walking, riding bicycles, driving cars, and hauling goods with very slow trucks.

We were also affected by CHOGM because the resort where they held the meetings is also where we go swimming and I work out. We were entirely shut out for two weeks, and we also experienced limited access in the months leading up to the event. The whole place was under construction and a huge mess. I really doubted that they would be able to finish the work in time to properly host the event. They waited until the last possible moment to initiate much of the construction, which was really confusing since they had known that they would host the event for two years. Many hotels that were being built in anticipation of the event did not get completed while others were partially finished.

They did their best to clean up the city and improve the roads and did an admirable job, though much of it occurred at the expense of the public due to the many major inconveniences associated with construction and road detours. They removed garbage dumps and repaired roads. They installed streetlights and did landscaping. They completely renovated the airport and it looks amazingly different. The city looks much better. We are all just hoping that it will be maintained for the long term. It was a bit chaotic while the preparation was going on, but all is over now and we are glad to have it behind us. Now I have to get back to they gym and recover all that was lost during the layoff.

Thanksgiving
Well, we now have two African Thanksgivings under our belt. It is not a holiday that is celebrated by Ugandans, but we have American missionary friends here that we were able to feast with. In some ways Thanksgiving 2006 seems like it was last month, and it other ways it seems like it was years ago. During our missionary training, we were told that being a missionary was very paradoxical, and I think that how time passes is part of that paradox.

We had a very traditional meal with turkey, mashed potatoes (or smashed potatoes as they are called here), sweet potatoes, green beans, corn, dressing, and cranberry sauce. Most of those items are common here, though turkey is very expensive here and cranberry sauce imported only for the Americans. We had a very nice day and spent it with our friends at World Gospel Mission. They have taken very good care of us and allowed us to be part of their team and included in their events.

Christmas
Christmas in Africa is just plain weird to me. December is the hottest month of the year here, which is part of the oddness but only part of it. It is so strange to hear Christmas music in stores. They are songs that we know but sung by people that we have never heard of and they do not sound the same. The decorations are not as elaborate but they are there. It just does not feel right. Now, as a missionary, I am not supposed to be concerned with how it feels, and should be celebrating the Advent season. However, I have to be honest and admit that it just feels strange, and I don’t like the feeling. I really do not like hearing Christmas music, as it just reminds me of the weirdness. Last year Pamela was constantly playing Amy Grant’s Christmas album. So far, she has not yet played it this year and I hope that she can hold off for at least another week.

Last Christmas was pretty depressing. We were at the four-month point and had endured a lot of disappointment and frustration already. We had finally settled into our home and were in a lull in ministry because the students were on Christmas break. It was a very slow time, and there was too much time to think and analyze. We were homesick, lonely, and not feeling very effective in ministry at that point. A lot has changed in the past year. We are looking forward to a bit of a break after being VERY busy these recent months.

So, as we enter this Christmas season, I am hoping that it will be a time for family and reflection. We don’t have to worry about buying things because there really isn’t anything to buy, and if it is there, it is two or three times as expensive as it would be in the States. I am thankful to be away from all of the rampant materialism in America. I am thankful to be able to slow down for a couple of weeks. We are thankful for the many ministry opportunities that we had in the past year.

Scooby
Scooby is a 15-month old female German shepherd that will soon be ours. She currently belongs to a family from Sri Lanka that will be moving to Australia in January. We are buying her from them. She is a pretty dog and great with kids. We are all very excited about getting a second dog. It also really helps security to have more than one dog, which is the main reason that I am getting it. We have not had any problems while we have been here, but you just never know when it could happen.

Speaking of dogs…When we visited Kenya, I saw the biggest dog that I have ever seen. It was half Rottweiller and half Saint Bernard. Monstrous and scary looking dog and I would love to have one. We would never have to worry about robbers coming to our house with those dogs around.

Earl
Earl is our African Grey Parrot and he is very sick. I have taken him to two different vets and they are both very concerned about him. He had what appeared to be a sinus infection so we got him an antibiotic shot and he was getting better. However, yesterday he started acting really sick again. He is sleeping all the time and not eating well. We are hoping and praying that he will recover. The vet that I saw today said that it is very unusual for a parrot to get sick and that when they do they often die. We have no idea how he caught anything since he is not in contact with any other birds or animals.

Internet
Hopefully our internet problems are finally over. In July, we finally decided to pay for a good service. It was almost $100 per month, but we were so frustrated by everything else that we had tried (and those were around $50 a month) that we decided to bite the bullet and pay for the “good stuff”. You have to keep in mind that even the good stuff is very slow (about 16 kb/sec). We were having so many problems in communicating and especially sending or receiving attachments that we knew that we would have to pay for the more expensive service.

So, we paid over $300 to have it installed and signed up for the service. Two days later it quit working. I tried calling the company but no one would answer. I then found out that they went bankrupt and were being bought out. I could not believe our misfortune. Apparently, they went bankrupt the same day that we had it installed.

We recently found out who bought the bankrupt business and were able to reestablish internet in our home. So far, so good. It has worked every time we have tried it. It is reasonably fast for here and it is compatible with our Mac. All this for the low price of $90 per month.

If this keeps up, then I will begin regularly posting blogs again.

2007-10-21T06:13:00.000-07:00

I haven’t written in a while because I am not sure what is worth saying. I think that most of you know that Pamela is in America for a one-month visit. She departed on September 26th and returns on October 28th. We have survived her absence, but the last half of her trip has been more difficult for us than the first half. I kind of expected that it would be that way. My schedule has been quite busy with taking care of the boys, teaching school, and weekly ministry commitments. We are all looking forward to her return and having a full family again.

I continue to be amazed at what is going on in the world of sports. I don’t remember a college football season with so many upsets (probably because there hasn’t been one). I see that Tennessee got whipped by Bama yesterday. So, at least the Corders and Brian Rhodes are happy. I am surprised that Brian hasn’t emailed me already to tell me the score. Of course, Brenda did email already.

I didn’t get to the internet for about 10 days and could not believe it when I saw that the Rockies are in the World Series. I am very happy for Todd Helton and hope that they win.

Ministry is going very well right now and very busy as well. I have four commitments each week to either teach or preach and I spend lots of time in preparation. I am still teaching 6th grade math and science each day and still enjoying it. I wasn’t sure about accepting this commitment, but glad that I did and am finding it rewarding.

We are finally in a regular routine and not having to work on logistical stuff as much. We still have lots of logistics remaining on the children’s home, though, and I know that it will require lots of time.

Pamela has really enjoyed her time in the States and sounds like her old self again. For those of you who have been with her, thank you for your encouragement and love.

I think that I have been too busy to really think about writing anything of interest so sorry for such a boring blog. Maybe there will be more news next time.

Blessings,
Kevin

2007-10-02T07:27:00.000-07:00

Some pictures from our visit with Pamela's dad that I was unable to post last time. Hopefully it works today.

also, Pam's cell number in the states is 850-582-2143.

Kevin

2007-09-30T00:50:00.000-07:00

Go Gators!

After careful evaluation and contemplation, I have decided that I am a Florida Gator. Some might say that I am just jumping on the bandwagon since the Gators are currently the reigning national champs in football and twice in basketball. However, I have many reasons to be a Gator. I lived the last 10 years of my life in Florida before moving to Africa. My drivers license and voter registration are both in Florida. Three of our four sons were born in Florida. Our home church is in Florida as well as the vast majority of our friends. Pamela and I spent over 2/3 of our married life in Florida. Florida is really my home, and if Florida is my home then it only makes sense that the University of Florida should be my school…so, Go Gators!

I wish it were only that simple. If you aren’t a gator, then you are just gator bait, and I am still on the receiving end of the gator chomp. I could be a very happy fan right now if I could switch allegiances, instead of a downtrodden Vol. 59-20! How is that possible? That would be classified as a good, old-fashioned butt whippin’. I can only look forward to basketball season where the Vols should actually be quite good and competitive.

First Family Visit
Pamela’s dad, Ron, came and spent two weeks with us from September 9-23. We had a very good visit with him and some good quality time. He got to see first hand where we live, the driving conditions, and lots of ministry. We spent time in a children’s home, giving gifts in our neighborhood, bible studies with the students and in worship services. We also took a 2-day safari to Queen Elizabeth Park, where we saw many lions and also found a large python. No car troubles on this trip and a very nice safari.

We got a scare four days into his visit when we received a call that his mother was near death and that he might need to leave immediately. God answered our prayers and extended her life and he was able to stay for the whole two weeks. However, only three days after he left she did pass away. Pamela has gone to America to be with her family at the funeral and also to get some medical examinations since she has had some strange symptoms for about 3 months now. She will be gone a whole month, so I will have my hands full between teaching, ministry and caring for four boys. We will make it. I have done this before and I just need to stay organized and on top of things. She was attending a funeral in Alabama, then going to Florida to visit our church and friends, and then going to Tennessee to visit family. If you are one of the people who spends time with her, make sure that she relaxes but also gets pampered. I think that she is feeling slightly guilty about being gone and may not allow herself to really enjoy everything. While in Florida, she needs to eat lots of good food, go to a Niceville High School football game, visit the Destin beaches, and have lots and lots of encouraging time with her many friends. In Tennessee, she needs to spend lots of time with family, see as many friends as possible and also rest some. If she goes to Georgia, then she needs to go to a Hillgrove High game and see my brother’s family.

I am praying that God will use this time that we are apart to give us clear direction about our path forward. We have been here just over a year and are trying to discern what the future should look like. We have many decisions to make and lots of planning both here and in America. Our work visas and the lease on our house expire in November of 2008, which could make that a logical time to come home. We have also contemplated staying until May 2009, though have had some doubts about that recently. We need to know God’s plan and will and have the faith and obedience to walk it out.

Internet Woes Continue
This trial continues to go on and on and on. My last blog about 2 weeks ago stated that we had just gotten a new internet service that was much better than anything else we had tried. It was reliable, a bit faster, and Mac-compatible. Two days later it shut off and has not been back. I found out last week that the company has gone bankrupt. This is quite frustrating. We have hopes that they might get started back soon and restore our internet. However, I have fallen terribly behind in responding to emails since I cannot receive or send from our home. This will have been posted from an internet café somewhere, but I usually don’t sit and respond to numerous emails while there. Sorry, if you have written and have not heard from me. I keep hoping to get reconnected at home.

p.s. Well, I just read that the mighty gators were upset by Auburn yesterday.
See what happens when I pick a team to root for. This week I will pretend to be a USC fan.

2007-09-13T05:13:00.000-07:00

Hello There.

For the first time in our time in Africa, I am actually publishing a blog from my own home. We just got a new internet provider this week and it is Macintosh compatible. It is a bit faster and much more reliable than our previous provider, though also more expensive.

If you looked at the pictures in the previous two blogs, then you may be curious as to what you were looking at. The little boy in the red sweater is Moses. The boy in the striped rugby shirt is Sanjay. We are still very interested in adopting one or both of these boys. I will try to post some more pictures today if it works.

The house in the trees is in Naivasha at the Hovinghs and is property purchased by Heart of the Bride.

All of the other pictures are at Turtle Bay. I will try to post some more of those, too. One is of a lionfish in a tidepool but it is a bit difficult to see if you don't look closely.

We got home from our trip and jumped full swing back into ministry. I am preaching on a weekly basis and teaching two bible studies and participating in a third one. Pamela is also involved in women's ministry and helping teach their weekly bible study as they go through Galatians. It has been great to get reacquainted with the students after a long break. We had a retreat last weekend and an outing to Lake Victoria on Sunday after church, so it was a busy first week.

We had our first non-missionary visitor from the states this week...Pamela's father is here and we are very thankful for his visit. We are having a good visit and just hope that he gets to stay for his full two weeks. We just found out a few hours ago that his mother is very ill and may be near death.

I gained an additional responsibility this week that I had not planned for, but so far it is going well. I am teaching 6th grade science and math at a local Christian school. It is not the Word of LIfe School where our boys go, but another one nearby. They lost two teachers unexpectedly and really needed help so I agreed to teach until Christmas, and possibly longer. I only have four students, three girls and a boy. The girls are from South Korea, South Africa, and Rwanda. The boy is from Uganda. I teach the first two classes in the morning so that the time commitment is not too great.

It is raining hard again as I compose this and quite cool. Apparently global warming does not apply to Uganda. We have had unusually cool weather for about 4 months now.

If you sent me an email and have not heard back, then I apologize. Email piled up while we were on vacation and we have been without internet until yesterday since our return. We will try to catch back up, but we are pretty busy these days.

If Tennessee beats Florida this weekend, then I will post another blog very soon.

Also, another note about the African shirts. I like the shirts and wear mine. I just was opposed to our entire family wearing them at the same time as we went to church and lunch afterwards.

Blessings,
Kevin

2007-09-05T07:49:00.004-07:00

some pics from our trip as described in the blog. Internet is very slow today and I am having trouble publishing.

2007-09-05T07:29:00.000-07:00

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

First off, I would like to apologize for the long delay in updating the blog site. It has been a combination of things, hence the title of the blog. This will be a very long blog because I have so much to update you on.

One of the main reasons for the long blog lay-off was a three-week respiratory illness that I suffered from. It was really strange and the doctors still don’t know what I had, but thankfully I am totally well now. I had some asthma-like illness with very labored breathing along with other cold symptoms. Twice I was in the hospital because I was having so much trouble breathing and my blood-oxygen level was dropping very low. It is supposed to be around 96, but I got down to 89, so I was on breathing treatments for the whole day. All they could do was treat the symptoms since they could not determine what was causing my illness. I was on nebulizer treatments, oral steroids, two different antihistamines, and a decongestant. I would start to get better and then have a major relapse. It got scary a couple of times when I was struggling so hard to breathe. Praise God that I am not having any of the symptoms now and it appears to be over.

The other reason for the lay-off is that we have been in Kenya for 17 days and just returned on September 3rd. We had one of the best vacations of our lives. I think that it was the best. Maybe I should get votes from the others. We traveled all the way to the Kenyan coast and stayed on the Indian Ocean. We were at an all-inclusive resort where all the food and drinks were included in the price, which made it even more enjoyable and relaxing. We left right on the heels of my 3-week illness, so Pamela really needed the break after caring for me and the boys all alone. No cooking or cleaning for two weeks was a good break. If you are interested in seeing where we stayed you can go to their website (www.turtlebay.co.ke). We swam, relaxed, lounged in the sun, snorkeled, collected shells and had a great time. The resort had many activities for the kids and the service was excellent. It was similar to being on a cruise but much better. I drank way too many sodas and juices and have an extra six pounds as a result. We stayed at the resort for 9 days, which was just the right amount of time. It was reasonably priced and I hope that we get to go back some day. The only thing that might prevent it is that the drive is very difficult, which is what I am going to tell you about now.

We left on Friday, August 17th at 5:30 am. We got packed the night before, had everyone ready to go and actually departed when we planned. Our goal was to get to Naivasha, which is the halfway point to the Kenyan coast. It is supposed to be about 10.5 hrs from where we live and we just wanted to get there before dark, which is at about 7:00 pm. Even if we made the trip in 11 hours, we could make it about 2.5 hours before dark. Therefore, we had a good cushion and should have made it easily. However, easy was the last word that you would use to describe our journey. The first obstacle was the Kenyan border crossing. It should take about 45 minutes or 1 hour maximum, but it took us about 2 hours. Then an hour later we began to have brake problems on the van and had to stop to have them repaired. We decided to have lunch during our stop and it took over an hour to get our food. Then it took another 30 minutes to repair the breaks. So, at this point we had already lost 2.5 hours, but still could make it to our destination before dark if we made good time. We started moving again and were doing fine, when we got to a very rough stretch of road and got a flat tire. We didn’t have a good place to pull off the road and where we stopped the jack could not get the van high enough to change the tire. The tire change ended up taking an hour, and it rained most of that hour. At this point, we realized that we could not reach our destination and would have to stop and find a place to stay about 1.5 hours short of Naivasha, in Nakuru. Fortunately, we did reach Nakuru and found a good place to stay. Since, we were in Nakuru we decided to visit a children’s home that we knew about that is run by World Gospel Mission, the mission that holds our work visa. On the way to the home, I stopped to get fuel for the van and check all the fluids on the car, the air pressure in the tires, and get the flat repaired so that we would have a spare. While at the fuel station, I ran over a manhole cover and it made it pop up and strike the under carriage of the van. When it hit the van, it bent my gearbox and all of the oil in the gearbox leaked out. I was able to talk to the owner of the station, who was a Christian, and he agreed to repair the van at his cost. However, I was stuck at the station for 3 hours while Pamela and the boys went to the children’s home. Finally, we left for Naivasha and arrived at around 4:30 on Saturday, which was about the time that we should have been there on Friday. In Naivasha, we were staying with Jason and Lisa Hovingh, who are Heart of the Bride missionaries. We had never met them, but had heard much about them and were looking forward to meeting them. We had planned to spend two nights with them, but since we had lost a day, we only spent one night with them. Our families clicked instantly, but it was soon time for bed and another day of traveling.

We arose and left at 6:30 am on Sunday morning for our 12-hour drive to our final destination. We were cutting it close since sundown is at 6:30 pm on the coast, but thought that we should make it. However, as with the previous day, it was not to be. We made it as far as Nairobi when the temperature of the van’s engine began to fluctuate, and then it really began to overheat. We stopped and could not determine exactly what was happening and called a mechanic. It turns out that we had a faulty radiator cap, which was causing the radiator to function improperly. Well, that turn of events cost us two hours and it didn’t seem likely that we could make it to the coast so we had to stop about 4 hours from our final destination and spend another night in a hotel. We found a really nice place to stay, though, and had a relaxing evening. We got up the next day and drove to Watamu and other than some bad traffic in Mombasa, we didn’t have any more car problems. So, our 650-mile journey took 3 days.

We stayed in Watamu for 9 days and had no car problems. It seemed that everything was ok and we prepared for our journey back to Uganda, again with a planned stop in Naivasha. We found out about a short cut that should save about an hour, so we could make to Naivasha in 10 or 11 hours if all went well. We took the short cut, were making good time, when we got on a detour of about 10 miles of very rough road and no shoulders. About 1 mile into the detour, the van began to overheat again, but I had nowhere to stop and had to keep going. By the time, we got to the end of the detour, the temperature was very high and we had to stop at a fuel station. When we got to the station, they didn’t have any coolant so we just used water to try to cool the engine. We ended up being stuck there for about 3 hours. The van still wasn’t cooling properly, but we were in a town that isn’t safe at night and felt that we should keep going toward Naivasha. The manager of the fuel station even came to me and said that we should try to leave before it got dark because we would not be safe there. We had planned our journey so that we would pass through Nairobi before the evening traffic jams. However, with our 3-hour delay, we were hitting Nairobi at peak traffic time and it took 3 hours to go about 15 miles. At one point, it took an hour to go less than 1 mile. By the time we passed through Nairobi, it was dark and fog was developing. We hoped to make it to Naivasha to stay with the Hovinghs, but were not sure about traveling in the dark, which is very dangerous in Kenya. We decided to push on and made it to their house at 10 pm. We should have been there at about 5 pm. I was exhausted, but we made it safely.

We had planned to stay at their house for 2 days, but had so much fun that we stayed for 4 days and left on Sunday, September 1st for Kampala. Again, we arose very early and left right at daybreak at 6 am. We only made it about 1 hour down the road when I heard a strange noise and thought that we had another flat tire. We were on another detour on very rough road and the jarring had broken a support structure under the van that holds the gearbox and it was now dragging on the ground. We jacked it up and tied it with strong rope and hoped that it was strong enough to make it for the 30-minute drive to Nakuru, where we would have it repaired properly. We did make it to Nakuru and found a place open on Sunday morning to repair it. However, the parts stores were all closed and we had trouble finding the right part to fix it. After all was done, it was 12:30 pm, 6.5 hours since our morning departure, but we were only 1.5 hours into our 10-11 hour journey. So, we stopped again. This time near the border. Once again, we found a safe and clean place to stay. We finally left out on Monday morning for home, and made it safely with no obstacles. Whew! What an exhausting drive to and from the coast! It is only 650 miles one way (about a 10-hr drive in the States), but took us three days to get there and three to get back. The roads are horrible in places and there were times that we only covered about 20 miles in an hour. The best that we ever did was about 60 miles in an hour. During all of these problems, we really did pretty well as a family. Christian kept saying that one day we would laugh about it. Actually, now that it is only two days behind us, I can laugh about it and also see God’s protection.

Here are all the ways that God protected us and provided for us:
• We did not suffer any physical harm during any of our breakdowns.
• We had a Kenyan man, Frank, traveling with us, and he was able to repair most of our problems. He saved our hides when the gearbox fell out and got us to a town.
• We found safe and clean accommodations every time that we had an unexpected stop.
• We were not threatened or robbed while stuck on the side of the road.
• When we overheated on our return trip, the car traveled for 5 hours without overheating again, even though we were stuck in terrible traffic jams.
• We found mechanics and parts on a Sunday morning to repair a significant problem.

The Good Part

Now that you have endured the bad and ugly parts of the past few weeks, I will tell you about the good (and great) parts of our vacation. Our time in Watamu on the coast was fabulous. It was definitely the prettiest ocean that I have been in. The snorkeling was incredible and I could not believe the amazing variety of marine life. We saw lion fishes, clown fishes and anemones, Moorish idols, emperor angel fish (prettiest fish that I have even seen!) wrasses, parrot fish, butterfly fish, triggerfish, tangs, etc, etc. I kept saltwater aquariums in America and I saw almost every kind of fish that I have ever owned. I had no idea that we see such a great variety. The corals were equally amazing and varied.

The last three days that we were there, the low tide was very low and there were tide pools. We found eels, octopuses, and other cool marine life in the pools. I could have stayed and explored there for weeks and not grown tired of it. We found some really cool seashells, too.

I did not go diving because the waves were too big to go beyond the second reef. The dive season is November to March, so we missed it. They see lots of sea turtles and even whale sharks outside the second reef in the deeper water. If we ever go back, then I will go during the dive season so that I can have that experience.

The beaches were beautiful, too. They have white sand and clear water, similar to Destin. There are lots of trees on the beach, too, so you can always find shade, which is necessary since we were so close to the equator. We all tanned very quickly and had to be careful because the sun was so strong. They had sea kayaks that were free to use and the boys had fun playing on them, when they weren’t in the swimming pool or drinking the free milk shakes.

It was an awesome place for a family vacation if it just wasn’t so hard to get there. Maybe in another year of more, the roads will be completed and the drive won’t be so bad. It is the detours that cause all of the problems and slow downs. They are fairly close to being completed. If the roads were properly repaired, then the entire drive would only take about 15 hours, and maybe less. We could also take the bus, but a plane is just too expensive for six of us.

The Other Good
Our time with Jason and Lisa Hovingh and family in Naivasha was so much fun and also refreshing. They are an awesome family and I am so glad that they are part of the Heart of the Bride mission team. They have a 10-year old daughter (Laura) and two sons ages 6 and 8 (Aaron and Andrew), and our boys had a great time playing with them. They live in a very remote and gorgeous area outside of Naivasha. Our boys played in the acacia forest, saw colobus monkeys, built dams in the creek and explored their land. They live in one of the prettiest places that I have seen in Africa. It is like Old Africa and well preserved. We saw zebras, antelopes, gazelles, and buffalo very close to their house. Just about 10 miles away, we saw wildebeest, giraffes and hippos. The boys even got to chase some zebras.

Lisa and Pamela are so much alike that they instantly hit it off. Lisa loves to run, decorate, organize, and help people. They talked and talked the whole time that we were there and went on some morning runs, where they saw lot of wildlife and got within just a few feet of a herd of zebras. Jason was a biology major in college and loves nature. We hunted for rocks, watched wildlife, hiked the property, and went fishing together. They are a fun couple and like the same things that we like. Our kids had so much fun together that our boys did not want to leave and their kids did not want us to leave. We have invited them to come to Uganda so that we can spend Christmas together but have not confirmed yet. They were fun and gracious hosts and fed us some very good food.

More Good
While in Kenya, we visited three children’s homes and began to seriously look into adoption. While in Naivasha, we visited the Heart of the Bride home, and saw their first four boys and the future home that will open very soon and take in about 40 more children. Of the four boys that they currently have, we really enjoyed two of them and would consider adopting either of them. One is a boy of about 18 months named Moses, who was a bit shy and really cute. The other is a boy that is 5 years old, named Sanjay, who just jumped right in with our boys and would fit right in. Pamela said that she could easily see adopting either of both of them. It is not clear now as to whether the national directors want to have these children adopted out, so it might not even be an option. It was still exciting to begin to really think about moving forward.

All in all, it was a wonderful vacation and one that we will probably talk about for the rest of our lives. I am sure that we made some incredible memories for our boys. We saw amazing things from God’s creation, made some new friends, and made it through some tough trials. We are safe and sound and back “home”. It was interesting to hear all of us talk about getting home as we finally made it across the Kenyan border and headed for Kampala. It feels good to be back in our house and in our place of ministry. Kenya was wonderful to visit and even more beautiful than Uganda, but this is where God has called us and placed us. We are confident that this is where we are supposed to be and thankful to have safely returned home after a great vacation to celebrate our first year in Africa.

2007-07-21T00:39:00.000-07:00

Niceville – A Year Later

July 15th was our one-year anniversary of having moved away from Niceville. In some ways, it seems like it was only yesterday and in other ways it seems much longer. We have been keeping up with the Niceville Baseball All Stars via the internet. This would have been a fun year since it would have been Christian’s last year to play Little League and Blake’s age group is so good that they are going to state. Dan Shelton would have been Christian’s All Star coach since Christian was on the Mariners last year. Of course I am assuming that both would have played All Stars again since they had made the team every year. We knew that we would miss sports, and we miss baseball the most. We really enjoyed going to Niceville High School football games, too, and we miss that. For our boys, though, it is baseball that we miss much more than football. It was fun watching our own boys as well as their friends. It was definitely a family affair and we could visit with our friends during practices and games. We are pulling for the Niceville 10-yr olds team as they and Coach Donald go to Fort Myers for the state tournament.

It is funny the things that you miss. One of the things that comes up most are the foods that we miss. For restaurants, it is the simpler ones that we think about -- mostly Cracker Barrel and Beef O’Bradys. Potato chips, ice cream, Diet Coke, and chocolate milk are often craved. You can get some of the food items here, but they are not as good and very expensive. A day at the Destin beaches would be an awesome treat, as would a day out deep-sea fishing.

Earthquakes
We have had several earthquakes lately. One night we were in a restaurant eating dinner with some friends and the table was shaking so vigorously that Pamela thought that I was shaking it with my leg. The boys were at home and were quite alarmed and unsure what to do. We had another mild tremor last night. We have had about 5 tremors in the past month or so. They are coming from the western part of Uganda near the Rift Valley, so we are most likely not in any danger even if we have a severe earthquake.

A Cold Day in July
Have you ever heard or used the expression “it will be a cold day in July before…”? Well, we had the coldest 4th of July that I have ever experienced. It rained the entire day, which is really unusual here, and it never got above 70 degrees. It was the coldest day that we have had in Uganda in 10 months. We are only about 25 miles from the equator and at about 3,000 feet elevation, so I still don’t understand how it could be so chilly. Anyway, we enjoy the cool weather and the better sleeping temperatures. The climate is really pleasant here and would be perfect if buildings were equipped with air conditioning.

Visit from Tony
Tony Gibson just came for a 1-week visit that was terrific. It was good to spend time with him to be encouraged and be reminded of why God called us here. He came last January when we had just started into ministry and his perspective on what had been accomplished in six months was much different (in a good way) than ours. Sometimes we can just be too close to a situation to see all that God is doing. Even in our children, he could see a positive difference in how they respond to us as parents and to each other. They are all doing very well in adjusting to the culture. The boys love getting to visit with Tony, and he and Blake had lots of fun playing foosball together. (By the way, Blake dominated!) He delivered some much-needed items as well as some wants including new IPods. Thanks to Debbie Lowmiller for doing our shopping so that Tony could bring the stuff in his luggage.

People who stay in touch
When we did our missionary training we were told that the people that will support you and stay in touch with you would surprise us. I had heard it from other missionaries before then. They were referring to the fact that people you barely know will get excited about your mission work while people that you have known for many years may rarely contact you. Well, they were correct. It is such an encouragement to have people that we have only briefly known or met that email us and even send us care packages. We have gotten emails from people that we knew many years ago and have not seen since then. We have even had people whom we have never met give financial support. It is interesting to see how God raises up people to encourage you that you would have never expected. It seems that when we are most in need of a pick-me-up that it is the day that a letter, email, or package arrives. We do have three packages that were sent to us that have gone missing in action. They should have been here at least two months ago. Please pray that they will resurface. It would be a miracle along the lines of Pamela’s suitcase coming back after 6 weeks.

Matching Outfits
If you saw the pictures posted with this blog then you probably noticed that all of us boys had on matching shirts. Pamela found the material and had the shirts made. She got upset with me last Sunday because I did not want us all to wear them to church and then for lunch afterwards. I said that we would look like “dorky missionaries”. I am fine with getting my picture made or wearing the shirt when no one else has his on. However, I did draw a line at all of us going out looking that way. I am guessing that most males reading this agree with me, and that the women are siding with Pamela.

2007-07-14T03:25:00.001-07:00

Pictures from Kenya

2007-07-14T03:17:00.000-07:00

sorry about promising pictures that never came. Our computer stopped working right in the middle of the download. I will try again today.

Kevin

2007-07-07T03:51:00.000-07:00

Hello, We are still alive and well but having terrible difficulty getting web access with my Apple computer. Therefore, I haven't done a post in a while. It looks like we may have found a solution and I will start to stay in touch more often. For this post, I will put up some pictures from my trip to Kenya last month as this is the first opportunity that I have had to do so. Enjoy! Also, look at the pictures under Flickr to the right.

Also, we have some major decisions to make right now and ask that you keep us in your prayers. I don't want to post on the web for the whole world to see, but if you would like to join us in prayer, please email me and I will give you an update. Also, don't post a comment on the blogsite if you want a reply, because it will not allow me to email you from there. Email me directly at our yahoo account.

Blessings,
Kevin

2007-06-23T07:51:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the long delay in updating the blog. I have had the following written since June 12th, but have not been able to get on the internet to post it. I prefer to compose my blogs on my laptop and then post in an internet café, so that I have access to my pictures, which are also on my laptop. However, I have tried for almost two weeks but the place where I go to post has not had functional wireless internet. So, I will post this without the pictures and try to get them done late. This is a very long blog.

Kenya Excursion
I just returned safely from a 5-day journey to central and western Kenya. We had a wonderful trip and a great time. The trip was planned around a leadership conference in a town called Malaba, that is near the Kenya-Uganda border. It is the home church of one of the KIU students, and he had invited me to come speak there. Once we decided that we were going to Kenya, we thought that it would be good to include some sightseeing, which was a very good decision.

The Team
We departed on Wednesday, June 6th from Kampala with Kevin, Christian, Frank (a recent graduate of KIU), and Kennedy (the pastor of the campus church). We were not sure whether to allow Christian to accompany us or not, but thought that it was such a unique opportunity for him to get to see Kenya. He did really well and was a good travel companion.

The Drive
It was 500 kms from Kampala to Nakuru, which is about 300 miles; however, it took 11 hours of hard driving to get there. Travel in east Africa is exhausting and difficult due to poor road conditions and heavy traffic. We left at 6 am and did not arrive until 6 pm. My whole body hurt after a day of traveling over the many bumps and potholes.

Nakuru
We spend the entire second day of our trip in Nakuru National Park. This was a special experience because it was also my birthday. The park is incredibly beautiful and diverse! I was trying to decide if I had ever been to a prettier place and the only thing that compares is when I went scuba diving in Bonaire. Interestingly, that trip was in 1995 but also fell on my birthday. We were surprised at how cool the temperature was in Nakuru. We had been told that Kenya was much cooler than Uganda, but had no idea how much cooler. Christian and I were not prepared for the low temperatures and did not pack properly. Kennedy was gracious and allowed Christian to wear his jacket for most of the trip. I really like the climate in Nakuru because it was warm during the day but very cool in the evening and morning, which makes sleeping much more comfortable.

This was only my second game park, the other being our trip to Queen Elizabeth in Uganda last January. The park is only a couple of kms from town, but as soon as you enter the gate you can see the beauty. The park is situated around a large lake, with plains between the lake and the surrounding bluffs that encompass the entire park. It makes for very diverse habitats of forest, open plains, and mountains in a relatively small geographical area. We saw many, many animals and I have included some pictures on Flickr if you would like to view them. The lake is full of pink flamingoes and very colorful. We saw zebras, giraffes, rhinos, buffaloes, several types of antelopes, hyenas, and lots of birds. This was my first time to view zebra, giraffe, and rhinos in the wild and it was exciting. Unfortunately, despite our best efforts to find some, we never saw a lion or leopard though they are present in the park. Cats are often elusive, and when you only have one day off viewing it is very happen chance on finding them. We had a great time and I got some awesome pictures.

During the whole excursion, I was trying to plan a way that our whole family could come to Kenya. I am not sure if we will be able to do it or not. I am mostly concerned about the expense and safety. They charge $50 per person to get a tourist visa, and then another $40 per person per day for park entry. If we go to parks in Uganda, then we pay no visa charge and we get a resident rate for park entry. Therefore, it is much cheaper and easier to stay in Uganda. Also, the length of the drive and the border crossing is such a hassle. Kenya can also be more dangerous than Uganda with crime. I know how to stay safe in Uganda, but would need guidance in Kenya. The best way to get guidance is to take a Kenyan with you, but our car will not accommodate a 7th person. I would love to spend 2-3 weeks traveling as a family through Kenya and go all the way to the coast of the Indian Ocean. I will continue to contemplate if we can feasibly do it. This is a unique opportunity to see the beauty of Africa, and what I saw of Kenya was incredible. I would like to see more and allow our entire family to as well.

Thomson Falls
We spent the first part of Day 3 going to Thomson Falls, which is about an hour’s drive from Nakuru. It is a beautiful waterfall and was also a place where we found some really unique chameleons. We traveled prepared and had a small animal cage with us just in case we had such an opportunity. We found six chameleons and put them in the cage to bring back to Kampala. I will soon include a picture on Flickr of this unique species. While at Thomson Fall’s we also went to a nearby lake that contained hippos, which provided another photo op. The falls are located on one of the bluffs that surround the Great Rift Valley and in majestic setting. The drive to the falls passed through coffee and tea plantations and provided some great scenery. We left at noon to make our way to Eldoret for the evening. The drive was only about 150 kms (90 miles), but took us over three hours. This was a very difficult stretch of driving.

Elodoret and Malaba
We spent Friday afternoon and night in Eldoret. While in Eldoret I had the privilege of meeting Kennedy’s parents and one of his brothers. They were very kind and I was amazed at how much Kennedy was like his father in both appearance and mannerisms. When they would laugh, it was identical. His father spoke to me about coming back in a few months to help with a church conference, so I will most likely be going back to Kenya in July or August.

We left Eldoret on Saturday morning early so that we would arrive in Malaba for the leadership conference. It was my understanding that I would be speaking in two or three sessions on Saturday and preaching Sunday morning, and I had prepared to do so. When we finally got to meet the pastor, I discovered that the conference would not officially start until Monday, with church services on Sunday to get it started. This was quite a shock to me because we had been planning this event for several weeks. I have been in Africa long enough to know to be flexible, but I have to admit that I was really exasperated with this one. I had spent many hours in preparation and planned three days of our 5-day trip around this conference. I still am not sure how to respond. Do I just ignore it and go on, or try to explain how frustrating this was. I spent a lot of time praying on Saturday to ask God if there was something that I was supposed to be learning from this and what I should or shouldn’t say.

Saturday was a relaxing day that we spent in the pastor’s home. They fed us two traditional African meals that included ugali and sekuma wiki. The food was nice and the hospitality was wonderful. The pastor also has four sons from ages two to twelve, and Christian bonded quickly with them. They spent most of the day playing with the chameleons we had found the day before. Most Africans are afraid of chameleons (actually all reptiles and amphibians), but these boys quickly adapted to the new creature. They took the chameleons out to the rubbish pile and watched it catch flies with its very long tongue. It is really a fascinating site. Christian left one behind for them to keep as a pet. The youngest son was named Simon and was quite shy. Christian was working diligently to befriend him when they told us that he doesn’t warm up to people very quickly. My interpreter told me that he has been trying to get Simon to be playful with him for a long time but has had not success. Well Christian kept trying until Simon finally enjoyed it. By the time that evening came, Simon was always with Christian and fell asleep in his lap. I wish that I had my camera with me because it would have been a cute picture. When we had to leave, Simon was crying to go with Christian. He is really good with little kids. I just hope that he will be as kind and gentle with his own brothers. If we adopt a sister (and brother?), I am sure that he will be a huge help.

On Sunday morning, church was scheduled to start at 9:00 in the morning but did not start until 10:00. This type of delay is not too unexpected. I was helping to shuttle some people to the church, when it was discovered that I had a broken belt on my Toyota. The belt ran the water pump and alternator and a couple of other things, so it could have been a huge problem. I thank the Lord that the belt was dragging under the car and that Frank spotted it. Otherwise, we might not have known that it had broken before further damage was done to the car, and we also would have had a difficult time finding the right replacement if we had not had the original belt. Frank missed church in search of a belt and mechanic to fix it, but thankfully all was well when the time came to return to Uganda. This could have been dangerous if we had broken down out in the bush somewhere. This was truly God’s protection to find the problem early and correct it while we were in a town. It is also the first mechanical problem that I have had with my vehicle in 9 months, for which I am also very thankful.

So, Frank worked on getting the vehicle repaired while we went to church. I did finally have the opportunity to speak to the church at about noon, and spoke on Joseph and his leadership traits. I hope that God will somehow use it, because we spent a lot of money, time, and energy for just a 40-minute sermon that included interpretation into Swahili. This lack of planning seems wrong to me. Or, is it just a cultural difference? Many of the churches here will spend many hours singing but only give 30 minutes to God’s Word. There is a lack of knowledge of the Word and a greater lack of application. Music and dancing are a huge part of the culture, and it is difficult to discern between what is true worship and what is just cultural. When so much emphasis is placed on this worship, and so little emphasis placed on knowing and obeying the Word, it is not surprising that Africa continues to battle corruption in all areas of life, including the church. I don’t want to leave the impression that all churches are this way because I have been to some churches that have a great balance between worship and teaching and have strong bible-based teaching. The fellowship at KIU is one of these churches. However, the vast majority of churches that I have seen and know about follow the pattern of lots of very loud music, very loud prayers with lots of repetition, and very little teaching from the Word. The room that church was meeting in on Sunday was about 60 feet by 30 feet, but they had two huge speakers and an amplification system. I have yet to go to a church that did not have an amplification system, no matter how small. My ears are still ringing a bit from this most recent experience.

There were many kids at the church and we had a great time interacting with them. There were probably twice as many children as adults. Many of them looked quite poor based on the state of their clothes and how dirty they were. Christian entertained them with his chameleons, though the older girls were terrified of them. The children loved having their picture taken, which was fun but prevented me from getting natural shots. One boy tried his best to get in every picture. I finally learned to be pretending to shoot in one direction so that he would go there, and then quickly turn around to take a picture in the opposite direction. There was also a little girl who loved to have her picture taken, but she was so photogenic that I didn’t mind having her in half of my pictures. Spending time with the children got me more excited about starting an orphanage and also adoption. We really feel like God is leading us to adopt a girl, but I am now wondering if we should get a boy as well. Seeing Christian with Simon made me think about it more than anything.

I must admit that I left from Malaba discouraged. I was frustrated by the lack of planning and lack of respect for our time. Church frustrated me because of the lack of priority on God’s Word and the huge emphasis on emotions. As I face these situations and try to discern between what is biblically correct and what is just my cultural preference, I keep looking to the Word for what is right and try not to be biased by my own preferences and traditions. This is a constant challenge, but does keep me busy studying the bible. The cultural differences in time keeping are not such a problem, but the lack of study of the bible clearly needs correcting.

Violence
While we were in Kenya, many people were killed in Nairobi as part of a sect called the Mungiki. The Mungiki act similarly to the mafia in America by intimidation and killing in order to extort money for “protection”. The Mungiki killed around 40 people and then the police retaliated and raided the village slum and killed 12 Mungiki people. It is very sad to see how quickly life can be taken away here and how people so easily accept it.

The last night that we were in Kenya, a grocery store owner was returning to his home and was shot and killed while driving his truck and then robbed. After he was shot, he crashed into a support pillar of a local shop and collapsed the overhanging structure and part of the roof. The accident scene was still undisturbed, with the vehicle amidst the rubble as we drove to church. This had occurred while we slept and only about half a mile from where we were staying.

Conclusion
Overall, I had a great trip. I got to see some amazing landscapes and animals from God’s creation. I had fun getting to spend so much time with Kennedy and Frank and learning more about their cultures and getting to know them better. Christian did very well on the trip and seems to have matured from the experience. I was mostly pleased to see his interaction with the small children. The main purpose of the trip was supposed to be ministry in the conference, but it did not occur. So, maybe that was my main purpose, but God just wanted to work on my flesh some more. Being conformed into the image of Christ is seldom a pleasant experience and I know that I need much more shaping, chiseling, and purification. My patience is tested almost daily by the lack of efficiency, traffic jams, and late appointments.

2007-06-04T04:02:00.000-07:00

From Pamela

Out of the blue, a wave of homesickness came over me today in an intense way. I was reading a few emails before church this morning when suddenly I was overwhelmed with pain in my heart for my family and friends. There have been so many occasions of homesickness but for the most part it has been manageable. I momentarily think of those I am homesick for and then I move on. Today was different. I was so overwhelmed with the pain in my heart that I wanted to cry. Some people are embarrassed to cry and especially here in Africa. It is a sign of weakness to the African people, especially for men to cry. Therefore, you don’t see people crying here very often even these sweet children who have plenty to cry about. In some ways, their hearts are hardened in this sense. They can flock to see people being stoned for stealing or a burning tire around someone’s neck for a crime, and they never shed a tear. Honestly, it is beyond my understanding and greatly disturbs me to hear of so many heart wrenching stories told without any emotion whatsoever. (Sorry that was a side note but with a point) If someone sees you crying here, it is so uncomfortable for them that they often laugh because they don’t know what else to do. In light of this environment I am now in, I also find myself holding back tears, which I don’t normally do. Crying is healthy and I did my fair share of crying last year as we were leaving the States to come to Uganda. If I had not cried when I felt the need to cry last year in our leaving process, I think it would have swallowed me up and overtaken me. In the nine months of being here, I think I have only shed a few tears. Unfortunately, this morning as this wave of grief came over me, I did the same thing the Africans do and quickly moved on to something else so as not to feel the reality of my soul. I want to share with you how the rest of my day went as an offering of praise to My Father.

As I hurried off to get ready for church trying not to think about what I was feeling, there was this continued heaviness in my spirit. I was agitated with the boys and feeling short with my words. I knew the day was on a downward spiral, if I didn’t’ cry out to God to help me in my weakness. As we drove to church, I quietly prayed in my heart for God to please meet me in my heaviness and carry the burden of homesickness for me. How often I find myself in such circumstances and don’t cry out to God for help but muddle through the day on my own. What a shame! It was really such a simple prayer of “help me today for I am weak” and God in His great compassion heard my prayer and answered me.

We arrived at church and quickly found our way to our seats as we were right on time, so no time to fellowship before the service. The pastor was preaching from I Thessalonians 2:17-20. “But we, brethren, having been bereft of you for a short while- in person, no in spirit- were all the more eager with great desire to see your face. For we wanted to come to you- I, Paul, more than once- and yet satan thwarted us. For who is our hope or joy or crown of exultation? Is it not even you, in the presence of our Lord Jesus at His coming? For you are our glory and joy.” The very basics of the message were that as believers in Jesus Christ we should be about investing in people with the gospel and love of Christ. The investment in other people is NO waste of time and worthy of the cost. The last two verses of the passage brought such encouragement to my heavy heart this morning. Our hope, our joy and our crown will be to stand in the presence of God with many Africans that God has entrusted us to share the gospel of Christ with. The closing song of the service was an oldie but a goodie that many of you know “Thank you” by Ray Boltz. Just a few lines…

Thank you for giving to the Lord, I was a life that was changed.
Thank you for giving to the Lord I am so glad you gave.

As my hope may have been drawn to home this morning, God in His kindness reminded me to not long for my earthly home in the States (wherever that is anyway) but to long for eternity with Him. Also, to be faithful to invest in the lives of people in Africa so that on that day when ever knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord, many Africans will be there willingly and joyfully bowing the knee because of obedience and faithfulness to His call.

Prior to coming to Uganda, there was a word of testimony spoken that encouraged me as prepared to leave. The word was this, “Do you not know, have you not heard, it is I the Lord who has called you out. I will go before you and I will go behind you, I will be your front guard and your rear guard. There will be a withered hand reaching out to you and you will offer hope in Jesus name. Do not fear for I will never leave you or forsake.”
Each time I go to my neighbor Selina and she reaches out her withered hand to me, I am reminded that we truly are vessels in the Redeemers hand. Oh that each person we see and speak to would experience the hope of Christ. That is an investment with eternal dividends. The cost is great and very painful some days but oh so worth it.

Even this past weekend we have had the opportunity to host a young woman from Kenya. A young man in Kevin’s discipleship group has been in a relationship with this young woman for four years now and he is trying to discern if she is the one he is to marry. This has been a very weighty decision for him. He is a recent convert and is so hungry and thirsty for truth. It is so exciting to be around him and to share the many truths of God’s word with him. On his many visits in our home, he has shared his family life and traditions with us. He comes from a large family because his father had several wives. It is not uncommon here to have several. You have one for mothering, one for cooking and one you take out on the town and maybe even some more. Anyway, this decision of a wife has become so weighty for him as he realizes it is God’s best to choose one and divorce is not an option. On a recent visit with his father in Kenya, the father told him that there are two kinds of women: ones that make good girlfriends and ones that make good wives. So this young man is trying to discern which one this young woman is. He asked if he could bring her to our home for the weekend and for me to spend some time with her. I was so nervous thinking of all the pressure he was putting on me. It is traditional that many of these discussions take place through the aunties. Long story short, the weekend was such a blessing for all involved and I am confident God will show this young man searching for God’s best – His best for him. In light of what I was sharing earlier about the investment in people, this young man is realizing the error of his culture’s traditional ways (especially in marriage) and choosing to do things God’s way. He desires to choose one wife until death and to love her instead of use her (most African marriages seem like a work partnership or something). This seems like a small investment but this investment alone in this young man can change the way of an entire people.

Instead of overwhelming homesickness, I retire this evening with an overwhelming sense of renewed passion to move forward with the gospel of Jesus Christ to a dark world. We are so humbled by these opportunities and pray for many more like them. Thank you for being apart of this ministry through your prayers for us. ~Pamela

2007-06-04T03:48:00.000-07:00

June 3, 2007

Meet Earl
Meet the newest addition to our family…Earl. As you may recall from previous blog entries, we had been hoping to get a pet parrot for our family. African Grey Parrots are known for being excellent pets because of their intelligence and capacity for learning language. They are fairly common birds here, and when you can find one, very inexpensive. In the States, they can cost thousands of dollars, but here they can be as cheap as $4 to $5. We had been searching for one for several months and making no progress. We were thrilled when some other missionaries offered their parrot to us while they go on furlough to the States, and said that we can keep it beyond that if we want. They provided us with a nice cage, bird toys, and the parrot. The best part was that it was all free. He is the coolest bird. He is just learning to speak and likes to say his own name the most. He can say: “Come here”, “good boy”, “good night” and some other things that we don’t understand. He mimics other birds that he hears outside, too. We are very thankful to have obtained a parrot and are enjoying having him in the home. We had also hoped to take one to America whenever we return, but I am told that due to bird flu, that international transport of birds is no longer viable. I haven’t confirmed this yet, but I suspect that it is probably true.

Collin’s Growing Vocabulary
We were having dinner the other night when Collin suddenly announced, quite excitedly, that he knew three cuss words. Pamela said, “oh really…which ones?” Collin replied that he knew the f-word, the d-word, and the b-word. Pamela asked him what the f-word was and he said that he had forgotten, though he was probably trying to recall “fart”, which is supposed to be an unspoken word in our house. Then we asked him what is the d-word. He was kind of grinning sheepishly and said that it was “ditch”. When we busted out laughing, he suddenly remembered that it was supposed to start with a “b” and blurted out the rhyming word to ditch. When we asked him how he knew that word, he said that he had learned it from one of our neighbors in Niceville. He was quite proud that he knew a bad word, and we were grateful that he only knew one as opposed to the three that he professed to know. I hope that you don’t misread this to think that I am proud of my child’s bad language. It is just funny to see Collin, the innocent child, being proud of his “accomplishment”. We are having to explain that this is wrong because he does not even realize it.

Jarvis
We try to minimize the number of people that we help that come and knock on our gate. If you get a reputation for helping everyone who comes, then they will be there everyday. It is a tough balance, because we are here to help, but you cannot possibly help everyone who asks, and many people are lying just to get money. Anyway…earlier this week, a young man named Jarvis came to the gate and Pamela briefly spoke to him and said that I should come talk to him. I was taking a bath and said that she should have him come back the next day. This is also a good tactic to see if someone is really in need or just going house to house begging. She responded that she really felt that I should go talk to him then.

When I met Jarvis, I could tell that he was different from most of the solicitors that I encounter. He was very humble and also seemed to be quite broken and on the verge of tears. Men are just not allowed to cry in this culture and will not allow themselves to be seen if they do. Jarvis began telling me his story and I soon found out that he is HIV positive. He had just recently begun taking ARVs (anti-AIDS drugs) and was very sick from the side effects. It seems that the side effects are similar to some cancer chemotherapy drugs. He was weak and nauseous. He had come to ask me to pray for him because he was fearful of telling his mother that he had AIDS. He had gone home in December to tell her, but he chickened out and said that he had TB. He did actually have TB, but it was a result of the AIDS. He explained that his mother was a Christian and that she would be so disappointed in him that he did not want to tell her. He is also the only son, and his mother is a widow. Therefore, it is his responsibility to take care of his mother as she grows older. He knew that he needed to tell her and that he also needed to be in her care as he gets through the first months of taking ARVs. He also wanted to know if he could wash my car of do other work in our compound to get some money for bus fare home, which is in Rwanda. He was obviously very weak and even having trouble standing and walking. I talked with him for about half an hour and realized that I needed to help him with bus fare and to spend some time praying with him.

He had a very strong testimony and explained that he knew that he had sinned and that his disease was a consequence of that sin. He said that he knew that God was capable of healing AIDS and that he was praying for that to happen, but that he also knew that God might chose not to heal him. He told me that he had only been intimate with one girl ever, but she was HIV positive and knew that she was. It seems that she had acquired AIDS from being raped, and in vengeance was infecting as many men as she could. When I asked two of my African friends about this story, they said that it is very common for people to deliberately infect others out of spite. He said that he knew God had not forsaken him and was still there for him. He also said that God had shown him that he needed to forgive the girl who had infected him and that he had done so. She had actually died recently from the disease. His biggest fear was having to confess to his mom what had happened. I spent time praying with him for courage, for healing, and for God to continue to lead him and keep him. It was both a sad and uplifting time. I was sad for this young man having to live with this horrible disease. I was uplifted to hear such a solid testimony and how he still knew the faithfulness of God during difficult circumstances. Please join with us in praying for Jarvis. He has returned to Rwanda but promises to stay in touch via email.

When I asked him why he came to our gate, he said that everyone in the village knows that we are Christians and that we will help people. This was encouraging to hear, but also somewhat frightening because you never know who will show up with a story of need. We need wisdom and discernment as we make decisions about whom to help and how.

Kenya Bound
I will be departing for a 5-day trip to Kenya on Wednesday of this week, the day before my 44th birthday, which means that I will celebrate my birthday away from our family. I will be traveling with three other Kenyan men, including the campus pastor and two students. The main purpose of the trip is for me to speak at a church conference that is the home church of one of the students. We are going to also try to visit a game park but the rains have been very heavy lately and it may not be possible. Pamela is a bit nervous since this will be her first time at home without me since we arrived nine months ago. I am excited about seeing Kenya and visiting the villages and rural areas as we travel. Please pray for safety for all of us as I travel and we are apart.

Blessings to you all,
Kevin

2007-05-25T01:19:00.001-07:00

Facing the Giants

The following letter is an email that I sent to the church that made the movie “Facing the Giants”. Following the letter is their response. I thought that you might enjoy hearing about the wonderful response of the students on the night that we showed the movie.

Greetings to the saints at Sherwood Baptist Church from Kampala, Uganda. My name is Kevin Ironside and I am a missionary from Niceville, Florida serving here in East Africa. I want to encourage you with the impact that “Facing the Giants” has had here, but first will provide some background information to put it into perspective.

My wife, four sons, and I arrived in September of 2006 with the purpose of ministering to and discipling university students. We are working with a Christian student fellowship at Kampala International University (KIU) that has about 600 students in attendance each Sunday on a campus of about 5,000 students total. Even though we are in Uganda, most of the students at KIU are from Kenya but also include students from Tanzania, Sudan, Congo, Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda and others. One Sunday there were students present from 11 different countries. This gives us a unique opportunity to reach much of Africa from one location.

On Easter weekend we showed the video of “The Passion of the Christ”, and the main hall at the university, which holds about 700, was filled to capacity. There was such a good response that we decided that we should try to show other movies in the future. Last weekend, we decided to show “Facing the Giants”. We were not totally sure about showing the movie because this is not a culture that is familiar with American football. In fact, if you say “football”, then they automatically think that you are speaking of soccer. Secondly, even though the university does all of its teaching in English, they have difficulty with American accents and especially southern accents. Being from Tennessee, I have to be careful to enunciate more clearly when I speak in order to be understood. However, we had showed the video to some Ugandan friends and also a group of four Kenyan students, and they had enjoyed the movie immensely and so we thought that it was appropriate to show.

The night that we showed the movie did not begin well at all. The movie was scheduled to start at 7:00 pm, but when I showed up with my laptop and video projector, they did not have any speakers or other equipment there. We waited until 7:30 before they finally brought the speakers. Unfortunately, they forgot the cable to connect the computer to the speaker system and so we were running the sound from the computer speaker through a microphone and it wasn’t very clear. Then about 10 minutes into the movie, the power went out. (This is a common problem here since they are in an energy crisis.) We were told that they were turning on a generator and that power would be restored. Some of the students left, but most remained sitting in the dark, except for the light from a few cell phones. By the time that power was restored, it was almost 8:00. Fortunately, by the time that power was restored, we did have a cable to run the sound through the speaker system.

As the movie started back up, more and more students were coming in, and around 500 were in attendance. I was encouraged that the students were engaging quickly and laughing at the funny parts and seemed to understand it. As the movie went on, it became very evident that they were engrossed in the movie and relating to the characters. They clapped when the revival was shown on the campus. As SCA began to win football games, the students were cheering the highlights. They cheered when coach got his truck. In the playoffs, they were cheering like they were really at the game. It was loud and thrilling. When SCA made the interception to get back in the game, they were clapping and shouting. When they made the winning field goal, the place erupted. I had chill bumps listening to the response of the students. At the end, when Brooke is pregnant with her second child, they cheered again. It was really amazing. In a culture that knows nothing of American football, they were able to receive and apply the many messages. At least 50 students came to me after the movie to thank me for showing it.

We have talked with many of the students to hear what they took from the movie. Below are some of the responses:

“I learned to never give up on myself or on God.”
“With God all things are possible, no matter how bad it seems at the moment.”
“I learned that we are to glorify and honor God in all things.”
“ I saw the power of positive leadership, especially during the death crawl scene.”
“I am not going to fear, but trust God.”

My favorite testimony was from a young man from Kenya named Obed. Obed is a computer science major who has been here the entire semester but does not have sufficient school fees to sit for exams. This means that he has gone through the term, but he will have to repeat the entire semester. (This is a common problem here for university and secondary students). Most students would be praying, begging, and pleading for God to provide their school fees. In fact, I wonder if many students only come to God to meet their needs. Prosperity teaching has become rampant in this culture and people often just view God as another spirit to be manipulated for their good. Obed asked to meet with me the other day to pray. He shared with me his predicament of lack of fees, and I was expecting him to ask me to help him with fees since they think that all white people are rich. However, I was greatly encouraged when he did not ask for fees. He just asked me to pray for Him and for God’s will to be done. He said, “I learned from the movie to praise God when we win, and praise God when we lose. I am going to praise Him if he provides the fees or not. Maybe God just wants me to trust Him and learn something from this trial.” I cannot adequately express what a huge step of faith that this is. It goes against the grain of almost everything being taught in this culture.

Students’ lives were greatly impacted and even changed as a result of viewing this movie. I am writing to encourage you and thank you for producing a film with such a clear portrayal of biblical truths. I wish that we had many more movies with strong Christian messages that we could show, but we only know of a handful. Be encouraged that your step of faith is having an impact across the globe. We plan to show the movie again because word has spread across the campus about how good it was. I am sure that the hall will be overflowing. My wife and I both felt that we should let you know the impact this has had, so this is it. Be encouraged! Thank you for producing this movie! You have made a difference in the lives of future leaders of many African nations. I wish that you could have been here to experience it, and I hope that this gives you a glimpse of what we experienced. It was definitely one of the ministry highlights of our eight months in Uganda.

Striving together for His glory,

Kevin Ironside

The response from Sherwood Baptist Church:

Wow, Kevin thank you so much for your email! You mentioned having chill bumps just listening and watching their reaction, and I had chill bumps just reading about it! We so enjoy receiving stories like yours and are so grateful for your service in Uganda! God bless you as you serve Him!

2007-05-25T01:19:00.000-07:00

2007-05-22T01:51:00.000-07:00

The Container Has Arrived

Wow! How exciting to open up a container and see the contents. It was like getting a GIANT Christmas present. We are so incredibly blessed to have you as friends and partners in ministry. We have plenty of macaroni, peanut butter, cereal, candy, cakes mixes and icing, and syrup. Yes, lots and lots of syrup. We go through a lot of syrup here because our favorite breakfast is banana and coconut pancakes. We make them from scratch and they are very good. However, we were always stingy with our syrup because a small battle was about $5 and we would go through a bottle in about 2 weeks. Pamela had been making syrup from scratch so that we would have some, but it was not as viscous as store-bought syrup. Well, we have enough syrup now to last us for several years if God leads us to stay that long. We also have many cake mixes and icing, which will be a treat for our family and also allow us to bless many others. They love to get cakes on special events here, especially the students. We will use the many, many toys to bless orphans and the many other children of need here. They are everywhere you go and have so little. This will be a very practical way to show them the love of Christ.

I was amazed to see the many items on the container. The boys were running around and so excited. It really was like Christmas, but more extreme. It is so wonderful to receive the American food products that we cannot get here, or if we can, are just not affordable. It is kind of funny to see how excited they were just over a bag of cereal. They even had cereal for dinner the day that the container arrived. They are already enjoying the pool toys, basketballs, and footballs.

I was also surprised to see new tools, a very nice lawnmower, and weedeater. We will put these to good use. I am also going to try to help a Kenyan friend start a lawn service business, so it will not only bless our family, but him as well.

You have blessed us incredibly and made our stay here much more pleasant. Going to the mission field is supposed to require sacrifice and some suffering, and missing American things is part of that. It was still nice, however, to get a reprieve and get some tastes of home.

We will use the foosball table, ping-pong table, and X-Box in a game room of the student center. Also, we had no idea that we went be getting so many books. These will be heavily used by the students when we put a Christian library in the center. We have all of the equipment to start a top-flight gym. God has not yet provided the right place for the student center, but we know that He will. The students go on break next week and return in mid August. We are praying and trusting that we will have the center up and running when they return. We would greatly appreciate if you would join with us in praying about this. We got a glimpse last Friday of how much these items will be used when I had my men’s discipleship group over for dinner and hanging out. They had never played foosball before, but they had a ball playing for several hours that night. (We have the table set up in our house until we find a place for the student center.) Some of them have already come back to play again. It is a huge hit! We have not even had a chance to set up the ping-pong table yet, but it is a game that they are familiar with and anxious to play.

I mainly wanted you to know how much we appreciate your sacrifice in blessing us and the people of Africa. Thank you to the men and women who packed the container. Thank you to the many people who bought items to ship on it. Thank you for the personal notes and encouragement on many of the things that were sent. But most of all, thank you for the chocolate! It is a rare treat here. Seriously, though, we are most thankful that you still continue to demonstrate your love for us and encourage us through your service and giving.

Blessings from the Tribe...Kevin

2007-05-14T02:46:00.000-07:00

Blog Update – May 11, 2007

Container
I am supposed to be going tomorrow morning to pick up our container from America. I will compose this with the presupposition that I will actually get it and only change this writing if something goes wrong. It has only been in Kampala since Monday, so it has moved along very quickly. I had very good help from a Ugandan man (different than the one who “helped” me last time) and he was able to navigate the system very well. I am not paying nearly as much money to get it through customs and getting it much more quickly. We are all very anxious to see the contents since we were not involved in packing this one. I am very thankful for how smoothly, though not without a lot of bureaucracy, that this has gone.

Also, this week Pamela received three cards/letters and Christian got a package from Andrew Smith in Niceville. It was so good to hear from the Rhodes, Sheltons, and Bartees back in Florida. We miss our friends there so very much and it always encouraging knowing that we are not forgotten. Christian was especially excited to receive real American candy that included sweet tarts and twizzlers. We had been battling homesickness a bit this week and the mail helped alleviate some of it.

Cobra
Our next-door neighbor, Selena, killed a 6-ft cobra last week right outside of our compound. She saw a cow kicking at something and then realized it was a snake. She took a machete and killed it. I have included two pictures on the Flickr post to the right. I believe that it is a forest cobra based on my book, Snakes of East Africa. They get very large, but apparently are not very aggressive unless molested, though very deadly if they do bite. It was the biggest snake that we have seen here.

Chameleon Pix
Speaking of reptiles, I have included a picture of a chameleon. We find chameleons often here, which still continues to fascinate the boys. Christian found one this week and we took a picture so that you see the type that is most common here. It is perched on Christian’s finger to give you a perspective on the size. They change colors quiet easily and quickly and are fun to play with.

Facing the Giants
We showed the movie “Facing the Giants” to the students two weekends ago and had a fabulous response. I will devote an entire blog to tell you everything about it. If you have not seen the movie, then you should. It has some really strong messages on faith and obedience. We desire to start showing movies on a regular basis if we can find enough good Christian movies to show. I only know of a few.

Joel
Several of you received an email two weeks ago about our worker’s brother, Joel, who was very sick. We don’t know how his illness started, but it appears that his lymph nodes got infected from another infection, probably his eye. Joel had been sick for a week when his family took him to the hospital. His eyes, neck, head, and hands were swollen and getting worse. He stayed in a local hospital for five days and when no progress was made, the doctors told him that they could not help him and that he should go to the witch doctors. When I found out about this, I offered to take him to a good international hospital, but he had already been taken to his village, which is over 8 hours away. Four days later, after his condition worsened, they brought him back to Kampala and we checked him into the international hospital. When he arrived, he was in terrible condition. Both eyes were swollen shut, and his right eye was the size of a tennis ball or slightly larger. His lymph nodes in his neck were so swollen that he could not bend his neck. His head was heavily swollen, and his arms and hands were swollen. He had not eaten for over a week. He could barely move. I was fearful that he was near death, though his vital signs were not horribly bad. They started him on intravenous antibiotics and he began to improve within 48 hours. It makes me wonder what the other hospital did! After 12 days in the hospital on antibiotics, he made remarkable improvement. One eye is normal, and the other is still swollen but nothing like it was two weeks ago. He is eating, walking, talking and feeling well. All other symptoms are gone and he was discharged. The one eye still requires treatment, but is much better than it was. God has spared his life, and we are praying that he will also spare his eyesight in his right eye. Thank you for your prayers. It was a very serious situation, but God has healed Joel and made him well.

While dealing with this situation and being exposed to others, we are seeing how much medical missions is needed. People die here everyday from things that should not result in death. Many of them have no place to go for care. It is a great way to show the love of Jesus, save lives, and create an open door for sharing the good news of the Gospel of Jesus.

Dr. Pam
Well, I should probably call her nurse Pamela instead of Doctor, but she has been taking care of the village women. Two of our neighbors suffered severe cuts and Pamela has been helping nursing them back to good health. Selena badly cut her thumb, and an older lady sliced off the end of her toe while hoeing in the garden. The older lady is called JaJa Rose. JaJa means grandmother. Most wounds are not given proper medical attention and can become quite serious if infection sets in. JaJa Rose was still hoeing in the garden the same day (barefooted), and Selena was digging in the garden while her thumb was still oozing blood. So, Pamela has been cleaning the wounds with peroxide, treating with antibiotic ointment, and daily changing the dressing. They are getting much better and healing well. JaJa is not a believer and also does not speak English. Pamela has been trying to witness to her through her loving actions and also through Selena interpreting. Please pray that she will accept the gift of salvation offered in Jesus Christ. She knows about Jesus but is resistant because of her family background. We don’t know her age but she is quite old for this culture, and probably does not have many years remaining.

Sickness
Pamela and I have both been sick for a couple of weeks. I caught a bad cold that turned into some type of respiratory infection. Pamela had the same cold, but hers did not progress as badly as mine. I started with the cold 17 days ago, but I still am not totally well, though the infection is gone after taking augmentin. Pamela is still suffering some cold symptoms as well. She also is having stomach ulcers. Her ulcers act up from time to time when she is very stressed. She tried to tell me yesterday that she was not stressed and did not understand why she would have them right now. Yeah, right. You just sold pretty much everything you owned, left everyone and everything that you know and moved to a new culture in Africa where you are teaching and training and working daily. Not much stress there. Please pray that God will heal her ulcers and continue to protect our entire family from disease, especially malaria, which we are grateful to have escaped from thus far.

Lost Wallet
On my way home from discipleship group last Friday evening, I stopped at the store to buy some milk. I bought the milk, and I remember getting my change and putting it into my wallet and then proceeding to the car. I went immediately from the store to home and came into the house. The next morning I was looking for my wallet and could not find it. I searched the house for 2-3 hours. I had no idea how it could be lost. I went back to the store to ask them if I possibly left it there, but I was fairly certain that I had not. I really felt that there were only two possibilities; either I dropped it while getting in the car or had my pocket picked between the store and the car. Well, I still do not know what happened, but most likely I dropped it. I was very pleased today to get a call from my bank stating that someone had mailed in my ATM card, drivers license, and social security card along with several receipts. They had taken the money (about $40) and kept the wallet, but sent all of my other items to my bank, which I am assuming was based on the ATM card. I can only guess that a fairly honest person found the wallet, and kept it and the money but returned the items that I really needed. I am thankful that God was watching over me and protecting me. It was my American drivers license and along with the other items could have been used for attempted identity theft.

What I want to be when I grow up
I heard a young Ugandan man sharing a testimony the other day at church that was heart warming. He was helping to teach a group of young African children around the ages of 3 years to 5 years old. They were asking the children what they wanted to be when they grew up. One little girl, around 3 years, raised her hand and responded that she wanted to be a muzungu when she grows up. (Muzungu is the Ugandan name for a white person). When the young Ugandan man asked her why she wanted to be a muzungu, she answered that she wants to help people. It is fortunate that whites have a reputation for being here to help and not oppress or exploit. I hope that they still feel that way after Benny Hinn comes to town next week.

WWJD
As their mother was preparing pancakes for breakfast, two brothers began to argue about who should get the first batch. Upon hearing the argument, their mother reminded them about Jesus and said that if He was involved that He would insist that his brother take the first batch. Upon hearing this, the older brother turned to the younger brother and said, “Mom’s right. You be Jesus this time.”

Please Write
We miss you all very, very much. We haven’t gotten any updates for a long while on Niceville Little League baseball. We want to know about the playoffs and who made All Stars. We would also like to know what is going on with NHS baseball. So, if you have time, please give us an update. It probably seems like a short time on your end, but it seems much longer on this end when we haven’t heard from you. And if any of my SAIC friends are reading this, I will try to shame you into writing. Seriously, we love to hear what is going on in your lives and want to stay connected through email.

Blessings for the Tribe,
Kevin

2007-04-28T05:13:00.000-07:00

April 28, 2007

Hello family and friends! It is Pamela writing to you this time. Many have complained that you have not heard from me and I feel your pressure. So, today is my birthday and this is my gift to you. A blog. For those of you who were close to me, you know that I love to give gifts and I really miss not getting to bless each of you on your special days. I hope today that I can bless you with a blog. Now, because I haven’t written in almost eight months, I have a lot to say. So, get a cup of coffee and let’s pretend we are sitting on my couch, as I did with many of you, and talk about the wonders of our life here in Uganda.

First, let me say that I am so thankful for how well Kevin has written on the blog keeping everyone updated on our life events. He is such an excellent communicator. I on the other hand write like I talk – all over the place. You sanguine personalities will follow along just fine. The rest of you might struggle and I am sorry. I am a random writer, but I hope you don’t stress out. There are so many things that I wish to share with you: our home, our food, our daily life, our boys, our friends, our ministry, our adventures, our heartaches, our sights, our smells, our sounds, our hopes, our Lord and Savior and His work in Uganda and in us, of course. I realize Kevin may have already shared some of these thoughts with you so you can skip over or enjoy my viewpoint.

Our House: is very nice and we are most thankful after a two-month search through some very scary places. We have a beautiful compound with a great place for our boys to play as well as the students we work with. We have fruit trees and a great garden that is producing many things. Christian has been enjoying the garden. I get tickled to look out and see him walking around out there looking at everything. Even Addison and Collin have helped plant some carrots. Of course, it cost me a few hundred shillings. Our home is a two-story with the main living down and bedrooms up. The kitchen and bathrooms are clean and functional. The house is really more than we need but it seems it is definitely where we are to be as we have been able to use all of its extra space for guests, a sewing area for teaching, a place to store things shipped for ministry, a room for books to loan out, etc. I have done my best to make our house a home with my interests in home decorating. I have made curtains for our windows and some covered headboards for our guest room so that we didn’t have to buy more beds. As a matter of fact, we just received some furniture that was ordered in November. Unfortunately, this turned out to be a bad deal and I am paying someone else to finish the work. This new guy does good work and quickly. So, I hope to have everything finished by the end of May.
OH MY, DID YOU READ THAT – THERE IS A GUEST ROOM AT THE IRONSIDES – SO PLEASE MAKE RESERVATIONS NOW- WE WOULD LOVE TO SEE ANY OF YOU.

Our Food: Meals are a bit challenging some times without all of our American conveniences. I was definitely a woman of convenience when it came to meal prep and I can say now that I had no idea what meal prep was until I came here. Oh my, you start by going to the market or the garden, then cleaning the vegetables, then preparing the vegetables to be cooked, then cooking the vegetables, OK now the vegetables are ready for whatever you’re preparing. Lets just say I am making chicken curry with rice. I would buy a whole chicken with skin, bone and sometimes other things inside from the butcher. You boil the chicken, remove the skin, take the meat off the bone and cut up into bite size pieces. There is no canned cream of soup if you are preparing casseroles. There are these packets of dry ingredients mixed with water that makes this type of cream of chicken or mushroom soup but not the same flavor for sure. So, there is another whole step in preparing to put together what I would call a simple casserole. Now, I need some lemon juice to add to the soup. I don’t have those great bottles of lemon juice ready and on hand but I do have lemons. I cut up a few and squeeze the juice until I have enough for the recipe. Now, we are ready to put together and put in oven, which I am thankful to have by the way. All that to say that meals are a bit challenging because they are so time consuming but we are thankful to have the things we have here. Meats, cheese and milk don’t taste as good but oh are we thankful to have them. I must tell all our fellow missionaries living in much harder places with much less that I appreciate you so much and the sacrifices you make where you are spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ. I really appreciate what we do have here even though it takes long to prepare our meals. Some other meals that we have for those interested are pizza (homemade sauce, homemade dough and homegrown vegetables), rice and beans, meatloaf and mashed potatoes, spaghetti, stew, of course all the African foods as well. We have a great garden with cucumbers, green peppers, tomatoes, zucchini, cilantro, carrots, and other things. Some haven’t brought harvest yet but in time they will. We have so many cucumbers and pickles are expensive that I have learned to make pickles. For breakfast sometimes, I make banana/coconut pancakes, which has become everyone’s favorite and occasionally French toast. Syrup is also rather expensive and I have learned to make my own as well. I know all of you that do these sorts of things all the time are not at all impressed but for those who know me well – this has been a challenge and an accomplishment. Please rejoice with me! Cereal is about $6 a box but we do buy it once a week out of convenience on school mornings. The boys eat lunch at school and they would have a lot to say about that – not good. It is African food that they are less than excited about and they get a punishment if they don’t eat it all. Most afternoons, they come home ravenous for snacks because they have eaten little at school. It seems that Thursday is the worst lunch. Blake told me he accidentally trips every Thursday spilling his food. Kevin and I, of course, quietly laughed and then told him not to do that anymore. Oh, the cleaver things these children come up with. Collin has actually turned into our best eater, although, his size wouldn’t show it. Well, that is if Christian isn’t in the race.

Our Daily Life: Laundry- this shall be a never- ending task as long as I live, I think. We are thankful to have both a washer and a dryer. We originally thought we would air- dry our clothes and not have a dryer because of lack of power and the expense. I am thankful to say that we are able to use our dryer and only have to hang dry when the power is out and clothes are wet. Laundry is challenging trying to judge when you will have power and not. There is no consistent schedule with power outages. The boys only have two uniforms for school and they get so dirty here - unbelievably dirty. So, trying to keep a clean uniform can be a challenge but not as challenging as hand washing them at 4 or 5 in the afternoon and hoping that they dried by morning. When we first moved in our home, we did not have a washer or dryer for several weeks. So, I have had a taste of hand washing and drying. Although, it was hard, I really am most thankful for those experiences. They make you more grateful.
Market Shopping- I have been pleasantly surprised with all that the supermarkets offer. When doing my grocery shopping, I generally go to at least two or three supermarkets to gather all the things on my grocery list. As much as I hated shopping for hours at Sam’s and Wal-Mart, I miss the convenience of it as well as all the selections and low prices. Fruits, vegetables, and even meats are affordable but prepackaged things are pricey. I enjoy visiting the various fruit and vegetable markets and sharing with our friends there. Life is so hard here and you can see it on the faces of many people. It is a blessing to love and bless these workers with a smile and simple conversation.

Our Boys: As of today, they have all had birthdays this year and are growing like weeds. Christian is officially taller than me and out weighs me -- that I don’t mind. He is maturing so much and I am seeing God’s work in His life. It is evidenced in his prayers, which are sincere and genuine. He is not fearful of doing new things even taking a boda-boda and going to the supermarket for me. Wow, I couldn’t believe it when he did that. You all would be proud of him.
Blake, although, you wouldn’t know this by his words, is enjoying the adventures of Africa. He has many trees to climb, things to build, fruit to eat, animals to play with and wonderful weather.
Addison was made for Africa. He has picked up the language and accent most. He rarely eats meat and loves mangos and rice.
Collin too seems to be so happy. I was most worried about his transition and asked many of you to pray specifically for him. He has done so well. He loves school, he eats well, he has even become quite the soccer player. He hangs in there with all the big boys.
They just finished their school year and are off for one month. They begin a new term the last week of May.
They want to say thank you to all of you who have sent packages of candy, macaroni & cheese, chocolate chips, pudding, jell-o and kool-aid.

Our Friends: Let me introduce you to Selena and Dowdy. Selena is the house girl to a lady that lives next door. The Madame is a woman pastor who travels around preaching in various countries frequently leaving Selena at home alone. Selena is about 24 and has a two-year-old son named Dowdy. We think that Selena has leprosy but we are uncertain. She has missing fingers and many skin lesions, which are indicators of leprosy. Her son, Dowdy, was born as a result of rape from her previous employer’s son. When she told the boss what had happened, Selena was chased away. Thankfully, she was taken in by Jasmine, her current employer. Although, this lady is a born again woman, she too mistreats Selena as so many people do to their helpers. Selena works full time and receives only 20,000 shillings per month, which amounts to about $10.00. You need to know that full time work is roughly sunrise to sunset. So, no easy job for sure. Selena is born again and pays tithes and offerings to the church from this little money. She often doesn’t even have enough money to buy milk for her son. We pass by their place as we come and go from our compound. As we are passing Dowdy comes running to the edge of the road waving both of his little hands, almost without fail. He is so precious and so is Selena. I am telling you so much about them because this relationship brings me so much JOY. Because of their circumstances, I have had many opportunities to help them by taking food, clothing, and toys for Dowdy, money and just sharing Jesus together. I take our boys over to play. Shortly after we arrive the other 11 nearby children come and play soccer. I sit under a beautiful tree with Selena and anther mother and we just talk. They all enjoy watching my boys be boys and playing with their children. Most people here speak English, but these children know very little. It is good for my boys to have to find ways of communicating with them and they all make do. In this relationship, I have been able to be the hands and feet of Jesus to them in their need. I have been able to minister to them frequently as of late and when I went by recently Selena just blessed me so much with her words of thanks. She recounted the story of Jesus telling the disciples when I was hungry you fed me and when I was thirsty you gave me drink. Then, the disciples asked ”but Jesus where were you?” Selena said to me,” Jesus will tell you, I was at Selena’s house and you helped me”. This was just a sweet reminder of what we are here to do. Our ministry here is so multi-faceted and being the hands and feet of Jesus is what we hope to do. Again, yesterday when I was speaking to Selena and she told me that her prayer for our family is Proverbs 28:27. It says, “ He who gives to the poor will never want, but he who shuts his eyes will have many curses.” Her response to this ministry is praise to God for providing for her needs. It is so beautiful for her to acknowledge her God as the provider, not the mzungu next door. I trust you hear this in the spirit it is being shared. This testimony is in no way intended to bring any praise or glory to us, but to God for how He is working in the lives of people here. (I have posted a picture of Selena and Dowdy together as well as the neighbor children.)

Our Ministry:
I have had the privilege of partnering with United Faith Chapel, a university fellowship, and Women’s ministry. It has been my heart’s desire to impart the truth of God’s word to these ladies and to enable them to search out the scriptures for themselves. I have had the opportunity to teach on or be apart of teaching times focusing on media, modesty, purity, physical well being, order and cleanliness of the home and self, being a woman of God – with aspects of a single woman as well as a married woman. Recently, I hosted a ladies conference here at my home with 50 students in attendance. Our topic was the Journey of a Woman looking at whom God has created the woman to be, the single woman and the married woman. All of the teachings have been grounded in the Word of God. It seems so many of these teachings are in contradiction with what many of these women have grown up knowing – here in is the importance of laying the foundation of God’s word. There are so many “born again” however, their belief and understanding of God is made up of what they think, have been taught or experienced. This is leaving many confused as the Word is coming forth because their foundations are being shaken. Their foundation has not been God’s word and some are finding themselves confused and frustrated. This is actually somewhat exciting as they are hanging around long after meetings are finished to further discuss the scriptures and gain understanding. Please pray for these woman to have their eyes opened and hearts receptive to truth. They are eager to know it. Also, pray for those whom might be more resistant because it shakes their foundation or what has been their foundation.
I have been asked to sing at every place we have gone to minister. Whether prepared or not, I have offered some testimony in song. I have to confess that this has been humbling a few times feeling so unprepared, but they are blessed and I trust God is too with my obedience not my perfection. Speaking of singing let me share a story you are going to love. As many of you know, Kevin is a self-proclaimed “non-singer”. Well, the other day he was training some pastors at a three-day seminar for pastoral leadership. When I came to get him, he asked me to sing a song that went with their teaching for the day. Unfortunately, I did not know the tune well, but Kevin did. I asked him to sing it and he did. Even after he sang it, it still wasn’t coming to me to lead. I needed him to sing along to help me with the tune. In the middle of singing, I got so tickled that I was actually singing a duet with my husband that I could hardly sing for a few moments. The laughter I hope came off as great joy over the song and not laughter at my husband. You need to know that he really can sing and did a great job. I know it was probably humbling for him, but really it was beautiful to me and those there for the training. Who knows maybe one day you will hear a number from him. Don’t count on it though.

Our sounds and sights and smells:
Sounds- the things I love about Uganda are the sounds of children laughing, playing, singing and/or running after you hollering “muzungu” and giggling. These are joyous sounds and sights. I wish I could capture the sounds and sights of these precious little ones and allow you just a glimpse. Another joyous sound and sight, is the celebrative worship of the people here found on Sunday mornings all across Uganda from the most elaborate cathedrals to the dirt floor, wooden-benched, tin-roofed meeting places. They really put us to shame with their joyful spirits while living in such desperate situations. These people know that JOY is found in a person not in their circumstances. When I hear of their heart breaking testimonies, I am ashamed that I can become so bothered by trivial matters.
Titles and names are a big deal here. I have been called by many names here in Uganda. Here are a few with their meanings or context. Madame – I am most often called this by just anyone showing respect for a lady. The Luganda form of this word would be Nyyabo. Those who know us well may call me by Momma Christian (usually the first born son) or Momma Blake, Addison or Collin and sometimes-just Momma. I think that one is my favorite, although, Mrs. Kevin would run in close second. We are called the Addison’s as a family sometimes. Of course, we are daily referred to as mzungu or mzungus, which is white one. We hear this mostly from children who squeal and come running for you to touch them. I must tell you that this never gets old from the children. It is so precious to see them come running and you have love and a touch to offer them. Their faces light up so much. I wish you could see them and hear their voices.
Sights- the landscape of this place is breath taking. The flowers are so beautiful and abundant. My favorite sight is the morning sunrise though. The pace of life at which I must run with raising four boys has not changed and in order to get a little moment of quiet, I have been rising early to see the sunrise and be alone with Jesus before the busy day. I wish each of one you could see them. They are absolutely gorgeous. I have tried taking pictures but they are a far cry away from the incredible beauty each one brings. The time alone with Jesus is also a beautiful thing. (I have posted a picture for your enjoyment)
Smells- most of these aren’t pleasant so I will leave this alone.

Our hopes: Adoption- For those of you who have been keeping up with the blog, you are aware that we have been diligently praying about the adoption of another child or children. Many of you already know this has been a stirring in our hearts for quite sometime. I must tell you that even though this has been on my heart, I have found myself scared and anxious at the thought. Some have asked if we have gone to visit any orphanages yet and the answer is NO. I know that my compassionate heart would walk out with several children but that compassionate heart won’t carry me on the hard days with extra children and their hurt. We are waiting to hear God’s voice on this matter. The assurance that we have walked in obedience to His voice and heart are what will sustain us on hard days not our own compassion. This is the very truth that sustained us in our early days here in Uganda. Things were tough but our assurance in Gods call was unwavering. Please continue to pray as we wait upon Him. Adoption in Uganda is not an easy process and we have been encouraged by some to look at other countries in Africa. I want to let everyone know that of course I would love a little girl but I have not entered this adoption process seeking to satisfy a selfish desire. My heart has been open to boys as much as girls. As a matter of fact, I have envisioned adding boys to this tribe more than a little girl. After, praying this month specifically about adoption, little girls seem to be on our hearts most, especially Kevin. When speaking of adoption, that is all you will hear from him – is little girls. So, let it be known that the big man desires a daughter maybe more than me.

Our longings: The things I miss the most are running outdoors, the Destin beaches, hot showers, diet coke and Dove dark chocolate. OK, of course, I miss all of you the most and then those things. I have been running since I was eight and it just rejuvenates me physically and emotionally. There is a place that I can go run on a treadmill, but oh I miss Bluewater Bay Blvd. I have tried running in our village but between the dirt roads that are so rocky and the boda-bodas (motorcycles used for public transportation) and the people starring, it is not refreshing but stressful. As for hot showers, our bathrooms have tubs with shower sprayers but unfortunately, the water pressure is not good and we are left to just take a bath in a few inches of water –most of the time warm although when the power has been out it is cold. So, I miss hot showers with water beating on my back. However, I am thankful even for two or three inches of water (four on a good day) to clean in as walking on dirt roads with open toed shoes leaves your feet nasty most days. As for the diet coke and dark chocolate, I have found some alternatives, but some sacrifices must be made and I can live without them although, some of you probably thought I couldn’t.

Our heartaches: There are so many things that I love about Uganda and then there are certainly many things that I hate. I know that hate is a strong word but when you hear what these things are you will hate them too. Here are just a few headlines from today’s paper. Twelve-year-old girl burned by stepmother. The stepdaughter was made to put on a dress soaked in paraffin and then made to light a candle, burning her severely. Her very own father, the husband to this woman, defended the stepmother and wanted custody of his child probably to actually kill her this time. Another headlines, fourteen-year-old girl and baby boy abandoned and desolate. This young girl was living in Gulu with her family. One day her parents took her to school. While at school, the girl was informed that there had been raids in her village by the LRA- Lord’s Resistance Army (a war going on here in Uganda for the last 20 years). She never imagined that her parents would have been taken or hurt, but when nightfall came and they didn’t return from working in the fields, she knew what had been their fate. At the time, this girl was only eight with three younger siblings. They were taken to a government run IDP camp for internally displaced persons. Sometime later a man came and offered to take her and her siblings to Kampala for a better life. Of course, they went, who wouldn’t have. After a short time, this man began to demand sex from her. This was just a child – how could he. She became pregnant when she didn’t even know what that really meant. She gave birth to a baby boy. Now, she is fourteen with a six-month-old son and three younger siblings. They go for days with no food. She puts the baby on her breast but no milk comes. The children cry when they see people eating and they haven’t eaten in three days. These young girls stories represent many young people walking the streets of Kampala. The violence here is traumatizing and not uncommon to the people here. It is apart of their lives. Just a few weeks ago, there were riots here in the city over some land being given to the Indians. So, Ugandans just began lashing out at people of Indian descent. One man was thrown from a boda-boda and stoned to death- an innocent man. If you are caught stealing here, they’re a variety of torturous actions that could be taken out on you. One is that they put a tire around your head and shoulders and set it on fire. Even a simple traffic accident can lead to mob violence perhaps killing someone, over a dent. Probably the thing I hate the most is seeing young babies, babies who can barely sit up, sat in the median of a busy road to beg. One day, we were driving through town, where the streets are lined with such children. This precious baby probably not even eight months old was sitting up sleeping with its little hand held out and open. A ragged woman walked over and reached into the child’s front pocket and took out some coins someone had given. How can this be?

Our Lord and Savior: God has been working in and through us in amazing ways. Sometimes, I wonder if this mission is more about what God wants to do in us than through us, but praise God He is doing both. There is no greater Joy than walking in obedience to Him, whether taking orphans off the streets, discipling university students, preaching the gospel, singing the gospel or living the gospel. We are so humbled that God would allow this opportunity and privilege in our life to share in His goodness. Since coming, life has not been easy but oh He has been sufficient and personal in every way. We want to bless Him, praise Him and declare His faithfulness to us. He is at work in the lives of people in Uganda. His word is alive and active and transforming lives in this place. Please pray for His continued work in and through us.

I love and miss you all and appreciate so much those who correspond with us. It means so much. THANK YOU!

2007-04-26T06:25:00.001-07:00

April 26, 2007

I have not written in a while because I have been very busy and I also feel as though everything will seem dull after the April Fools blog; however, I will provide an update on some recent events.

Everything in this blog is true, so you don’t need to look for any clues or hints.

Collins Birthday
We celebrated Collin’s 6th birthday this past week, and we believe that he had a good time. His birthday fell on Wednesday and we didn’t do much on that day except have a dinner at home of his choice. When we asked him what he wanted, he replied, “I want meat on a bone.” This can be interpreted to mean that he wanted pork ribs, so I grilled some pork ribs for dinner. We are fortunate that we were able to find a place in town that could fill our gas cylinders for our grill. The cylinder valves are very different that the ones from the states and we did not think that we could get our propane tanks filled. But, a couple of weeks ago we visited the main Shell terminal, and they were able to fill our tanks so that we can now use our gas grill. For this we are grateful. Anyway, on Saturday we had Collin’s party and he invited two friends to go with him to DiDi’s World, a local amusement park. We were not sure what to expect of an amusement park in Africa. Amusingly, their advertisements claim that they are Disney World in Uganda. We were quite confident that it would not be Disney in Uganda. We were pleasantly surprised, though, to find a park that had several functioning rides, was quite clean, and pretty fun. The quality of the rides was similar to what you would find at a local fair, and they also had four water slides. All of our boys had a good time. The best part was that the park was almost empty (maybe 50 total customers) and we only paid about $3 per person to get in. When the boys rode bumper cars, they rode for almost an hour straight because no one was waiting in line to get on. We spent the entire day there and did not arrive back home exhausted like we would from an American park. It is only about 5 minutes from our house, so we will probably start doing this more often. It would have been worth the price of admission just to go for the water slides, though the water in the pool at the bottom was green. I hope that they don’t catch any diseases from the dirty water.

Safety
Kampala has had some violence recently, and we are praying that it will not escalate. There is currently lots of controversy over the government giving away forestland to an Indian sugar company. There have been several demonstrations and three people were killed two weeks ago during one of the demonstrations. The demonstrations have all been in the city center and it appears that we are safe as long as we are not downtown when the demonstrations are occurring. It seems that many people are unhappy with the current government and are using this forest issue as an excuse to demonstrate and riot. They have used tear gas on crowds many times since we have lived here. Fortunately, we have not been in the vicinity any time that a riot has broken out.

Monday night was the first time that we have heard gunshots in Uganda. Around 1:30 a.m. we heard a single gunshot somewhere fairly close to our house. I asked a policeman about it this morning, and he said that there were actually two gunshots and that one was farther away and that one was close by. He did not know what happened. We did not feel threatened or terribly frightened, but it was a reminder that this can be a dangerous place. God has protected us thus far, as we have had not any robberies or major sickness. The only thing that we have had stolen were Pamela’s pearls, some tools, and some clothes when we first arrived. We feel like we live in a safe area and that we will be ok. However, we still pray for God’s protection and security from danger and disease.

Helping the Fatherless
Our primary ministry is discipleship of university students, but we still want to help facilitate the starting of a children’s home to care for orphans. We have initiated starting an NGO here, and have begun praying about finding land and the children that God desires for us to help. I don’t want to share too many details here but will provide more information in the near future. Please be praying and know that some important groundwork is being laid and things are beginning to progress very well.

Also, we have set aside the month of April for times of fasting and prayer as we seek God about adoption for our family. We don’t have any direct word from the Lord, but Pamela and I both sense that we are supposed pursue adoption and that it will likely be a girl. God’s Word tells us to commit our ways to Him, and that He will give us the desires of our heart. As we have been praying about this, both of us have had an increasing desire to have a girl and that is what seems to be on our heart. We will not move until we are sure that we have heard from the Lord, but this is where we are for now.

Student Center
Our container from America will be arriving in the next week and we still do not have a place to set up the student center. We are praying about whether we should rent or try to buy land and build a building. I have not found a good place to rent and wondering if we are not supposed to do that. Please pray that God will provide clear direction on His will and that I will not rush out ahead of Him feeling that we have to do something now. Also, pray that God would provide a place to store the gym equipment until we have the center ready to start. In our eight months here, it is very clear that all of the apparent “delays” have actually been God’s hand of protection and direction. We are trusting that this delay will also result in clearly seeing God’s plan.

Work Visas
Huge praise! If we had finalized our work visas when we first arrived, then it would have been $12,000 for just two years of work permits for our family. Just this week, missionary work permits have been reduced greatly, and the cost for our entire family for a two-year permit will be around $800. What a difference! We are so thankful that what appeared to be a delay was once again God’s protection and provision. A family in America had given us $2500 toward our work visas, and we will now coordinate with them to use this money toward ministry instead of taxes and fees.

More Birthdays
Pamela and Christian will celebrate birthdays on the 28th of this month. Pamela is promising to post her own blog on that day and has been writing on it. So, hopefully you will hear from her later this week.

Fuel Shortage
There has been a severe diesel shortage for the last few weeks with no apparent end in sight. Fuel has risen from $4/gallon to over $6/gallon, and if you can find a station with fuel they will often limit you to 2-3 gallons. We are told that it is due to a break in the pipeline that comes here from the coast of Kenya. However, you can never be sure about what the truth is if your only source is the local papers.

Witchdoctors
The reliance on traditional medicine, even among Christians, is quite prevalent and concerning. We had our first real encounter with it this morning. Our helper/guard, Mickey, went yesterday to visit a sick cousin in the hospital. When he arrived, he found that his cousin was seriously ill with his entire upper body extremely swollen and his head almost twice its normal size. He had been in the hospital for 5 days and was getting worse and the “real” doctors at the hospital were telling him that they did not know what to do and that he should go to the village doctors (aka, witchdoctors). Mickey would not agree to this and said for him to stay at the hospital. When Mickey arrived home last night and told us what happened, I told him that I would pay to take his cousin to a better hospital. We left first thing this morning, to take his cousin to the International Hospital, but we found out that an uncle had taken him last night, as soon as Mickey left, to the village that is 8-9 hours away. I am very concerned that by the time that they realize that the village doctors cannot help him, that it may be too late. People continue to believe in traditional medicine and worship, doing sacrifices and rituals, in an attempt to manipulate the spirits. It is such an ingrained part of this culture that it seeps into the church and influences many of their beliefs and practices. It manifests itself primarily in the form of people always looking to God for miracles and riches. They pay money (“sacrifices”) to the pastor who promises that God will answer their prayers to get a new car or a bigger house. Instead, the pastor gets new cars and bigger houses, while the people continue to try to manipulate the spirits, that is now represented by one God instead of many. There is so much junk teaching and prosperity gospel teaching here that it is disgusting. I rarely hear anyone speaking of personal holiness, repentance, or true salvation. Everything is about what God can do for them in a material sense.

Ministry
Ministry is going very well and we continue to get busier and busier. I taught three bible studies, preached once, and did pastoral training in just a 4-day span. This week will be similar, though I will probably only be teaching one bible study.

2007-04-09T02:53:00.001-07:00

April Fools Unveiled

I have been trying to get on line for the last three days to post this blog and let everyone know that I was joking. I never intended that people would really believe what I fabricated, but I thought it still best to give a hint that it was a joke. By posting on April 1 and providing a hint, I thought that most everyone would realize that I was playing around. While we covet your prayers, I just hope that there were not prayer times for our made-up family travails. At one point, I laughed to myself thinking about some church group praying for the Ironsides who have bats in their home, worms coming out of their bottoms, and cobras trying to bite them. We tried to think of more crazy things to include, but everything that the boys suggested was too outlandish (lions in our yard, elephants stealing our vegetables). Well, maybe with the gullibility of some, even those would not have been so unbelievable. The idea was that people would be fooled up until the final line of the blog.

So, the question has come from a few as to what was true and what was fiction. Basically, the ideas came from real events, but were greatly embellished to make it more shocking. The lies that are most believable are always those that contain an element of truth, which even Satan, the father of lies, often employs.

I totally made up the story about the monkeys. They had not been to our compound, and we have never seen any that were carrying sticks as weapons. However, two days after posting the April 1st blog, we saw four monkeys right outside our gate. So, maybe it was somehow prophetic, though I would not want any of the other events to come to pass.

The boys did find a dead snake while we are at the pool, but it was totally dead (as opposed to mostly dead) and did not try to bite them. I never saw it, so I don’t know what kind it was. Pamela really did have a group of 50 women at our house for a seminar.

We did go to a village church, but there were not any “native dancers” and the only things that we were served were Coke and Fanta.

We have had several sick boys, but none of them had worms coming out of bodily orifices.

We do actually have to have our house fumigated for bats in the attic, but I have never seen any in our house.

So, it was a lie wrapped inside of some real events. I see pastors here twisting the scriptures in similar ways, and I know that it occurs in the US and the rest of the world, as well. Many years ago I heard Pastor Adrian Rogers give a wonderful example that I have not forgotten. He said that the most dangerous lies are those that are closest to the truth. He gave the example of two watches; one that is 6 hours slow and another that is 30 minutes slow. He then asked which is the most dangerous. He stated that if I look at my watch and see that the time is 6 hours off, then I will most certainly recognize that something is wrong with my watch. However, if I look to my watch and the time is only 30 minutes off, then I probably will not recognize it and could miss an important engagement. Mostly truth mixed with a lie is still a lie. Beware the false teachers and the lies of Satan, who mix the truth with a lie or alter the truth to deceive us.

I think that my next fabrication will involve telling people to send me money so that they can get blessed or something. At least, I should benefit financially from being so convincing. HINT: I am only joking. See how easily this works. When you see the word “hint”, it provides a clue. Yes, I am being a smart aleck (sp?). I did hear that a few thought that the hint was that Pamela was having a birthday in April. That was not the reason for the hint, but her birthday is on the 28th and I know that she would love to get a card in the mail. It only takes about two weeks to get a letter here so you still have time. You can send it to: Ironside Family, World Gospel Mission, PO Box 11788, Kampala, Uganda.

Congratulations to Lisa Knaus who was the first to write me saying that she believed that it was all an April Fools joke. I will not reveal the many people who wrote to me thinking that it was real. Hey, I just had an idea. I could threaten to post their emails unless they send me money, especially the ones asking if I captured the stick-wielding monkeys on video or if we took pictures at church.

From now on, my blogs will contain only true events, until at least next April. Thanks for being such faithful readers. I waited a week to post again so that people would have ample opportunity to read the joke blog before I revealed that it was all in jest.

Also, we are still having emails that you send to us that we never receive. If you do not hear back from us within a few days of sending, you should try sending again. We know of several people who have emailed recently, and we never got their email. It really is aggravating not knowing what makes it through. By the way, we love getting updates on Niceville baseball, both for the little league and the high schoolers.

We hope that you had a wonderful Easter celebrating our risen Savior! We had between 700-800 students in church yesterday morning for Easter service, and there was not an empty seat. We took our projector to campus last night and showed “The Passion of the Christ” and over 600 students came. We gave an invitation at the end and one man came forward to receive Christ. We would like to start showing movies on a regular basis because there was such a good turnout. I think that the next movie we will show will be “Facing the Giants”. Our family has already watched it twice and we loved it. Such a powerful message in an intriguing story line! They don’t know American football at all, but we have showed the movie to Ugandans and Kenyans and they both really enjoyed it, too. We would welcome suggestions on good movies to show, preferably those with a Christian message. Also, the church could really use a projector for not just movies, but also for projecting the words to worship songs during church services. We are using mine some, but I do not believe that I should give it to them because 1) it was a gift from SAIC to me, and 2) it is 110 volt and the power here is 240 volt. So, if God’s Spirit is prompting you to provide a projector, then please let me know and I will coordinate the details. It would be a huge benefit to the ministry and a good kingdom investment.

We miss you all.
Kevin for the Tribe

2007-04-01T12:43:00.000-07:00

Revenge of the Monkeys

This has been quite an eventful weekend and I should have known that something was up when monkeys returned to our compound for the first time since Paska killed one almost three months ago. They were staying along our wall and occasionally venturing into the trees, and we were fearful that she was going to have a second victim. However, we were quite surprised when we saw the ingenuity of the monkeys and that they had taken up sticks for protection. There was a group of five monkeys, each with a stick, and they would hit Paska with a stick if she approached. If one monkey was getting fruit from our guava tree, the other monkeys would stand guard. All the monkeys survived and Paska is a frustrated dog. She needs to stick with hunting rabbits, it’s much safer.

We are trying to get everyone healthy for the first time in a while. Christian finally recovered from his sickness, but Addison came after him and spent all day Tuesday vomiting, and was also home from school on Wednesday recovering. On Thursday, he was better and now everyone had endured this bug or virus or whatever it is that is getting us one by one. Now we have a new illness to battle that hopefully will only have one victim. Collin had been complaining of stomach aches and that his bottom itched. He is always whining, and he was still eating and playing normally, so we didn’t give it much thought. Well, he was fussing more than usual, and especially about his bottom itching. Pamela decided that she should inspect him to see if he had a rash or something and upon inspection she found worms. They were actually crawling out of his bottom. We have treated him and it is supposed to be cured in two days, but still very gross! We hope that he has not passed it to anyone else. We will all take the medication just as a precaution.

It has been a very busy weekend of ministry. I met with my men’s discipleship group on Friday night; Pamela had 50 women students to our house on Saturday for an all day seminar; they had a talent night at church Saturday night that lasted until 10:30 pm; and I preached at a church in the village this morning, but we did not get home until after 4:00 in the afternoon. All went well and it was a productive weekend, but we did get a bit of a startle in church. We were in the village and I warned our boys that it would be a long service and a bit different. However, we were not expecting one of the differences. It is quite common to have “presentations” in church. Presentations may be a testimony or a song or even a dance. Sometimes they will last up to an hour of the service. One of the presentations this morning was a tribal dance, but we had no idea that some of the women would be doing the dance while only clothed from the waist down. Our boys were not sure whether to laugh, run, or stare. Pamela and I felt pretty much the same way. Somehow, we made it through and Pamela even sang a song this morning before I preached. Then, we were not aware that we would be staying for lunch afterwards, but if you are offered anything here, it is very rude not to accept. Therefore, we stayed to eat and just hoped that it would all be safe to eat. Well, I am not sure how safe it was because they were serving fried grubs. I thought that Christian was going to throw up just from looking at it. However, Blake (always the brave one) decided that he would try them out and he actually liked them. He said that they tasted like the fried grasshoppers that we had eaten many times. So, we did our best to eat enough to be respectful and appreciative, and now we are all hoping that we don’t get sick again.

Yesterday, while Pamela had the women to our house, I took all of the boys to go swimming, including two or our neighbors. We tried to stay gone most of the day so that we would not disturb the teaching time at our house. The pool that we go to is by Lake Victoria, and sometimes the boys like to explore a little. Since we were at the pool for many hours, they did more exploring than usual. While Blake was out exploring with his friend Musa, they came across a dead snake that had apparently been run over by a car. Africa is known for its many snakes, and especially the large variety of venomous species. Fortunately, most Africans think that all snakes are poisonous and so they kill them all whenever they see them. We have been here for seven months and only seen three snakes, and two of them were dead. Well, this was snake number four and it was dead too, or at least they thought. They were picking up the snake and examining it, when it began to move. I am not sure whether the nerves were still alive and the snake really dead, or if the snake was still alive. Whatever the case, the snake began to move quite a bit and even tried biting them. Some Ugandans were nearby and beat the snake again, so it was dead for sure. They came and got me after the event, and so I went to see the snake. It was a cobra! If they had been bitten they could have been killed. A dead snake is capable of biting if the nerves are still active. In fact a fireman in Florida was killed by a dead diamondback rattler a few weeks before we left America. I have now warned them not to pick up any more dead snakes.

The last event came last night as we were going to bed. There are many pests here including malaria-carrying mosquitoes, cockroaches, snakes, ants, termites, and bats. We have to have our house fumigated at least every three months to keep them away, but the last time we had fumigation done I did not have them do anything for bats. It is already expensive enough to do the fumigation for bugs, and I had not seen many bats the whole time that we have lived here. Plus, I didn’t see what the big deal was anyway if a few bats happened to get into your attic. Now I know that if bats come that it is not just a few and somehow they can show up by the hundreds. Apparently, they get on the move and look for a place to roost. Once they find their new roosting place, they stay there through the daytime and begin to move again once darkness sets in. On Saturday night, already at the end of a long day of ministry, we were settling into sleep and heard a noise in the hallway. I wanted to ignore it because I was already tired (and under the mosquito net) but it kept occurring and getting louder. I finally got out of bed and wandered down toward the boys’ rooms and flipped on the hall light. There were bats in our house by the hundreds! They were trying to scatter from the light, which just made it worse. They are fruit bats, which are harmless, but fairly large by bat standards. I had to quickly turn off the light so that they would settle down and then close off all of the doors. I then opened the hallway window and was able to get them out of it. I hope that they are all gone. I guess that I won’t know for sure until darkness comes again tonight. They make a mess, and they smell horrible. I will definitely get the full fumigation treatment next time.

We really don’t what to know what might come next in our crazy lives. I hope that your lives are more uneventful and that you enjoyed the arrival of April this weekend. (Hint!)

Blessings for the Tribe,
Kevin

2007-03-27T02:29:00.000-07:00

March 27,2007

Frank and Dennis
Frank and Dennis are two men who have recently accepted Christ as their personal Savior, though in quite different ways. Frank comes from a family where Christianity was discouraged and even scorned, but he had been searching for several months. He is one of sixteen children (15 sisters!) and the only to go to university in his entire village of around 25,000 people in Kenya. He has graduated with a law degree but has not yet found a job. He is very intelligent and a great communicator. I have been amazed at how quickly he is grasping spiritual truth. I am trying to spend more time with him because he is soaking up everything. He came to the Lord through Pastor Kennedy who had been witnessing to him and spending time with him for several months. We talked with Frank for about an hour one night after a Saturday night church service and just a few hours before he received Christ. You could sense that he was close, but we did not realize how close. The exciting thing was that his father has no relationship with Frank, but called him that same night to tell Frank that he should seek God. When his dad first called, Frank thought that he was drunk and hung up. However, his dad called back and shared that Frank should pursue God. This same man had forbid two of Frank’s sisters from coming home because they had become Christians and had not talked to Frank for two years. He came forward for salvation the following morning at church. He is the man talking with me by the lake in the only picture of me on Flickr. There is also a picture of him and Pastor Kennedy with their arms around each other’s shoulders. Frank is the taller one and Kennedy has on sunglasses.

Dennis is a young man of around 20 that we met at the Shell gas station. Whenever we would stop to get fuel, he would be our attendant and loved interacting with our boys. One day I was asking him if he was born again. He responded that he was not born again but that he was a Christian (a common response here, actually, which is why you ask if they are born again). I asked how this was possible and he told me that he believed in God but did not believe that Jesus was His son. I told him that he could not be a Christian without believing in Christ and explained the gospel. He and a Muslim man stood and talked with me for 15-20 minutes that day and we started a relationship. On Christmas day we decided that we would take Dennis a copy of the book “More Than A Carpenter” for a present. We went back a week later to see what he thought and he said that someone stole his book, so we gave him a second copy not fully knowing if he was being truthful or not. A couple of weeks later I went back to see him again and found out that he was fired for stealing money. Every time that we stopped for gas, we would ask about Dennis but had not seen him for weeks. Based on his stealing, I was thinking that he lied about the book and probably was selling them.

I got a text message a few days ago on my phone from Dennis saying that he missed us and had been told that we were asking about him. I don’t know how he got my phone number, but somehow he tracked me down. I asked him if he read the book and he told me that he now knows that Jesus is the One true Son of God and that He loves Him. He got saved through reading the book! I need to find a way to get him into ministry and follow up with him on a regular basis, but at least the foundation has been laid. Moving people into discipleship is very important but also very challenging here, but imperative if lives are going to be transformed in such a way to transform a corrupt cultural system.

Birds
Uganda is supposed to be one of the best places in the world for birding and I understand why. We live only a few miles from Lake Victoria and also right beside a swamp, and so we get lots of birds coming through. We have seen many types and even more in recent days. The national bird is the Crested Crane and it is a beautiful bird. We have seen them flying by almost everyday lately. I don’t have a picture to post, but I will try to get one soon. I never have my camera with me when I see one. We have seen birds of all sizes and colors, including some brown parrots and African grey parrots right outside our front door in our guava tree. We see maribou storks everywhere, and they are large hideous creatures, which is quite a contrast to the other birds. They can usually be seen digging through garbage heaps in town. We have seen weaver birds, bee eaters, and many water fowl. There are hawks, eagles, and falcons everywhere, and they come to our yard all of the time. The sounds that they make are as fascinating as the variety of species. Even as I compose this blog, I can hear at least six distinct calls. There are loud hoops and soft singing and everything in between. I keep thinking of how much Jennifer Mathers would enjoy birding here knowing that she could really appreciate the tremendous diversity.

Outing with Students
We went after church Sunday with the KIU students to a place called the Entebbe Botanical Gardens. We went here one other time and got pictures of monkeys, and we saw even more monkeys this time. I have included some pictures on the Flickr link. The black and white monkeys are called colobus. They are very pretty but also tend to be very shy and run up into the trees if you get close. The gray monkeys are called vervet and are not shy at all. In fact, one got in our car and stole some food while we were feeding the other monkeys. I have included several pictures of Pamela and the boys interacting with the vervets. This is also the kind of monkey that Paska killed in our compound, so maybe they should take a lesson from the colobus and spend more time in the treetops. If you look through the pictures, you will see one monkey walking on his hands. We thought that he was showing off for us, until we realized that both of his feet had been cut off. We were told that it is common for witchdoctors to tell people to get monkey body parts for rituals, and that when you seen a monkey with a missing foot or tail that it was probably victim to a traditional ritual.

It was a very fun afternoon in a lush setting by Lake Victoria and with the students. This was one of the few times that we have had interaction with the students that was not in a formal setting. We get times before and after church and bible studies, but it is usually rushed. The discipleship groups are more intimate, but also fairly formal. We got to see the real personalities come out. It was really fun when they got into their tribes and did some traditional African dancing. Unfortunately, I did not have my video camera with me but I did get a few pictures that are also on Flickr. You could easily see the hams in the group by those who wanted to be the center of attention and leading the dances.

Thumper
Our boys now have a pet rabbit, courtesy of their friend Artibul. They are so excited and have played with it constantly since they were given this new gift on Sunday morning. Unfortunately, our monkey-killing dog would like to add another victim to her list and we have to lock up Paska before we can interact with the rabbit. She cries and whines and runs about wanting to “kill the wabbit” (hopefully you recall Elmer Fudd’s musical episode or you will not get the joke). The guys who built our fort came and built a rabbit cage yesterday. We use the wood from our crates that were shipped, so we have very little material costs on these items, and it gives us additional opportunities to interact with our friends. They asked me yesterday if I would take them to the zoo one day so I promised that I would do so. The only problem is that they might show up with 10 people wanting to go and my car will not hold that many people.

Internet Problems
We were finally starting to think that our communication problems were mostly behind us, but now our home internet has stopped working again. So, if we are slow to respond to email it is because we are back to having to go out in order to retrieve and send email. However, it does appear that our laptop is totally healed! It has not shut off on its own for at least a month and is working well. Praise the Lord because it would have been very expensive and difficult to get it repaired.

p.s. if new pictures do not appear on flickr it is because internet is very slow today where I am working.

2007-03-21T23:43:00.001-07:00

March 20, 2007

I hope that you have noticed that I got some pictures posted under the
Flickr window (look to the right of this blog). If you click on a picture, then it will enlarge. The internet is so incredibly slow that posting pictures is a challenge, but I did manage to get a few posted and will try to do some more this week. I have tried to post pictures within the text of the blog, but it never shows up even after it says that it downloaded. Oh well, either I am doing it wrong (likely) or the internet just can’t handle it here.

Pamela just returned yesterday from spending four days “up country” in the town of Arua. This used to be a dangerous area but it is much safer now. Most of northern Uganda is still unsafe due to the Lord’s Resistance Army activity. She had a good trip and made it to and from safely, which is never taken for granted here.

Christian is still battling an intestinal infection of some sort, probably giardia. He went back to school for a couple of days but is home sick again today. We are giving him another round of medicine, which should help clear this up. I learned a new term this week – “diarrating”. Apparently, this is the Ugandan term in verb form for when you have diarrhea. Hopefully, Christian will quite diarrating soon or he will be skinny. One good thing about being sick here – you never need to go on a diet.

Christian caught a chameleon yesterday but I just found out that he already released it. I was going to put a picture of it on the blog for his friends to see.

I am going to start posting a weekly update of emails that we have received so that you can know that yours got through to us. In the past week we have received emails from:
Barbara Ironside, Sarah Hawkins, Lisa Knauss, Brenda Corder, Heather Huff, Alison Lublink, and Jamie McKee. Apparently, women are much more faithful at staying in touch than men based on that list. If we send you an email, please send a short reply letting us know that you got it. This would be quite helpful.

Prayer Needs:
1. Clear direction from the Lord about adopting (boy or girl or both, how old, from where)
2. Location for the student center.
3. Resolution of the work visas. They are currently trying to charge $1000/year/person for missionaries. It used to be $250 per person for a three-year permit. We are unable to leave the country until this is resolved. I am holding out and hoping that there will be a reasonable compromise.
4. Good health for all.
5. Fruitful ministry, especially in discipleship of students.

Last week was a busy and productive week for ministry. I got my first chance to do pastor training, which was something that I had really hoped to do here. I trained a group of 10 pastors on Thursday and Friday on gifts of the Holy Spirit and also on how to prepare a sermon. It was an excellent group and they asked excellent questions. Our discussion on the gift of tongues was the most lively of all. I tried my best to stick to scripture and not rely on my opinion. There are varied teachings on tongues across the globe, but I heard something new this week. One pastor said that people pray in tongues so that Satan cannot understand them and thwart their prayers. As a group, we decided that there wasn’t anything in scripture to support this viewpoint. I just keep pointing them back to the Bible on everything, and I am encouraged at how well they know the scriptures. False teaching is rampant in Uganda, and especially prosperity teaching, so knowing and following the Word is imperative.

We have enjoyed the baseball updates from Niceville. Please keep them coming so that we can stay a part even halfway across the world. We thought about you guys on opening day and wished we could have been there.

I am very pleased that the UT Vols made it to the Sweet 16 in the NCAA tournament and I am hoping for an upset of Ohio State. I don’t require email updates about them as I keep up with the results on the internet. I appreciate people sending college sports updates, but it is not necessary. If I have email, then it means that we also have internet. Actually, we often have internet but don’t have email but the opposite can never occur. If we have internet, then be assured that I am following sports and especially UT basketball and football. You can take the boy out of America, but you cannot get all of America out of the boy. I am as avid a fan as ever, even without seeing a game on television for many months now.

2007-03-14T22:41:00.000-07:00

March 14, 2007

It’s hot here right now. This is supposed to be the rainy season and cooler, but we have only had a few short rain showers for several weeks now. Six of our seven fans have broken, which allows little relief. Less I make it sound too severe, it is still very tolerable, but I am ready for the rains to start back. It is only really uncomfortable when we are trying to sleep.

Christian is the latest to become ill and is home sick from school today. He appears to have the same illness that Blake, Addison, and I had back in early February. He only weighed 139 pounds this morning, which is less than he weighed when we left America in September even though he has grown two or three inches taller. I asked him if he wanted to add anything to this blog and he has not provided me any material yet.

We have received very few emails in recent weeks, and so we are wondering if they are disappearing into cyberspace again. We have sent out some emails that would have initiated responses and heard from only one or two people. So, if you have sent an email in the past three weeks and not heard from us, I recommend that you re-send it. Pam’s mom confirmed that we have not gotten two emails that she sent us.

We harvested our first vegetables from our garden this morning: two cucumbers and one zucchini. The dry weather is hindering a greater crop, but it was still exciting to see produce coming from our yard. We should have many vegetables in upcoming months. Getting fresh tomatoes year round has been a nice treat.

We had another near miss on an eye injury since I last wrote. The boys were playing street hockey and Blake accidentally hit Addison in the face with his stick. He has a black eye and a cut beside his eye. This makes three boys who have had injuries to the face around their eye. We thank God for his protection, and pray that Collin will not be the fourth to get hurt.

Pamela is going this weekend to Arua in northwest Uganda along the Sudan and Congo borders. She will be helping some of our friends from World Gospel Mission, John and Erica Rineheimer, who are moving there to help train pastors. She made many curtains for their house and is helping them to decorate and settle. It will probably be a nice break from mothering, even though it is an 8-hr drive and will not be an easy trip.

I found an interesting tree frog yesterday. The boys found some more chameleons and I was releasing them in a tree, when I spotted the frog. It is black with yellow stripes and resembles the poison arrow frogs from the Amazon rain forest. We saw two parrots in our yard last week, too, though they were not gray parrots, which are our favorites. We visited the local zoo last week and got to see lots of animals up close. There are wild monkeys that come into the zoo, apparently to beg for food. Christian and Blake had guavas in their pockets and the monkeys reached into their pockets to take them. The boys got a kick out of interacting with the monkeys. They were holding onto the boys’ hands and pants. One monkey got annoyed with Blake and tried to bite his leg, but fortunately did not succeed. We got to see chimpanzees as well, which were the favorite animals in captivity. It is kind of anticlimactic to go to a zoo after being on a safari and seeing everything in the wild. It was interesting though, when the ostriches began mating about 10 feet from us.

I am wondering how I am supposed to get income taxes done this year. This is a bad year for me to be out of the country when doing taxes because this will be the most complicated tax year that I have ever experienced. We sold a house, had major changes to our stock programs at SAIC, had large expenses associated with moving to Africa, and made some financial investments with the equity from the sell of our home.

I guess that it is warming up in America with the approaching spring. Spring was always one of my favorite times of the year as everything would begin turning green and the days grew longer and warmer. It was also the start of baseball season. We have 12-hr days year round, and the temperature only fluctuates about 5 to 10 degrees from rainy season to dry season. It is a pleasant climate and we are close enough to the lake that we usually have a breeze to cool us down, though a little more variety would be nice. What is interesting with this climate is to see how big some plants get that I always thought of as small in America. For example, the ficus trees are as big as oak trees, and we have salvia flowers that are 4-ft tall, when they were only 6-inches or so in America. Did you know that Uganda is one of the world’s biggest producers of roses? They are beautiful here and grow very well.

Our biggest news is that we are more seriously considering adoption. We have found out more information in recent weeks and now know that we need to start moving on this soon if we are really going to do it. You have to have a child in your custody for at least two years, and they prefer three years, if you are going to leave the country. We also found out that they need to be a “true orphan” with no confirmed living relatives if you are to get custody. So, we are seeking the Lord about this and how we should proceed. Five of us want a boy, and one of us would prefer a girl. Maybe we should get one of each. It does make me realize that I will need income again soon if we are going to increase our expenses even further. It is in our hearts to do this, though we still don’t have clear direction from the Lord.

If anyone out there is contemplating a care package, there are some small things that we could use right now that are not included on our container that is due to arrive in early May. So, if you decide to send something our way, please check in with us prior to so that we can get some small items included. It is mostly kitchen spices and inexpensive things that we just can’t get here.

If there is something that you would like to read about that I have not included, please let me know and I will write about it. I am not sure what people are interested in, and our schedule is getting so consistent that there is not as much variety to write about. I am trying to get Pamela to write something, but she says that I am doing fine. Please encourage her to add to the blog. She had an interesting experience yesterday helping a student who is pregnant.

Blessings,
Kevin for the Ironside Tribe

2007-03-05T22:54:00.000-08:00

Six Months in Uganda

Today, March 6, 2007, marks our six-month anniversary in Uganda. We have been told that the first six months are often the most difficult, so this is a major milestone. The first four months went very slowly and the last two months have passed extremely quickly, mainly because we have been busy in ministry (finally!). It is actually helpful to me to evaluate the progress made in six months because it reminds me of God’s faithfulness and also lets me see that we have made some real progress. This is a fairly comprehensive review of what we are doing and have done, so it is a bit long.

University Ministry
First off, we came with a call to help disciple university students, and this will be continue to be our primary focus. Though it hasn’t gone anything like we expected (we thought that we would be at Makerere University and instead we are at Kampala International University, [KIU]), we are definitely involved in discipling university students. We are working through United Faith Chapel, which is a church made up almost entirely of students from KIU and it meets on the campus. This past Sunday, the pastor wanted to see how many countries were represented, and there were students from Kenya, Uganda, Sudan, Congo, Tanzania, Burundi, Rwanda, Somalia, Ethiopia, and Zambia in attendance. It is really exciting to get a small taste of “every tribe, tongue, and nation praising Jesus!”

Pamela meets on Monday afternoons with her discipleship group of around 14 women, and then teaches a Bible study to a larger group of women later that evening. She is also helping to encourage the women’s group leader, Lillian, and assist her in ministry. Lillian is a university student from Kenya and doing an excellent job, but as a student she really needs the support. God has recently raised up three women to assist in women’s ministry, which is something that the church has been praying about for over a year.

I have a discipleship group of 11 guys that are mostly from Kenya, but also from Tanzania, Burundi, and Rwanda. It is very exciting to be reaching so much of East Africa in one group setting! We meet on Friday evenings and it is a very fun group. I am also meeting with Pastor Kennedy every Monday to pray, plan, and talk. He is only 28 years old, and like Lillian, just needs support and encouragement as well as accountability. I really enjoy my time with Kennedy and would appreciate you praying for him, too. One prayer need is that he would really like to be married and is seeking God about this. I get regular opportunities to preach in the church. They meet on Saturday nights and Sunday mornings. I have preached most of their Saturday services in recent months, and will be preaching more on Sunday mornings, too, as we go forward. Around 300 students attend on Saturday night and between 500-600 students on Sunday morning. They have had nearly 800 in attendance on some Sundays.

In working with students, we also have discipleship opportunities outside of the formal times. I met with a young computer science major this week who said that he had two questions that he needed to ask me. The questions were: 1) How do you hear God and know that it is Him? and 2) How do I surrender to God and why does it seem so hard? We talked for over an hour through these things. It was quite encouraging to meet a 19-yr old student who has been saved for only one year, who was interested in hearing and obeying God and doing so with his entire life. This is just the most recent example, but we get chances like this almost daily.

They are very interested in learning about how to have godly relationships and will talk about this as long as you are willing to stay. They had an all day seminar on the topic last weekend, and the students just kept asking questions. This is a tough topic because there really isn’t that much in the bible that teaches on what courtship should look like. I hear many people with many strong opinions on the subject, but I also find that most people that teach on the “new way” didn’t actually do their own courtship that way. We can certainly provide some counsel and give biblical principals on purity, but when students are out of their home country and away from their parents/family, it makes the courtship process even more complex. When you combine this with the many cultural differences because of the many countries represented, it gets quite complicated and whatever you teach better be based on scripture and not just an opinion. Currently in East Africa, “dating” means having a sexual relationship, which puts tremendous pressure on the students. They know this is wrong but they are not sure what is right. They don’t have many safe places to go to spend time with friends of the opposite sex, or even of the same sex for that matter. This is part of the reason that we desire to start a student ministry center…just so they have a safe place to hang out. Most university students spend their hang time in bars and clubs, and they are everywhere here. It is really sad to see this pressure to drink and party literally all weekend long.

We are still pursuing a location for the student ministry center, which we hope to place near campus. It will host a gym, computer lab, library, music room, and game room. We have almost all of the stuff to stock the facility with the exception of the library. Our next container is due to arrive in early May with most of the items, so we would like to have a location secured by then.

What We Have Learned and How God Has Provided
We knew so little when we arrived in Uganda that we had nowhere to go but up. God’s grace has been sufficient and He has been faithful to guide, direct, and carry us. These may all seem like small things, but they were difficult and overwhelming when we arrived.

• We have learned how to drive on the other side of the car and the road. The traffic here is horrendous and the roads are equally bad, but we can find our way now. It used to terrify us and exhaust us, but we are doing much better. It is still difficult, but not overwhelming. We have had no serious accidents and only one real incident when I struck a small child (who was ok).
• We know how to shop. This was also a hard thing to learn, but we pretty much know where to go to get what we need.
• We can greet in Lugandan and Swahili…well, Pamela can speak much better than I can. Our communication is going well and we improve each week.
• We know the good restaurants. Very important for Pamela and I to get away occasionally. The Thai and Indian foods are excellent.
• We found a very nice house with a big yard for the boys to play in.
• We found a good dog to be a companion to our boys and to help guard our compound.
• We have made many new friends, both Africans and Americans and see people that we know everywhere we go. Our boys are relating very well to the nationals and know peoples’ names in the store, gas stations, swimming pool and other places. Addison and Christian are doing extremely well with meeting nationals, and I really don’t think that Addison realizes that he is white and that most others are not.
• We have learned that even though we got off to such a difficult start that it was all part of God’s plan. Even through some of the deceit that we faced, we know that God has led us to Uganda and we have never doubted that. What man intended for evil, God intended for good and used to get us here.
• We have learned how much we need the body of Christ. Our friends in America have blessed us and encouraged us through emails, care packages, and prayers. Our Christian friends here help us by praying with us and spending time with us.
• We finally got internet in our house. Communication is so important, and though it continues to be challenging, it is much more consistent now.
• We have moved from daily survival into daily ministry. Homesickness still hits from time to time, but it is not the daily struggle that it once was.
• We have learned that God’s word is our answer for all of our questions. We have faced situations and problems that we never knew in America, and we have found everything we need to know in God’s word. For this, we are most thankful.
• We have learned the importance of accountability and adherence to God’s word. We have seen the harmful effects of what happens when these are not in place, and how easy it is to for people to stray from truth.
• God has protected us from serious illness. We have all had some bouts of illness, but we have not had malaria or anything terribly serious.

Business Development
We are still uncertain what this will evolve and how it will materialize, but we have had interesting developments. The biggest thing has been helping a Rwandan man to start a business. I have been advising him and gave him a business loan to start an international calling business. He was doing this on a small scale but lacked the capital to really move forward. He is off to a good start and has a profitable business already.

The ministry center has the potential of being run as a business as we will need to charge a membership fee to run it. This is important because you have to be very careful about giving too many things for free here, and also because it needs to be self-sustaining. We will charge a minimal fee and try to remain profitable or at least break-even. I can use this to train and mentor in business, including accounting, hiring and training staff, maintenance, and other areas of business.

I am still pursing alternative electricity solutions. I am not sure where God is leading on this, but I have not forgotten about it. I have some excellent contacts in the government that would allow us to pursue this if the American-based company decides to come here.

What We Miss
We try not to spend time and energy looking back, but there will always be some things that you miss. Our list is simple and diverse:
• Cleanliness and order. It is very dirty, crowded, and chaotic here.
• Hamburgers.
• Corporate worship with quality music. We have lots of enthusiasm here, but not much talent or preparation.
• Our family and friends.
• Our church, ABF and home group.
• Niceville.
• Regular, consistent communication, by phone and email.
• Football and baseball, especially for our boys.
• Walmart. (I used to hate Walmart, so this is hard for me to admit)
• Paved roads and clear driving patterns.
• Seasons.
• The Destin beaches.
• Showers.
• Oddly enough, my job.

Orphan Ministry
We felt that God wanted to use us to help facilitate the start of a children’s home in Uganda, and now we know how important it is to have someone “on the ground” when starting a new ministry. Our role will be more of facilitation, but critical in establishing a home that will avoid corruption and exploitation of orphans. Unfortunately, there is so much money associated with orphan ministry that there is tremendous temptation for the nationals to get into this area of work just to get money. Our role will be to:
• Identify a national person who can be the leader of the children’s home. This person must have a heart for orphans and be willing to personally sacrifice (rather than gain) to help them.
• Identify the group of children who God is calling us to help.
• Identify the best place to build a facility.
• Understand the legal process for starting a children’s home.
• Help with accountability once the home is established.

All of these things could take years to establish if there was no one on the ground. We have learned so much about each of these areas and see how God is preparing us. We know of two different groups of orphans who need help. We have met some potential leaders and are praying through it now. We know of models to follow that have had long-term success. We are beginning to know better on the economics and what to pay for land.

We do not have adequate time to do this on a full-time basis, since our primary call is to discipleship. However, God is making efficient use of our time so that we are equipped to facilitate starting an orphan ministry here. I believe that we will know much more and be much further along by the one-year mark.

Encouraging Others
Pamela has always had the gift of hospitality and encouragement, so it should not come as a surprise that she is using this so much in Uganda. She encourages other women almost daily through hospitality and companionship. She has many who want to be trained in sewing. We see God using us to encourage other missionaries as well. We meet other missionaries almost weekly. We had lunch with a family yesterday and will be meeting with another family later this week. Sometimes it is for us to be encouraged and counseled by more seasoned missionaries, and sometimes it is for us to encourage them. It happens so frequently that we believe it is part of our ministry here. People are so quickly drawn to Pamela that it is likely that this will continue to happen.

Finances
It is much more expensive here than we anticipated, and we are going through money quickly. Unfortunately, the value of the dollar has dropped almost 10% since we arrived, making it even more expensive. We have spent over $100,000 since we departed America, but I think that it will cost about $45,000 per year to live here now that we are established. God has led some people to give, and we are using that money (about $15,000) for the student ministry and for shipping the next container.

Conclusion
We have far to go, but God has also taken us a long way. We were in a survival mode the first couple of months, but now quickly advancing forward. Not having someone on this side to take us through the logistical process of getting settled made things more difficult than most missionaries experience, but it also taught us a lot very quickly. God has been extremely faithful to protect us and guide us and bring people into our lives to help us when we needed it most.

We still have no idea how long we will be in Uganda or what would come next if God leads us back to America. We made an initial commitment to be here two years, and we know that we will be here for at least that long. We can’t imagine being far enough along in ministry to leave in 18 months, so it is likely that the earliest we would return to America would be in May of 2009. We don’t know if we would be returning to Uganda or not. We have contemplated a furlough, but flying six people back to America would be quite expensive. If we did take a furlough, it would probably be around Christmas of 2007 and only last 6-8 weeks. We kind of doubt that we would do that because of work that needs to be done and possible visitors at that time.

We sometimes wonder what the next few years hold for our family. Where will we live? What will I do for employment? We have absolutely no idea at this point. We might not know what the future holds, but we know Who holds the future. Some days I am tempted to contemplate the future and try to plan, but I know better. I am to abide in Christ daily, seek first His kingdom, and He will lead. We are thankful to be here and to see God using us. We desire that God will do a work in us and in our family dynamics and also use us to do a work in Africa.

We covet your prayers. We are constantly encouraged by the many people who keep up with the blog and let us know that they read it. We have confidence that we are in God’s will and that He is leading us. For these, and His continual grace and faithfulness we are most thankful.

Blessings to you all!

Kevin for the Tribe

2007-03-03T06:30:00.000-08:00

Boys Being Boys

We have had some interesting experiences with our boys in recent days, but mostly with one. Blake has not lost his zeal for life or his propensity for finding trouble. I got to go visit the school headmaster three times in one week due to mischief. A couple of times he was just being too silly in class and didn’t know when to stop. Nothing too serious, just Blake being Blake, but it was disrupting the teacher and he wasn’t obeying her. The third incident was also in good fun but caused a bit too much disruption as well. Blake had some of his school items taken from school while he was out of the class. They were things like his ruler, pencil sharpener, and eraser. It was frustrating him that his classmates were taking his things, which we believe birthed his idea for fun. Blake first began taking other people’s items as well and would let them look for some time and wait for them to get frustrated before revealing that he had it and then return it. Then he began to take items from one child and place them in another child’s backpack or pencil pouch. When the student with the missing items would begin looking for his things, Blake would tell them that another student had taken them. One girl, who was being made to look like the “taker”, was emphatically denying taking anything. Blake and his friend Musa said, “look in her pencil pouch, we saw her take it”. She opened her pencil pouch to reveal her innocence only to reveal the missing items. She was so disturbed that she began to cry and sob bitterly. The teacher had to intervene and discovered that Blake and Musa were involved. Thus, the third trip to the headmaster. I think that he now realizes that there is a time for fun and a time to be serious and that this was inappropriate behavior.

Blake also broke off one of his front teeth this week. It was a tooth that was previously broken and repaired in the States. He had been really good about being careful not to bite down on hard items, but he forgot for a moment while eating a sucker. He doesn’t like the way it feels or the way it looks, but it will still be a few more days until we can see a dentist. We know a good dentist here who was trained in the UK and have seen his work. However, he is out of the country until March 7. We hope that he can repair it properly. Interestingly, he broke his tooth the day after nearly losing an eye.

Blake and Collin both play very rough with our dog Paska and get too close to her face while playing. I have warned both of them repeatedly that they are going to be bitten. They keep telling me that Paska won’t bite them. I then tried to explain that dogs sometimes bite by instinct when someone gets in their face and that I know many people who have been bitten by their own dogs in the face. Well, Blake was wrestling on the ground with Paska and was right in her face. She nipped at him and caught him right around his eye. Two of the teeth marks missed his eye by just a few millimeters. He has a black eye and a cut. It isn’t too bad, but could have been quite serious if she had hit his eye. While explaining to Blake that he needs to heed my advice and to be thankful that he hadn’t lost his eye, he began to argue with me that losing an eye wouldn’t be that bad. When I said that he wouldn’t be able to play baseball or football with one eye, he said that he thought that he could. When I told him that he wouldn’t look as good with just one eye, he argued about that. Anyway, the next day he lost about 2/3 of a tooth and was terribly distraught about how he looked, which is nothing compared to losing an eye. I told him that I believed God allowed it to happen because he did not have a teachable spirit when I was trying to explain about his eye and warning him not to play in a dog’s face. Hopefully, he learned this lesson too.

Blake is still having much more trouble adjusting to life in Africa than the other boys. He was far more upset about leaving America than the others and was the only one who cried. He misses his friends very badly. He sleeps on the bottom bunk of a bunk bed and has his friend’s pictures taped to the underside of the top bunk. He talks about them all the time and keeps asking if they will be able to come visit. He often asks if we will ever live in Niceville again and if my company will take me back. He says that if we ever go on furlough that he will hide until the plane leaves for Uganda. We really want him to enjoy his time here and to learn what God wants to teach him. He is not having constant problems, but they occur fairly often and all appear to be coming from not liking it here. By the way, I asked for Blake’s permission before writing these stories and he replied, “sure, tell them about everything.” Those who know Blake can probably here him saying it.

Collin was shooting a bow and arrow the other day that our helper Micky made for him and Blake. Micky knows the boys’ propensity for trouble, and so he made the arrows very light and without a point. It is a good thing. Collin fired an arrow from about six feet away and hit Christian between his eye and his eyebrow. At this range, it would have caused serious damage even though the arrows are not true weapons. Again, we thank God for his protection. Collin is doing very well here and stays happy most of the time. He is our most content child and likes living in Africa. He has a melancholy personality so he still pouts and whines often, but he would do that no matter where we lived. Collin is having trouble learning to read, which seems to come very easily to the Ugandans (while math is easier for our boys). Please pray that his reading skills will increase.

Addison nearly spent the night sleeping in the back of our car last night. We had dinner with a missionary couple that we recently met and arrived home around 10:30 pm. Collin and Addison had both fallen asleep in the car even though it is less than 10 minutes away. We woke both of them up and opened the back hatch for them to get out. We locked up the house and proceeded to bed. I had put Collin in bed and was waiting to pray for Blake when I realized Addison wasn’t in his bed. I asked Pamela where he was and she said that maybe he never came in. I went back downstairs, unlocked the gate and went outside. There was Addison, lying in the back of the car with the hatch open, sleeping soundly. I wonder when or if he would have woken up and what he would have done. Addison just enjoys life and people. He doesn’t see skin color and hugs and climbs on everyone, which makes building relationships easier for our family. Everyone, no matter how little we have known them, is an instant buddy to Addison. Addison is struggling with is temper and anger and needs to learn more self-control. He is also very close to asking Jesus to be his savior and I expect that it will occur in the near future.

Christian, though only 22 months older than Blake, seems to be many years older in size and interactions. He has grown at least two inches while we have been here and also lost a few pounds, so he had thinned a little. He is about 5’7” and weighs about 145 pounds. His voice is changing and he has shaved a couple of times. He has gone from a size 11 to a size 13 shoe in the six months that we have lived here. He is fairly content, though he would prefer to be in America, too. He, like Addison, also needs to get self-control of his temper and anger. It is quite convicting to see how the sins of the father are passed to the sons. I struggled greatly with anger and a temper at his age, and continue to struggle with it. Christian also interacts very well with the Ugandans and meets people of all ages everywhere we go. His best friends at school are the teachers, and they all enjoy spending time with him. He will talk to anyone and loves to tease the Ugandans. I have had to warn him repeatedly to quit scaring Ugandans with chameleons because they think that they are poisonous.

Now that March is here, it means the start of baseball season in America. I am missing it already. This would have been a special year because it would be Christian’s last year of Little League since he turns 12 next month. He is a very good pitcher and this would have been a fun year for him. Blake’s 10 year-old buddies have an incredible team and will be very competitive come tournament time. I wish that he could have shared it with them, and I will miss seeing that group of kids play this year. Addison and Collin got to play on the same team last year and I would have enjoyed watching Addison advance to machine pitch. Collin is our most natural baseball player and he loves playing. I will miss seeing him with a huge smile on his face while in the batter’s box and then watching him slide into each and every base after he gets a hit.

God called us to lay down several things in order to come to Africa. I had to leave my job, we sold our house, we left our community, church and friends, and we left our family. Still, leaving sports remains one of the most difficult. I wonder if God will allow us to pick it (sports) back up someday. We don’t want it to ever be an idol and distract us from serving God. However, we love the ballpark and watching our boys play. We miss the interactions with the parents of the other players, who have now become our dear friends. I loved knowing almost all of the kids and watching them progress, especially this year’s group of 10 year olds. They are a special group and I believe that they will accomplish great things in this year and years to come.

I am trying to maintain some baseball skills by throwing and catching and doing some hitting. It just isn’t the same thing as being at the ballpark with your friends, though. Last year was crazy with all four boys playing. We had kids playing at three fields, and many times we had to go to all three on the same day. I went directly from work to the ballpark, which usually meant that from the time that I left for work in the morning until I returned home was 14 to 15 hours. We ate on the run, and sat in the cold during the early part of the season and in the heat for the latter part. Dinner was either pizza or hotdogs at the field, or something quickly assembled after getting home at 8 or 9 o’clock. When the after-season tournaments started, we were gone everyday for both practice and games. It was exhausting and I was always glad when the season ended. But, I really wish that I were there for one more season and ready to do it all over again.

March 6th will be our six-month anniversary in Uganda, and I will post a thorough update of our progress so please stay tuned….blessings!

2007-02-20T03:48:00.000-08:00

February 20, 2007

Yesterday was Blake’s 10th birthday. We did most of our celebrating over the weekend, and he had a good time. We also had an earthquake yesterday, and I just began to wonder if there is some significance to it occurring on his birthday. It came around 5:30 am and woke both Pamela and I up. I haven’t heard how strong it was, but it shook the house and made a loud noise.

Relationships are very important to Blake, and he has made some new friends that came and spent time with us this weekend. He is spending most of his time with our neighbor, Musa, who goes to his school. Finding birthday gifts is not very practical here, though we did get Blake some animals carved from ebony wood that included a lion, a giraffe, and a crocodile. Ebony wood is beautiful. Even without stain it is such a dark brown that it looks black. It is also a very dense wood and quite sturdy. We have found several things such as bowls and serving utensils made from ebony that we are collecting. The craftwork is amazing and quite reasonable, so we have picked up some cool items that are hand carved or handmade. Because Addison and Blake have birthdays in consecutive months, we decided to give the boys a “fort” for their birthday. It was finished yesterday and turned out really nice. It is African-style with a thatch roof and tree trunks for the woodwork. (Yeah, I know that a picture on the blog site would be nice). We have a zip line coming on our container that will be incorporated into the future design. This is one of those things that should make living in Africa more fun than being in America. We really desire that they want to be here. Addison and Collin are happy, but Blake and Christian still talk about going home almost every day, though I think that they are happier than they are willing to admit.

Communication challenges! I know that this probably sounds like a continuous whine, but email communication is horrible. It appears that only about half of the emails that we send make it to the intended recipient. It is very important that you have our email address in your address book, or it will most likely not get to you. I am getting emails from people that state that they have not heard from me in a long time, even though I have recently emailed them. I am mostly concerned about the many “thank you” notes that we have sent that probably never got there. Sorry, if you have sent us a care package and not heard from us. I will go somewhere and resend emails today from my laptop.

If you send us an email, then we will probably get it. If we send a reply, then it is about 70% likely to get to you. If we send new emails, then sometimes they make it and sometimes they don’t. Please don’t let this stop you from emailing us. We do read them, and respond to them. You just might not ever get the response.

Our internet service is so slow and unreliable (off half the time) that posting pictures on the blog isn’t an option right now. We are considering getting a better internet provider. We currently pay $55/month for this lousy service. A more reliable service would be around $120/month. Isn’t that disgusting? The “good stuff” is still dial-up and slow, but at least it would stay on almost all of the time and be slightly faster.

Our laptop is still acting up a bit, though it works most of the time. It appears to have been partially healed, but we really need a complete healing. Please pray that God will make it whole without us having to send it off for repairs in the US.

Tony Gibson was here for about 36 hours last week on his way back to Florida. He has been in Africa for almost four weeks visiting Uganda, Zambia, and Kenya. We sent back a DVD of over 100 pictures for him to share. I didn’t get to review it before sending it, so I hope that it works right. It is supposed to be pictures with word captions that explain the picture. It shows our house, safari pictures, our dog, the boys at school, and some pictures from Christmas with the orphans. If you check in with Heart of the Bride, then they should be able to burn you a copy for those who are interested.

Student ministry continues to progress. Pamela taught a bible study for the second week yesterday, and started with a discipleship group yesterday, as well. I meet with my discipleship group tonight, which has 10 guys representing four countries. I have started meeting with Pastor Kennedy on a weekly basis for accountability, mentorship, and planning. I will continue to preach on a weekly basis as well.

We have been challenged lately with people constantly asking for money. It is really difficult to know whom to help, and who is just a professional beggar. We had four requests last week. On another note, we have met a young man named Artibul, who has been so giving. He is one of the guys who helped build the boys’ fort, and our boys really like him. Artibul is 18 years old, and only about 5’2” or so, and Addison plays with and hangs on him constantly. I think Addison thinks Artibul is younger because of his small stature. Anyway, Artibul brought Blake a birthday card yesterday, which took a lot of effort and probably cost based on his limited income. I stopped by their workshop one day last week, and he came and asked if he could buy his friend Addison a rabbit. We really enjoy being around these guys, who speak pretty limited English. There are around 8 of them who build furniture, and I am praying about whether to try and start some regular ministry with them. They seem interested in learning about the bible, but I would need a translator because of their limited English. They all seem to enjoy spending time with our family, and we enjoy them. It will be interesting to see what comes of this relationship.

We keep getting emails from people telling us that they are keeping up with the blogs. Thanks so much! It really helps to know that people are praying for you and thinking of you. With our communication challenges, we can start to feel quite isolated at times. Getting notes and care packages from the states is incredibly encouraging for all of us.

We are still working on getting a parrot. Hopefully I can provide an update with some progress soon. It could be another one of those things that makes living in Africa better than being in the US for our boys. Right now, the fort and having a dog would probably be the two highest “best things about living in Africa”.

2007-02-12T21:48:00.000-08:00

Ministry Update

Much of this is repeat of previous information, but should help some answer some frequently asked questions.

Our ministry plan is taking shape very nicely. We are working primarily with United Faith Chapel, a fellowship at Kampala International University (KIU). They meet on Saturday night (about 300 students) and Sunday morning (from 500-600 students). I have preached at their Saturday night service for the first 3 weeks of this term and the last 4 weeks of last term. It looks like I will be preaching 2 Saturday nights per month, and then either 1 or 2 Sunday mornings per month. I am grateful for these opportunities and greatly appreciate Pastor Kennedy sharing the pulpit with me. He is a humble servant and knowledgeable and under the authority of God’s Word.

Pamela will be teaching at the women’s group on Monday nights, and her first time of teaching was last night. It is a group of around 25 students and they are anxious to have her, though she doesn’t feel comfortable in the role of teacher. Actually, that can be a good thing because it keeps us more dependent on God. I am sure that she will do great and that the women will quickly love her.

I will be taking group of 10 guys for discipleship starting this week. We have been trying to get this started but many of the students were delayed in returning to school. This is what I really long for because I see that the impacts of small groups have much more lasting impact than preaching in large groups. Pastor Kennedy is forming the group to represent several East African countries. I will tell you more as this progresses.

As I have written several times before, it looks like our primary ministry will be a Christian student center. We are so excited as this takes shape and I was greatly encouraged by the contribution of items that is coming on our container that was shipped last week. We have most of the things that we need, but we still have not located a place to host it. It would be ideal to be very near the university, but we also do not want to pay high rent. My desire and goal is for the center to be self-sustaining financially, and if we have high rent then that will be difficult to achieve. We may need to subsidize it at first to get it up and running. Please pray that God will provide the perfect place. We will use this to host bible studies and discipleship groups, as well as all of the other activities. Once we get this initiated, it would be a great opportunity for short-term teams to help with, in discipleship/teaching/training as well as construction and improvements.

Our prayer requests in all of this:

• For the Holy Spirit to lead as we study and teach
• For the Holy Spirit to change lives and teach truth
• For a solid foundation to be laid with the students and for relationships to develop appropriately
• For a location for the student center
• For Pastor Kennedy to remain humble as God blesses this ministry

2007-02-11T03:41:00.000-08:00

February 11, 2007

Some type of intestinal virus has been going through our household and I am now victim number three. Blake and Addison preceded me, and I hope that I will be the last. It is quite frightening to be very sick here, because you are never quite sure what you might have. This particular illness had chills, fever, and vomiting and acted similar to malaria. We took Blake to the hospital twice because he stayed sick for 4 days and we did not want to take any chances with malaria. A missionary girl that we met at Thanksgiving died of cerebral malaria last month. She was only 16 years old. If you catch malaria early it is easy to treat, but we hate to run to the hospital every time someone is ill. We need wisdom and protection in regards to sickness.

We have had many opportunities for hospitality in recent weeks. We are now on houseguest number four. Two of our guests have been singles that we met during our missionary training at MTI (Scott Ickes and Stacy H.) and it has been interesting to see how three weeks of training brought so many people into relationship. We have also met several missionaries here who attended MTI, and it immediately gives you some common ground. We are so thankful for the training that we received and we use it daily.

We had an opportunity this week to adopt two Jack Russell terrier puppies but decided against it. A missionary here is leaving on a 6-month furlough, and she needed someone to care for her dog who has two 1-week old puppies. The deal is that if we took care of her mommy dog for six months, then we could keep the puppies. We took a poll and it was 5 votes to one to keep the dogs. However, if mama ain’t happy then no one is happy. Actually, I was fearful for how our dog would interact with the adult terrier, who is much smaller than the monkey that Paska killed.

I really hope that our next pet will be an African grey parrot. They are beautiful birds and also the most vocal of all parrots. Some have a vocabulary of over 1,000 words. I keep getting conflicting information about the legality of having a parrot, though. We know several missionaries that have them, but we are told that it is illegal unless you have a license. However, they are not currently offering licenses, but do occasionally do so retroactively for parrots that have already been purchased. Trying to find out the correct information is not an easy thing to do here. If I get an opportunity to buy one, then I probably will and then try to figure out how to make it legal later. If you don’t have a license, it just means that you could never bring it back to America with you. We are told that you can get a parrot for around $20, and they are over $2,000 in America.

I read a fascinating article about spiritual abuse this week that described many of the things that we have experienced here. The articles are on www.morrischapman.com and are found in a three-part series on his blog site during April of 2006. The article describes 7 characteristics of spiritual abuse, and we have witnessed every one of them. I have also been reading 3 John and the description of Diotrephes in verses 9 and 10 is exactly what is occurring here. It is amazing how anything we encounter is addressed in scripture and that God has a response to every type of sin.

I am composing this blog on my Apple laptop and it has been running for almost 2 hours. Maybe God has healed it. Previously, it would shut down after a few minutes and never lasted more than 20 minutes. If you are praying about our laptop, please continue to do so and know that God is answering your prayers. It really would be a miracle if it started working properly now since the water was spilled on it over two weeks ago.

We keep meeting other Christians and fellow missionaries all the time. It is really exciting to see how it occurs. I was helping pull a motorcycle out of a ditch this week, and another Ugandan man also stopped to assist. It turns out that he is with Campus Crusade and spent 17 years teaching at a seminary in Kenya. God has recently called him back to Uganda to minister here. It will be interesting to see how God uses this relationship. Also, this week, I was trying to get my laptop to send email at the gym (they have wireless there) and a lady came over to see what I was doing. It turns out that she is also a missionary here and her ministry is in media. She primarily produces videos for mission organizations. She came to our house for lunch that same day, and we had a wonderful time of fellowship together. She is leaving in two weeks to go to the states for treatment on a brain tumor that has returned, but she is at total peace. I believe that God will place us in work together in the future since she is feeling called to student ministry. The relationships that we have already made in such a short time has been the most encouraging thing about being here. We have many new friends, both missionaries and Ugandans, and we also keep meeting people in ministry and places of influence. It is clear that God has a purpose in this and we look forward to seeing it unfold.

I dreamed this week that I was on a brief return trip to America and I was in some type of food court with many hamburger places. I was having the hardest time deciding which place to eat and what to order. I settled on a double cheeseburger and chocolate shake. The boys have said many times that the first thing that they want to do whenever we are in America is to go to McDonalds. (Christian just told me that he would rather go to Beef O’Bradys). The food is good here, but there are some things that we miss. We have learned how to make homemade pizza, and the meat is pretty good, though a bit gamey. We have found an excellent Thai restaurant and Indian restaurant that is good as anything that I have had in America. It is not cheap, though, and is about the same as it would be in America. We are also currently dealing with a poor exchange rate. When we arrived we could get 1850 shillings per dollar, but it has dropped to 1730 and was down to 1710. We are trying to put off any expenses for a while until the dollar strengthens, which is supposed to happen in March. Apparently this occurs every year with the influx of dollars at Christmas and the new year.

That is all for now. Please let me know what you are interested in hearing about and I will try to address it.

Blessings,
Kevin for the Ironside Tribe

p.s. the computer ran for about 4 hours uninterrupted today, but did just shut down after about 10 minutes while I was trying to post this blog. Please pray that it will be corrected once and for all.

2007-02-07T09:51:00.000-08:00

Long Time, No Blog

First off, I wish to apologize for our lack of communication. We have been without internet access for 2 or 3 weeks now for two reasons. The first reason is that our at-home internet quit working, but has now been corrected…hopefully for good. The second reason is that we could not do email away from home because water was spilled on my Apple laptop almost two weeks ago. It is still not working, and we are very concerned. I took it to a reputable computer shop and they said that it could cost hundreds of dollars to repair. However, they also told me that if the computer is accessed that any applicable warranties will be null and void. Therefore, we are trying to determine the proper way to approach this dilemma by ascertaining as to whether or not we even have a warranty. If not, then we will try to get it repaired here and then resort to shipping back to America if that fails. Please pray that it will be a simple fix.

It has been so long since I last wrote that I am not sure where to start. We did go on a 4-day safari to Queen Elizabeth National Park in western Uganda and had a wonderful experience. We saw lots of elephants from a very close distance. We also found a family of lions one evening and were able to get within about 12 feet of them. There were two adults and two cubs. We got some great pictures. The park we were in did not have zebras or giraffes, but we saw plenty of everything else including antelope, buffalo, waterbucks, warthogs, and hippos. We also saw a large monitor lizard and two pythons. We stayed in a very nice safari lodge that sat on a bluff overlooking the park. It was a tremendous experience and a nice retreat. The drive was pleasant too, as we were able to view some awesome scenery and the picturesque Rwenzori Mountains along the Congo/Uganda border. This is an incredibly beautiful country once you get outside of the city. The soil is rich, the trees are huge, and the flowers are abundant. I hope that we get additional opportunities to see more of Africa in the future.

The boys are back in school this week and “summer break” is over. We are already seeing the evidence of how much more ministry time this allows. We have had some exciting things develop in recent weeks and we are getting more established in university ministry. Please pray for us as we seek God’s location for a Christian student center, which is our highest priority at this time.

Tony Gibson, President of Heart of the Bride Ministries (our sending agency) spent last week with us. We had some great meetings with potential partners in orphan ministry. We met a young lady named Grace who shared an encouraging and uplifting testimony of how God led her to help rescue street people in Kampala. They are mostly widows and their children, as well as orphans, and she has helped a total of 792 people. These are people who were displaced by war in the northern part of the country and came to the capital city hoping to find work and a better life. Unfortunately, they found out that being homeless and jobless in Kampala is worse than being in the war-torn north. They had been living destitute lives of begging and poverty with no hope of returning to their homes. Grace worked with the Ugandan government and several humanitarian organizations to get them transportation (it’s a 12-hr drive away), land, housing, food, clothing, and blankets. She is now striving to start a school and an orphanage for the nearly 300 children who have no parents. It is truly an amazing testimony of faith and prayer as she had no money or political connections and relied totally on God.

We have received communication that our next container was successfully shipped from Niceville this past weekend. Huge thanks to Karen van de Voorde, Dan Brink and crew for getting it properly sent. I am scared to start listing everyone who helped until I know for sure because I will undoubtedly leave out a name. It is mostly full of gym equipment that we will use in the student center. It also contains some items that we were missing from America, like cereal and chocolate chips. Thank you to the many people who helped contribute to our needs and wants. I haven’t received all of the information on who helped, but I did hear that my former SAIC office in Shalimar and the Koinonia ABF were major providers. I will properly thank all of you very soon now that our communication has been reestablished. Speaking of which…I am very concerned that many of my email messages are not reaching their intended recipients. I have sent numerous emails that I would have expected a reply to. I have called some people and know that they did not receive the email. I need to find a more reliable way to ensure that messages are getting out. This is troubling and aggravating.

Paska has not killed any more monkeys, but we were scared that baboons were coming after us while on safari. While driving along the road, we stopped to get pictures of a large group of baboons (what do you call a group of monkeys?). We had some french fries in the car and the boys were trying to feed them. Well, one of the mommy baboons decided to get a little closer and jumped onto the car and was about to come in the window. Pamela was busy getting the camera ready when she looked up to see a baboon inches from her face. Fortunately the baboon decided that the hood was close enough and afforded us an opportunity to get some up-close photographs. It was quite an experience.

I will write more soon and start providing more regular updates. For now, know that we are doing very well and feeling quite adjusted. We have made many new friends, both Americans and Ugandans. God leads us to new people on a daily basis and in interesting ways. Homesickness has greatly subsided, though we still miss our family and friends very much. The care packages in recent weeks really helped lift our spirits and gave us a taste of home. We received our most recent package from the Finleys in Colorado just as we were leaving for our safari. We have been drinking iced tea and Kool Aid, eating chocolate chip cookies, and were able to make a cake for Addison’s birthday party that was just held this past weekend. Pamela and I were just commenting today on how quickly the time is passing. The first two months were very difficult for many reasons. November and December brought the holidays and a lot of homesickness. However, January was a blur, and we are already a week into February. Our student ministry plan is getting quite firm, and opportunities to help with orphan ministry are coming frequently. It seems that we have turned a corner and are doing much better. I am not sure when it occurred, but probably as soon as Christmas was over and the university students returned. We are excited about what God has before us and appreciate your many prayers for our family. God is working in tremendous ways and it is imperative that we hear from Him and know His will and plan for our path forward.

Blessings to you all!

2007-01-19T11:20:00.000-08:00

Friday, January 19 ,2007

This will be quick because it is late and I need to get to bed so that I will be rested for our trip tomorrow. We are going on our first safari!!! We leave for Queen Elizabeth National Park bright and early tomorrow morning. You can probably google it and find out all you would ever want to know. It will take us about 7 hours to drive there on very poor roads. The boys are very excited and I am sure that I will be too once we actually arrive.

Some other good news: I am composing this blog while online in my own house. We finally have internet at home as of about 2 hours ago. It is very slow, but I will take it. Actually, I should be packing instead of writing this. Our email account was unlocked by Yahoo and we have read several emails. Sorry, I won't be responding until we return from our trip.

Other very good news: We received several care packages from the States that were incredibly appreciated and received with joy and thanksgiving by us all. Actually, I cannot tell you how wonderful it is to get a box and begin looking through it to see what we got. We received packages from Pam's mom, Pam's dad, the Tomaschkos, the Snyders, the Kennards, Lynette Connelly, and the Lowmillers all in this past week. We feel like we hit the lottery. We are amply supplied in breakfast bars and coffee creamer. I will write more later when I am not so tired, but I want those who sent packages to know how much it lifts our spirits to receive your generous gifts. We ate macarroni for dinner tonight and the boys were so excited.

I will learn how to post pictures on our blog site when we return from our safari so that you can see where we live and what our safari was like.

Everything is going well. Ministry has started back now that the university has reopened from Christmas break. You can hear more in about 5 days.

2007-01-16T05:11:00.000-08:00

Email Problems (Again)
We have been having email problems again and unable to retrieve emails for over 10 days. We have yet to get internet to work in our home and our Yahoo account has 111 messages waiting to be read. I have been to three places trying to download them, but the account is locked up. So, if you have sent us anything urgent, you should know that we have not seen it.

2007-01-14T04:06:00.000-08:00

It’s a Dog’s World

When I was around 18 years old, I purchased a chow-chow puppy. I am partial to all puppies, but I find chows the cutest (with apologies to labs and golden retrievers who I also find quite adorable). My mom is a sucker for cute puppies too, because she really didn’t want a puppy in the house but couldn’t say no when she saw this one. She was a red-orange chow with a black face, and we named her Ginger because of her color. Chows are sometimes known as having a bad disposition, but Ginger was the sweetest dog that we ever owned. However, she was also the dumbest. We could trick her so easily that it became comical to watch. If anyone “meowed”, Ginger would immediately begin snorting and sniffing as she darted around to find the invisible cat. If you complimented the meow with a toss of a rock into the bushes, she would go into full destroyer mode. If she did anything wrong, she would try to hide, but much like a small child, she thought that if her head was hidden that her entire body was also hidden. If she dug up a bush or made a mess, I would find her with her head under my car and her backside exposed to all of us. Actually, her ploy worked, as I would be so tickled by her dumb antics that I would have trouble scolding her.

One of my favorite memories of Ginger is the time she caught a rabbit. She was so proud of her captured prey. She would strut about with the rabbit in her mouth and then bury it in my Mom’s flower garden right outside of our garage. She would dig it up often and prance around with it. The humorous part of this story is that most of the rabbit was flat as a pancake with tire marks. Yep, she caught herself some road kill. I had seen the dead rabbit in front of our house the day before, and she had retrieved it. She was just as proud, though, as if she had tracked, captured and killed the rabbit herself. She also expected us to share in her pride. At this point in my story, you are probably expecting some type of spiritual lesson or insight or wondering why I am telling you this. Right? Well, the reason is that our dog Paska had a Ginger moment this week. It wasn’t a dumb dog moment or picking up road kill; rather, she was proud of something that we were not happy about.

The boys are still out of school so I had taken them to go swimming for a couple of hours. When we pulled back into our gated compound, Paska did not greet us in her normal manner. Usually, she is standing at the gate, sniffing the air, and running around our car waiting for us to get out. By the way, she is a really good dog and has quickly adapted to our family and adopted us as her own. Anyway, this time she was acting differently, and I immediately noticed. She wasn’t at the gate but was running in the yard. She also had a different gait and a prideful strut in her walk. I could tell that something was different but I had no idea what. When I got out of the car, Pamela greeted me and was acting equally strange. She had a sheepish grin on her face and was acting odd. She began to speak in low tones so that our sons would not hear (nor loud enough for me to understand either). Finally, I understood…Paska had killed a monkey. It was a vervet monkey and had been visiting our compound for two days. The boys were so excited because we had been hoping to see monkeys since our arrival. He would usually perch himself upon our wall for a few minutes and then run off. Apparently, he got a little more brave while we were gone and came all the way in. I still don’t know how Paska caught him, though. We have several trees and I would have thought that a monkey could get away from a dog. Unfortunately for the monkey, Paska is very fast. I really told you this whole story to let you know that our dog is a monkey killer and that no monkeys visit our compound anymore. It also brought back memories of my dog Ginger being so proud of her rabbit. Paska was just so pleased with herself. However, we didn’t allow her to prance around with the monkey and instead threw the monkey in a nearby swamp. It was really sad to see the poor thing. This incident also made me think of something else.

I have owned several dogs including two collies, a stray sheepdog, a stray husky (both strays were brought home by my dad), and a rottweiller in addition to Paska and Ginger. All of the dogs were males, except for the latter two. All of my dogs have done dumb things and gotten into trouble. However, the males always seemed to know when they had done wrong and walked around with their heads hung low. Sometimes acting suspiciously even before their crime was discovered. Only my girls were proud of wrongdoing. Is this a female dog trend or just two separate incidents loosely connected across continents?

I expect that this trivial blog will draw more comments than anything else that I have written.

2007-01-06T03:59:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year!

I wrote “2007” for the first time today as I cashed a check at the bank and it felt so odd. Wasn’t it only like a couple of years ago that so many people were concerned about Y2K? 2006 was quite an eventful year as we spent much time in preparation for our move to Africa and have now lived here for 4 months. We continue to adapt and get more settled each week and keep hoping that it will soon feel like home. There are many times that I think that this will never really feel like home, but we continue to meet many Americans who have been here for 1 or 2 years and call Uganda their home.

We look forward with much anticipation to what this year will hold. We have several goals that we hope to have accomplished by this time next year. First, we hope to establish a Christian student center at Kampala International University and be heavily involved in daily ministry there. Secondly, we hope to identify a place and a group of orphans so that a children’s home can be in progress. Thirdly, I hope to have at least one business idea up and running by this time next year. Each of these individually is a pretty lofty goal for Africa, given the slow pace and inefficiency, so trying to accomplish all three might not be possible. If God wills it, then it will happen. Oh, and I am trying to get started on writing a novel. I think that is enough to keep us busy.

We have many things to update you about so this will be a lengthy blog.

Visiting Gulu Children: We have told you previously about our new friends from Vancouver, Canada. The Jones family has four boys who are almost identical in age to our four, so we have a great time together. The Jones run the Uganda Jesus Village (UJV), which is an orphanage here in Kampala, and took us to visit it in the middle of December. We were immediately drawn to these children from Gulu. They are orphaned as a result of the war in northern Uganda and southern Sudan with the LRA (i.e., what the documentary “The Invisible Children” is based on) and also from AIDS. The children range in age from 3 to 14. They sang songs for us and performed some traditional African dances. We were visiting them to get a better idea of sizes and ages so that we could return later with Christmas presents. This was an excellent opportunity to begin to give our boys a better vision for why we left America and came to Africa.

Visiting property for a children’s home: After visiting the UJV, we went to view property that could be used for a children’s home. (I have started using this term more since orphanage is rarely used in Africa, even thought that is what it is). It was about 15 km outside of Kampala and has been used in the past as a refuge for battered women and children. It had a very large chapel, classrooms, office space, a large kitchen, a sewing room (with 13 sewing machines), bathrooms, a medical clinic, and some other buildings. It is located on 12 acres and has adequate space for more housing as well as a garden. This would be an ideal location to build houses so that the children could live in a family atmosphere/structure. Everything else is already in place and it could be used immediately. They are asking $225,000, which seems like a good price, but I am not sure yet. If this were in Kampala, it would probably be well over $1M. Once you move out of the city, prices drop quickly so we need more advice.

Christmas Day: We were very concerned that Christmas could be a sad time since we were spending it apart from our family. However, God was gracious and we had a good day. We gave the boys their African gifts, which they really liked and continue to enjoy. We then went to the Uganda Jesus Village to give gifts to the 58 orphans and the adult workers. Each person was presented with a wrapped present and a personally decorated card. We gave mostly clothes and books, with some jewelry and other items mixed in. We got a laugh out of seeing one Ugandan boy wearing his new NY Yankees hat. It was a blessing to give these children gifts and see the joy that it brought. We also took them homemade cookies that had been decorated with icing and sprinkles. We had enough left that we were able to give some out in our neighborhood. We started by stopping six children, but soon there were 30 or more children coming from everywhere. God multiplied the cookies much like with the fish and loaves. Somehow, we had two cookies left after all the children departed with smiles and green icing on their faces.

New Year’s celebration: For the first time in as long as I can remember, I celebrated New Year’s without watching any football. I hope this is not a tradition that I will continue. We spent New Year’s Eve playing cards with three of our friends and then watched from our upstairs balcony some fireworks being shot at a nearby hotel. New Year’s Day was spent at a cookout with our next-door neighbor, who is a Minister in the government. We met some people of status there, including the man who is conducting the peace talks with the Lord’s Resistance Army in northern Uganda/southern Sudan. It was quite interesting to hear what is taking place there. It was fun day of meeting new Christian friends and seeing what the body of Christ looks like on an international level. We sang hymns and songs and had a very nice time. I keep wondering why God is putting us in contact with people of such influence in government and business since it is happening frequently without us seeking it.

Addison’s birthday: Addison will turn 7 on January 7th. He is quite excited and has been counting down the days for about a month.

Internet at home? We are hopeful that we will soon be reconnected with the world from our home. The local internet provider finally received their modems and we purchased one. We still have to wait 48 hours for them to activate it, but at least we have the hardware. It will be so nice to have daily access to email and the internet. For example, I just heard today about Suddam, and had no idea that anything was going on until I overheard someone talking about it. We also keep getting further and further behind in our email responses and blog updates.

Safety: Our dear friends Billy and Joanna Coppidge were in a dangerous accident last week, but thankfully not seriously injured. The Coppidges are the couple who took us in their home when we were homeless for a weekend. They were driving in a busy section of town when a train struck them. There was no warning and it was on a track where I have never seen a train before. Their car was destroyed, but they escaped with a few stitches and sore bodies. I was almost hit by a train about a month ago myself, and was alerted by a pedestrian only seconds before it came. This was just another reminder about how dangerous driving can be here. Almost every time we get in the car, I pray for safety for us and others. I have come so close to striking pedestrians on so many occasions, that it is only the grace of God that we have not hit anyone. It is especially dangerous to drive at night, and we try our best to plan so that we can avoid driving during the dark hours.

Blessing from Knoxville: My sister Michelle gave us some money at the end of the year, and we decided that we would use it to buy our boys an inexpensive pool table. This is also something that we can eventually transfer to the student center, once established. For now, it is in our home and getting lots of use and bringing much joy.

Monkeys in the yard: and I am not referring to any of our boys. We had been told that monkeys come into our compound, but in our two months in our house, we had not seen any actually in our yard. We had seen one once outside our gate. This morning, however, we saw a monkey in our compound. Unfortunately, our dog chased it off before we could get any pictures.

2006-12-21T07:14:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas!

This is a difficult time for our family as we spend our first Christmas overseas and away from family. There is much good in it, though, as we are more focused on helping others than in receiving this year. We have prepared gifts and cards for each child at a local orphanage called the Uganda Jesus Village, which has 58 orphans between ages 3 and 12. We have had our sons helping to make each child a decorated card and in wrapping gifts. We will deliver them on Christmas day. The people who run the orphanage said that it is likely that these children have never received a wrapped gift before and that we will probably need to show them how to unwrap them. We are excited about this great opportunity to share Christ’s love and know that it will have a great impact on our children. Thank you to the many people in Niceville and Knoxville who donated items before we departed America for us to give as gifts. We have been blessed to be a blessing to others.

We had a group of eight Ugandans from the local Baptist Mission (where we stayed for eight weeks) for a Christmas lunch on Tuesday. It was a very encouraging time for us as we were able to share food, fellowship and love with fellow believers who are daily in a position of serving others rather than being served. They were greatly appreciative and blessed us by being in our home with us. It was just a small taste of seeing that it is better to give than receive.

Pamela and I went shopping at the local craft market yesterday for our boys’ presents. It will be very different this year! They will be receiving only handmade items that are made mostly from local woods. The various items include a drum, chairs, slingshots, animal figurines, and a chess set. As I have considered the modest gifts (compared to what they would normally receive), I am reminded that some of these things could easily be things that they could keep for many years or possibly the remainder of their lives. Whereas, if we gave them the more traditional gifts of games, toys, and clothes, that they would almost all be discarded in a few years. We pray that this first Christmas in Africa will be special and memorable. We often wonder how many more Christmases our family will spend here.

I was so glad to receive an email from Mike Wild last week. He told me that three things are required of a missionary: faithfulness, obedience, and to never look back. I believe that we are doing pretty well on being faithful and obedient, but not looking back is quite difficult, especially during the holidays. We remember that we left behind our families, a wonderful church family, a great community, sports, a beautiful home, a well-paying job at SAIC, the Destin beaches, and all of the comforts of America. I must admit, that we can begin to feel a bit sorry for ourselves when we look at where we were and then compare it to where we are now. However, in all of this I am continually reminded that what we have done is not even worthy to be compared to what Jesus Christ left behind in order to come as our Savior. He sat at the right hand of God, worshipped by the angels in all of the glory and splendor or heaven. Yet, He chose to leave. He was born in a stable, grew up in humble circumstances, without honor or prestige. He had no wealth or comforts. He would be misunderstood, falsely accused, and continually challenged. He ultimately would lay down His life with the cruelest of all deaths…the death of the cross. He was faithful, obedient, and He never looked back. He did this so that we could have life and share this life with others. We are privileged to suffer with Him, so that one day we can be glorified with Him. (Rom 8:17)

I think of Christ leaving heaven to come to earth in a different way this Christmas season because we can partially identify with Him. I believe that Christmas will be more difficult this year, but it will also be more meaningful as God continues to change us and conform us into the image of Christ as we minister in Uganda. Our prayer for you is that you will be able to appreciate what Christ has done for us without having to leave behind all that you know. Worship the King for He is worthy!

Merry Christmas from the Ironside Family!

2006-12-14T03:00:00.000-08:00

Ministry and Family Needs

As we prepared to leave Florida for Uganda, we felt that we were not to solicit any financial support and that God would lead people to give as needed. We are still operating under that premise, but do feel the freedom to let needs be known. For now, we will not directly solicit anyone for help, but we feel like we can let you know how to help if God so leads.

God provided abundantly for us financially through the sale of our home, and we will continue to use those resources as long as necessary. Thus far, we have spent over $80,000 out of our personal savings and have received about $10,000 in donations. We greatly appreciate those who have responded to the promptings of the Spirit to give to us and/or the ministry needs in Uganda.

We have some bigger needs coming up that you may want to help with. First off, we have another container coming to Uganda in either January or February. This container will mostly be filled with exercise equipment for the gym that I am trying to start. It looks like the gym will be part of a Christian Student Center at Kampala International University. Shipping the container will cost $10,000, and clearing customs will be between $1,000 and $2,000. I paid for the purchase of the equipment already, and also received a generous donation of equipment from Lee Ellis of Body Dynamics and Jon Willis of Destin Athletic Club. If you know either of them, please tell them thanks for their generosity.

More about the student center…My goal for the KIU church is to develop a Christian student activities center beside the campus. They have no student services of any type at the campus, so this could be an awesome thing. KIU has about 5,000 students and over 800 of them attend the church. They use the largest room on campus for church services, but have no other access to space during the week. In the student center, I would like to have a gym, a computer lab, a library with Christian books, a game room, and rooms for Bible studies and discipleship. The needs here are: money to ship the next container, books for the library, rent for the building (I haven’t located a place yet, so I don’t know how much but probably around $1500/month), and stocking the game room. My dream for a game room would be a pool table, ping-pong table, board games, and Play Station. They are paying to do these things, but they are almost always in bars and nightclubs. This could also be a place, once established, where short-term teams could come in and work with the students or help to develop the facility. I am excited about this vision, because it could attract non-Christians, and if they got saved, then they would already be plugged into a network for discipleship. The church has very limited space for any type of discipleship or training, and the space in the student center could be used for that, as well. Originally, I was planning on charging to use the gym, but I really want this to be an outreach. I may have a minimal charge just to keep the riff-raff out, but they need Christ, too. Pray that God would provide clear direction on how to operate the center.

We also hope to include some basic food and household items on our next shipment, if there is adequate space. It is mostly small items that we cannot obtain here or that are very expensive. It is kind of frustrating to make this list, because almost every non-food item is something that we gave away before coming. I have provided the list to Karen Van de Voorde at Heart of the Bride if you are interested in either purchasing or contributing to the purchase. It would be best if you coordinated with her so that we don’t get duplication of items. She can be reached at 850-678-9008 or karenwithhob@yahoo.com.

Thank you for prayerfully considering if God would have you participate in this effort. Many have asked us recently, probably because of Christmas approaching, about what we need. We are humbled by those who wish to partner with us and minister to us.

Blessings and Merry Christmas,
Kevin for the Tribe

2006-12-12T00:20:00.000-08:00

December 11, 2006

I am losing track of what I have already written about, so please forgive me if I repeat old news. We have had our dog for one week now and she is adapting to our family very well. Her name is Paska (pronounced very much like pasta), which means Easter in Swahili since that is when the previous owner obtained her. She is a great guard dog and really enjoys playing with our boys and our boys with her. Her favorite thing to do is chase lights. She chases reflections of our watch dials, flashlights, and laser pointers. She will do it as long as you will play the game. She looks pretty stupid sometimes as she claws at the light and tries to pick it up in her mouth. The boys never seem to tire of teasing her with this chase of futility.

The rainy season seems to be winding down and we have not had rain but once in the last four days. The weather is great right now, and we have been to the pool for three straight days. This is really one of the few activities that we can do for fun without driving for an hour or more. We can be to the pool in about 10 minutes and it is in a beautiful setting by Lake Victoria. It is a nice treat and retreat. The sun is really strong since we are only a few miles from the equator and we have to careful not to burn. Also, since we are on the equator, the sun rises and sets at the same time every day. Sun up at 6:40 am and sundown at 6:40 pm. I will miss having the longer days that I am used to in summer, but it is great to have 12 hours of sunlight during the “winter”.

Our landlady is finally back in Uganda and has been by the house 3-4 times. She is being very friendly and taking care of most of the problems we were having. She is acting as if she will also pay for some electrical problems that we had fixed, which would be a huge blessing. We were not sure what to expect, but she is treating us well and having many minor things corrected.

We had a good weekend of worship. I was able to preach at KIU for the 4th consecutive week and felt that it went well and was received by the students. They start their break this week, though, and will not return to school until early February. So, we will not be ministering to university students for almost 7 weeks. This comes at a good time, though, with Christmas and our boys also being out of school for the same duration. Last night, we were at the International Fellowship, which is comprised mostly of missionaries. Pamela led worship and I preached. We had a very good response and several people said that it was the best service that they had experienced there. I believe that God was honored and we praise Him for the opportunity.

We are very excited about tomorrow as it will be one of first good opportunities to start orphan ministry. We will be going with the Jones family to an orphanage of 60 children from Gulu. Gulu is the area where the “Invisible Children” are from if you have seen the video. They have been orphaned as a result of war activities in the northern portion of Uganda from the Lord’s Resistance Army. The Jones are from Canada, and have four boys that are almost identical in age to our sons. They run the orphanage and we are going to help provide Christmas presents. We believe that we have enough items with us to give each child a gift. We will do an assessment of ages and sizes tomorrow and begin preparation for later. After we go the children’s home, we will be looking at some property that the Jones have already identified for an additional children’s home. It is already partially developed and sounds perfect for a large ministry. It is 12 acres and already has multiple structures and includes a sewing room with machines. I will let you know more after we look at the property, but it sounds very encouraging.

Email communication continues to be a challenge, so bear with us during our slow response times. It is likely that we will not have internet in our home before February, which requires us to always go somewhere to use the internet. You cannot use a laptop in the internet cafes here, so we have to find a place with wireless internet. On many of the wireless systems, I can receive email on my Mac, but I cannot send unless I compose while online. We generally don’t have much time while online, so we are limited in what we can get out. Receiving emails is not a problem. Composing emails while offline is not a problem. We just never know when we will get a chance to get them sent.

Only two weeks to Christmas…it just doesn’t seem possible. I remember how different that my first Christmas in Florida felt with the weather so much warmer than I had been accustomed to in Tennessee. I am not sure how Christmas is going to feel with warm weather and everything different. We are trying to focus on the true meaning of the season and are reading an Advent story each night with the boys. This should be our first Christmas where we are much more focused on others than on ourselves, and I expect that we will experience immense joy. We hope to bring Christ’s hope to many children who have never had Christmas before, and we get started tomorrow.

2006-12-07T02:01:00.000-08:00

sorry that we have been out of touch. I have just a moment to let you know that we are having trouble getting internet access. We will try to do better if God allows. I have posted two new blogs today that are dated as I composed them. We are doing fine but just having trouble getting internet since we cannot get it in our house yet.

Kevin

2006-12-07T01:56:00.000-08:00

December 3, 2006

I am writing this before I have had a chance to post previous blogs and will post them all simultaneously. We have had some good experiences the past week, though I find myself extremely homesick and melancholy as I compose this blog. I think that it is mostly that Christmas is approaching and we REALLY miss our family and friends. We also really miss America and the ease of daily living. We set up a Christmas tree this week (thank you Denise Melendez for providing it), but it is rather small and modest and reminds us that we are not in America anymore. Interestingly, we gave our tree away before leaving because we didn’t think we would need it or have room for it, but now live in a house with 9-ft ceilings. Oh well, just one more thing that our flesh has to die to.

Anyway, on to the past week… Thursday night we were invited to a dinner at Speke Resort that was with Nigerian kings. They were traditional African kings and each of them ruled a tribe in Nigeria. The thrones that they occupy had been steeped in witchcraft and sorcery and Satanic sacrifices. These men were giving testimony of how God broke that chain when He called them to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. It was so encouraging to hear what God was doing and His power over darkness when men step into the light. They are changing their nation for Christ though proper leadership based on humility and scripture. It was extremely cool to see them in their African garb and ceremony. We had a great time and fun evening. On a side note, of the 400 people in attendance, only two of us were white. We are comfortable with it, though it still takes getting used to.

Yesterday I attended a Christian leadership conference. Again, there were 400 people and this time only one white person since I went alone. The speaker was incredible. He was from Ghana and directly addressed many of the leadership problems in Africa. It was all based on scripture and very applicable, sound, and challenging. He spoke of Joseph, Daniel, David, and Nehemiah and showed how each man led by Godly principles. I hope that I will have an opportunity to spend more time with him. Those in attendance were either government leaders or business leaders and I am using this forum to make relationships. They seem happy to have me there, and being the only white dude, it is easy to meet people. I am meeting many people of influence and am anxious to see how God will use it.

I preached for the third consecutive week at KIU (you should know this acronym by now if you are reading my blogs regularly). This week I spoke from Joshua chapter 5 where the Captain of the Lord’s host appears to Joshua. I emphasized that it is not about us, but about Him and that the battle belongs to the Lord. There is an extreme emphasis here on spiritual warfare and how to fight it. Much of the teaching talks about all we must do in our flesh to win the battle (e.g., pray all night, shout loudly, say the exact right words). I was trying to teach that victory belongs to the Lord and it is not about saying “the magic words”. Their cultural influence of witchcraft and sorcery makes spiritual warfare very real and frequent here, but this same influence can result in them fighting a spiritual battle in their flesh. I am trying to balance this teaching by showing that God has already defeated Satan and victory comes from Him and Him alone. Our fighting posture needs to be one of humility, dependency on Him, holiness, and obedience. Joshua 5:13-15 clearly shows all these things. Please pray that God’s word will sink deep into the hearts of the students who have been taught some very unbiblical things recently about spiritual warfare including carrying clubs and axes while praying in order to gain victory. I hope that you understand that I am not downplaying the importance of spiritual warfare and I recognize how real it is. However, I also realize that Satan isn’t behind every sickness, sin, and difficult circumstance. They are busy trying to cast out “lust demons” instead of teaching repentance and crucifying the flesh. It seems to me that they are giving Satan so much credit, that it actually glorifies Satan and empowers him in their lives. As I read about the many battles of the Old Testament, in particular I Samuel 17, Exodus 14, II Chronicles 20, Joshua 7 & 11, and Judges 7, I see that victory comes only from God and that He is the Commander. We have to seek Him in holiness and hear from Him how to win the battle. The battle plan was different in almost every case. Sometimes, they do nothing while God fights the battle (Exodus 14), one time they sing while God turns the armies against themselves (II Chron. 20), David uses a sling, and Jericho is defeated by marching and a shout. I have been told that demonic influences are only defeated after years of praying and that you have to the words exactly right. That sounds like victory is too much dependant on us. The battle belongs to the Lord, and the victory is by His strength and for His glory. Pray that God will continue to teach me more about what this means and that I will be able to communicate clearly the truth of His Word.

Pamela was playing Christmas music yesterday and I heard the words “I’ll be home for Christmas if only in my dreams.” How true,.

2006-12-07T01:53:00.000-08:00

November 28, 2006

This will be a long blog because it has been 9 days since my last update. First off, a belated Happy Thanksgiving to all! We had a very nice Thanksgiving weekend, and we praise God that it was a time of refreshment and encouragement. The holidays could easily be a depressing time as we spend it here without our friends and family from America. We spent Thanksgiving Day in Jinja, which is the source of the Nile River. It is beautiful there. We were with most of the Baptist missionaries in Uganda and their families. We had delicious food and great fellowship. The following day we had Thanksgiving dinner with the people from World Gospel Mission, which is a much smaller group but very fun. The food was excellent there, too. So, we had plenty to eat, including turkey. One turkey here is $75, though.

This has been a good week of ministry as well. I preached again at the church at Kampala International University on Saturday night. I was very encouraged because they seemed excited that I was back for a second straight week. I preached on doing everything for the glory of God. Last week, I spoke on how we need to be right in our relationships in order to be right with God. They are responding well and appreciate Bible-based preaching. Too many preachers here read a text from scripture and then just talk about whatever they want to. Sunday morning I preached in two churches that are more village-like. The first church is called Riverside (even though there is no river in sight) and was started by my Ugandan friend, Patrick. Patrick was my interpreter when I was here in 2003 and we had stayed in touch by email for the past 3.5 years. His church was started on Easter of this year and is doing very well. I received a very warm welcome from them. I went straight from there to Restoration Assembly Church in Kawempe. This is the church that was started during my visit in 2003. I preached there on a daily basis for the first week of the church, which according to the locals makes me the father of the church. It was exciting to see people who were saved almost 4 years ago still being faithful to the church. It is very common here for many people to make professions of faith during crusades, but without any proper follow-up or discipleship to fade away. I recognized many faces and they said that they remembered me, too.

We keep getting closer to being settled in our home. We are currently trying to resolve some pretty significant electrical and plumbing issues. The landlord is trying to save money and is not taking full responsibility for repairing the problems. Please pray that they will act responsibly and fairly. We are also trying to get furniture made. We have very little in the house because we left most of our stuff in Florida. We need three beds, many bookcases, a kitchen table and chairs, three dressers, and an entertainment center. They use beautiful wood, mostly mahogany, but the craftsmanship is not to western standards. We hope that we have found a good carpenter. We are almost totally unpacked and pretty much just lack unpacking our books, which will need to wait on the bookcases. We never found the missing items, so it is likely that they were stolen. We lost almost all of our tools, which can be replaced, but they are much more expensive here. The pearls have never shown up and are likely gone for good. This is just another test of trusting that it all belongs to God and that He can do with these things as He pleases. We are ok with it, now, and just disappointed that the pearls, if stolen, were likely taken by someone we know.

We are supposed to be getting a dog this afternoon. It is half German shepherd and half African mutt. She is around 7 years old and very sweet and playful. She belongs to a British man who is returning to England. She has grown up with small children and interacts very well with our boys. We will probably get a black lab puppy in a couple of months, too, if Pamela allows it.

We arose at 5 am yesterday to call our church home group in Niceville (Bartees, Mathers, Nelsons, Orrs, and Rhodes). It was so good to get to talk to them all and catch up. We found out about a phone service that allows us to call the US for about $8/hr, which is actually less than local calls in Uganda. It is bitter sweet to visit via phone with folks, though, since it makes us more homesick even while being encouraged. I was able to share with them some of the details of how difficult it has been here. If you only read the blogs, it may sound like not finding a home and just going through some minor difficulties discouraged us. Most of our discouragement was coming through ministry relationships that I did not think appropriate to place on the blog. Just know, that we are doing much better and God has both protected us and provided clear direction.

If you are praying for us, please include the following:
• Protection from illness, people, and especially while we drive
• Clear discernment about spiritual warfare and how to combat
• Joy for our boys
• Direction on how to pursue business development
• Discernment on who to trust
• That this would truly become our home
• Joy for us all as we spend Christmas in Africa

Every blog includes a bit of culture shock (also known as whining). This week’s came when I got an oil change. I had to go to the Toyota place to buy an oil filter ($13) and fuel filter ($35). I also needed a spare key made so we had to drive across town to another place for that. My alternator was acting up a bit, and we had to drive to another place to have it checked and repaired. By now, I had already spent 6 hours and still did not have my oil changed. The next day, I got the oil change and had the fuel filter installed. The oil is $5.50 per liter and it takes 8 liters. So, an oil change took a day and a half and around $65 ($5 for labor). Labor is generally cheap here, but supplies are outrageous, especially if you try to get quality materials.

Thank you to the many people who have requested a list of items that could be sent to bless us. We have all of our needs met so this list is strictly a list of wishes for things that might make life a little “sweeter”. The grocery store has many things but is lacking many of our favorite things. So, here is a list:

Macaroni N Cheese (we can get the noodles but no cheese; cheese here is very expensive)
Sugar-free powdered drink mix (Walmart brand is fine: lemonade, iced tea, fruit punch)
Chocolate chips/ peanut butter chips (these are no where to be found)
Muffin/ brownie/cornbread mix
Pickling salt (no pickles here, I must make my own)
Maple (to make syrup – it is almost four dollars a bottle)
Fruit snacks, granola bars, snack items for Sams/Walmart
Flavored coffee creamer in powder form (hazelnut, cinnamon-vanilla)
Raisins and nuts (pecans, almonds)
Cake mixes or other boxed mixes
Tuna or salmon packets
Jell-o/pudding mixes
Candy for the boys of any type

We have been told that regular airmail to Uganda should have packages arriving in less than two weeks. There is sure no guarantee here but the service to our missionary friends has been about two weeks. So, we have been told that it is not necessary to pay for faster service because it would be a waste. Ship to:

The Ironside Family
c/o World Gospel Mission
PO Box 11788
Kampala, Uganda

There is no zip code and that is the whole address. They are out of PO Boxes so we must share with others and the WGM folks have been kind enough to share with us.

I am supposed to be meeting some African kings on Thursday night at a dinner for Christian businessmen. I will provide an update in our next blog.

2006-11-19T04:20:00.000-08:00

Howdy!

I haven’t really provided a person-by-person update so I thought that this might be an appropriate time to do so. From youngest to oldest:

Collin: He is probably doing better than anyone. He says that he likes it here and enjoys going to school. He is so diligent that learning and doing schoolwork is actually fun to him. He has more “stars” at school than any other student, and his teachers really like him. He eats better here than in the US and likes Ugandan food more than anyone else in our family. He still cries a lot, and I guess that he will always be the baby of the family. Many of the Ugandans think that he is a girl because of his hair and delicate features. (They sometimes think that Blake is a girl, too, which doesn’t set well with Blake!). They love to come up and touch Collin’s soft, blonde hair. Collin likes being with his family and having routine, and now that we are starting to get a routine of sorts, he is doing well.

Addison: Addison would probably be happy anywhere on earth, and so he is fine in Uganda. We were having some discipline issues with Addison the first few weeks here, but he is doing much better now. He still has moments when he has bursts of anger and a lack of self control, but the moments are much less frequent. He also likes school and has several friends there. He is very competitive in soccer and apparently pretty good, because it is sometimes Addison vs. the rest of his class. We really need to expose our family to orphan work because they have not really gotten any exposure to ministry beyond the campus work. He asks when we are going to help the orphans.

Blake: Blake doesn’t like Uganda and is quick to let us know. He asks almost everyday if/when we are going back to Niceville. He says that if we ever visit that he will run away on the day that we go to the airport and hide out until we leave. He plans to live with either Ethan Shelton or Zander Huff. He doesn’t have a preference as long as he can be in Niceville with his friends. It looks like he is having fun to me, but he never wanted to leave Niceville and often looks back. I think that he will do better with time, especially if we can do some “African things” like safari, fishing, or finding cool lizards or birds. He is doing well in school, even though he hates it. His reading and writing have improved dramatically in just two months. His teacher pushes him, and he doesn’t like it. She sees that he can do better than he thinks he can. He has a good friend at school that lives next door (Musa) and they play most days. Please pray that he will find joy in being here.

Christian: Christian has good days and bad days. Sometimes he seems to be content and doing well, then other times he is quite homesick. On the homesick days he says that he hates Africa. Much like Blake, I think that he will do better when we get to really see Africa. He had lots of expectations of seeing African wildlife before we left America, and we just don’t really get to see Africa in this city of Kampala. We all hope that God leads us to a different part of Uganda or Africa, though we know this is where we are to be now. Christian relates very well to the Ugandans, especially the men in their twenties. He is doing well in school and likes his teacher. We will try to set him up an aquarium soon and get a parrot. He also needs to see purpose in us being here, so getting more involved in ministry will provide purpose to our drastic change in life circumstances.

Pamela: (I will let her tell you how she is doing rather than me trying to assess.) Well, how am I doing? Let’s just say that I am most thankful that Christ is the stability of my times because it has been so hard for us here. Each day, I have died to the flesh that wants to look back and instead I seek to embrace God’s truth for each day and for this time. As a mother, I carry not only my own emotions of what is going on here but the emotions of our boys who have struggled as well. Although, our feelings are similar, I find that as I seek to encourage them in the truth of God’s calling on our lives I am speaking God’s truth over myself. It is my heart’s desire to be at peace here and begin to minister here in Uganda. On the occasions that we have had opportunity to minister, I have found myself so encouraged in our mission. So, I know that in time as we get settled and begin to minister on a regular basis, we will also begin to feel more at home here.

With the holidays coming, I have often found myself teary as I think of our family and friends gathering without us but once again, I must focus on Christ and what He has called us to. There are so many sacrifices being made in this calling and Christ name being exalted among all the tribes is worth everyone. He is worthy and we will press on in this journey enduring the heartache of being away from you all at this time. We do hope that many of you are beginning to get your passports ready for travel our way this spring or summer. Our boys have been asking often if someone would be coming for Christmas. I know a familiar face from home would cheer all our hearts.

We live next to a compound of a woman and small child. The little boys name is “Davey”. Every time we leave our compound and pass by his, he comes running and waving his little hand. He is about two years old. Last Saturday, I took a gift for Davey and his mother and went for a visit. I took Addison and Collin with me giving them a chance also to find purpose in what God has called us here to do. We sat on the concrete porch, shared our gifts and our hearts for sometime. It was so refreshing to me to have the opportunity to connect with this Ugandan woman. Her neighbor saw me there on the porch and came to visit as well. I look forward to opportunities to share with them in the future.

I would like to say thank you to the many who contributed various gift items for us to distribute here. We have had opportunity to share some already and as I have organized them I have thought of many ways to use them. Thank you for allowing us to bless others through your generosity. In time, I will share testimony and photos of this gift-giving ministry.

Kevin: I am kind of like Christian, with good days and bad days. So far, it seems like we are spending way too much time trying to just live and far too little time in ministry. It doesn’t seem very efficient or meaningful. It is very clear that God needed us to have preparation time before plowing into ministry. We have been humbled and taught to wait upon the Lord while we seek where to minister. It looks like I will be preaching on a regular basis and have ample Bible teaching opportunities with KIU. I am also making more and more business connections and trying to discern where God is leading in that area. Some good news for me…I have lost twenty pounds since we arrived here and at 220 pounds am the lightest that I have been in over a decade. I am more active, eat less, and have had several bouts with stomach ailments to contribute to the reduction.

House status: We have our electrical inverter set up now, so we have lights 24/7. We just got our washing machine hooked up yesterday so we can stop washing by hand. We hope to have our dryer available soon. We cannot use many of our appliances when we are on inverter such as iron, washing machine, or water heaters. However, we can make coffee and use our DVD player. We are close to having all of our boxes unpacked with mostly just books remaining. We cannot do them until we get some bookshelves. We are not sure whether to have them made or to purchase them. The furniture quality is quite variable and you can never be quite sure what you are purchasing. We haven’t found a dog yet, but we are looking. We will likely wait on a black lab puppy that will be available in February but would also like to get another more mature dog for now. Also, it is rainy season and it rains everyday. It is nice because it keeps it cool, but the mud is getting annoying. It is supposed to stop in December and get much warmer.

LIVE UPDATE: We are writing this blog from a swimming pool that we joined, and the boys just found their first chameleons. They are so excited and Blake just announced that this is “the best day yet!” God is good to give such a simple thing that brings much joy! They are having a blast putting the chameleons on different colored clothing and watching them change colors. The Ugandans are terrified that we would let our boys play with something so dangerous since they think all lizards are poisonous.

2006-11-16T04:10:00.000-08:00

November 16, 2006

Wow, I cannot believe that we are only 1 week from Thanksgiving! We will be spending Thanksgiving Day at a Baptist prayer retreat in Jinja (the source of the Nile River) and the day after with our new friends from World Gospel Mission (WGM). We are connecting well with the WGM people, and we see many ministry opportunities with them. Their local leader, Jonathan Mayo, has connections with Niceville through the First United Methodist Church and was even there last spring. They are training pastors and helping to start businesses in Kampala, both which are objectives of mine.

Pamela and I were both sick earlier this week, but now both of us are on the mend and feeling better. Our house is getting closed to being unpacked, and we would probably be finished if we had more storage space and closets.

I witnessed a horrible accident today where two men were struck by a motorcycle that was traveling very fast. I feared that one of them was going to die from striking his head on the pavement so hard. It is chaotic when these events occur, which are a common occurrence due to the heavy pedestrian traffic and many, many autos and taxis.

Several people have inquired about a mailing address and we have one now since the WGM is willing to share their PO Box with us:

Ironside Family
World Gospel Mission
PO Box 11788
Kampala, Uganda

If you send anything, it will take about 3 weeks to get here if you use airmail. If you pay for the “expedited service” it costs more money and gets here at the same time as the regular service. So, just use the regular service. If you send it by boat, it may take 6 months or longer or never get here.

It will be at least another month before we can get internet in our home, so our communications with probably be infrequent since we have to go to internet cafes to get email access. It is not a simple process. Don’t let that discourage you from sending them, you just might not get a timely response.

I will be preaching at Kampala International University this weekend at their Saturday night service. There are usually about 400 students in attendance. I would appreciate your prayers and am very excited about this opportunity that will probably continue on a weekly basis for a while.

2006-11-10T04:08:00.000-08:00

Friday, November 10, 2006

I haven’t written for over a week because we have been busy moving into our house. It has been a stressful, difficult week, but we are very thankful to finally be in our home. Getting our container released from customs was much more time-consuming, complicated, and expensive than we expected, but it has been delivered and totally unpacked. We did not get final customs release until Monday so we bunked with some new friends over the weekend. They were gracious to house, feed, and encourage us. God was good to provide for us through such sweet people. If TN had not lost to LSU, it would have been a really good weekend.

It was much harder to unload the container in Africa, than to load it in the US, mainly because there was not a forklift to use here. It took two full days and four loads to unpack the container at Maersk and transport it via truck to our home, which is about 6 miles away. It rained intermittently throughout the two days and we were working around mud quite often. Unpacking is going pretty well, but we are have trouble locating some items and don’t know if we forgot to send them, they were taken, or we have lost them in our new home. We cannot find most of our tools, though we did find our toolbox. It only contained screwdrivers. We are missing wrenches, a socket set, a hammer, a plier set, etc. I have wasted too much time searching boxes in hopes of locating the missing items. Pamela is also missing a pearl necklace that I gave her for our anniversary a couple of years ago. She has worn them since we have been here, but we cannot find them anywhere.

We hope to get our electrical inverter installed this weekend so that we can have electricity all the time. Thus far, we have been without power in our new home more often than with it. It has been sort of like camping inside, since we haven’t been able to cook but once, and are living by candlelight.

There have been many things happen this week that I wish that had time to give ample discussion to, but my computer only has a few minutes of battery life remaining. Highlights include: meeting with Patrick and Wilberforce, two Ugandans that I met when here in 2003; learning of a great opportunity to work in training pastors, which was something that I really wanted to do but did not think that I would be able to because I don’t have a seminary degree; having a small child run into the side of my car while I was driving the boys to school (we are not sure if we hit him or he hit us). He stopped crying in about 3-4 minutes and was moving fine and not bleeding. He appeared to be okay, but it was really scary. We keep meeting other missionaries with similar visions for ministry and we are still trying to determine where all we should plug in.

I will provide more details when I have adequate battery life and time to write. The good news is that our work visa is in progress, our container has been released, and we are in our home.

We are going to try to find a guard dog soon, since they are excellent for security. It will probably be a German shepherd mix since that is the most common breed here. We also met a missionary family who raises black labs, and they will have puppies available in February. They boys have wanted to own a dog for many years, and it appears to be a good extra security measure, so we will probably get an adult dog now and then a puppy in a few months.

We haven’t had email or internet access since Saturday and probably have many unreturned emails. Sorry, we love to hear from you. Also, I have sent a bunch of emails to people and have not heard back from many of them. I am fearful that many of our email messages are being screened and never reaching their intended recipients. Maybe you ought to check your junk folder sometimes to see if we are being screened. The difficulty in email communication is quite aggravating since we can never know if our messages got out. However, there are many people that I have written that I am pretty sure would have responded to my message. I am told that African emails servers are known to carry viruses and that American servers often screen them out periodically. Also, if you gave money to us through Heart of the Bride, then I sent you an email about two weeks ago. If you gave us any money and have not received an email from me, please let me know. I am posting this before I have an opportunity to check email, but we will try to catch up soon. We may not have internet access in our home for a few more weeks, so staying in touch will be tough for a while.

We miss you all more than you can imagine. With the holidays approaching, we are all feeling quite homesick.

2006-11-02T05:51:00.000-08:00

Thursday, November 2, 2006

Yesterday marked 2-month anniversary, and it seems in many ways to have gone by quickly. It is hard to believe that we are still not in our home, though we see how God has used the time in the guesthouse to guide and direct us. We have accomplished very little by our American standards, but know that God is shaping us and preparing us for ministry.

We have learned a lot and have been surprised by many things, even though I had been here before. We had been warned of culture shock during our training at MTI, but had expected that it would take longer to hit us. We were told that we would have a “honeymoon period” where everything would be exciting and fresh. It has mostly been difficult and frustrating to make the adjustments. Some examples: driving is very difficult, and it can take anywhere from 30 minutes to 1 hour to get to Makerere University, which is only 6 miles away. Driving is very stressful because of the traffic, taxis, and boda-bodas (scooters), combined with bicycles, people, and many potholes. When someone, especially the taxis, gets impatient, they form a new lane of traffic. So it is not uncommon to see vehicles four abreast on a two-lane road. Efficiency is not a word that you could use frequently here. It takes many hours to get anything done. The other big shock has been the cost of living here. Most items are at least twice as much as in America. For example, gas is over $4/gallon, a box of cereal is over $5, and a can of shaving cream $6. The most expensive things are internet service and cell phones. Internet service (dial-up) is $70/month and cell phones cost about 15 cents/minute to use. Airtime is purchased in $10 increments and people run out all the time, so they ask to use your phone, or they will call you and immediately hang up signifying that you should call them back. (It is free to receive calls.)

I did discover that ESPN Sports Center comes on every Sunday at 1:00 pm local time and I can get college football highlights from Saturday. We found a place to get ice cream cones that cost only about $1.50. I have learned my way around fairly well so that I can drive most places without getting lost. We are enjoying the climate and adjusting quickly to life without air conditioning. It is the rainy season, though, and not as warm as it will be in a couple of months. Our boys’ school is excellent and they are all doing well and seem to like it (well, as much as young boys can like school).

We visited a church at Kampala International University (KIU) on Sunday for the first time and really enjoyed it. There were about 500 students in attendance and they were from several countries including Uganda, Kenya, Congo, Sudan, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Zambia and probably others. We are seeking God as to where we are to focus our many ministry opportunities. We also have an opportunity to work with a local mission in training national pastors. I still believe that a major focus is supposed to be on developing economic opportunities so that the local people can have money to live life. It is such a struggle here for many, and poverty is rampant. I have met others who are also concerned and we are seeking the Lord on how to proceed.

We are still waiting to move into our house. Other than the last 3 weeks we spent in Niceville in June/July while we were packing up our home, we have been living out of suitcases since the end of May and are really ready to be settled into a home.

We supposedly will get our work permit application stamp tomorrow, which will allow us to get our container and move into our home. Tomorrow is also the last day that we can stay in the guesthouse because others with prior reservations are arriving tomorrow. We may be sleeping on the floor for a night or two, unless God works a miracle and we get everything done tomorrow.

We have had so many delays throughout our time here, but see God’s hand in all of it. He has used the delays to protect us, give us relationships with other missionaries, lead us to ministry opportunities, and purify/prepare us for ministry. God has reminded us often to wait upon Him and see Him accomplish His will and purpose. We have had to dig deeper into God’s Word to seek Him and His direction. We have an especially difficult and trying week but cannot share all that has gone on. We just ask that you would pray that we would find God as we seek Him with all of our heart, and that He will make His way clear. We need discernment and wisdom about many things.

2006-10-27T03:57:00.000-07:00

Please Pray that our Yukon will Sell

We have been trying to sell our Yukon XL for over 2 months now with no progress. I wouldn't be in a rush except that I am having to pay $85/month for insurance and this seems like a waste of money.

It is a 2000, GMC Yukon XL with 95,000 miles in case you know anyone that might be interested. It is currently in Knoxville. I was asking $10,000 but have lowered my bottom price to $9,000.

Thanks,
Kevin

2006-10-26T00:28:00.000-07:00

Death of a Vision

When we were at Mission Training International (MTI,) we had a day that was devoted to teaching about soul care and solitude with God. A portion of the day was dedicated to a time for each of us to go and find a place of solitude to spend time alone with God. We were informed during the morning that we would have time in the afternoon to go out somewhere in the beautiful mountains of Colorado Springs. I immediately knew my destination. We were in our third week of training and throughout our training at MTI, I had enjoyed an incredible view of a mountain bluff outside of the window of our training room. It was probably only a mile or two away but almost straight up. As soon as they announced the afternoon plans, I made up my mind that my destination was the top of the bluff…a place where I purposed to meet God.

When the afternoon arrived, I came prepared in my hiking boots and with a supply of water. Our only instruction was that we were not to take a Bible or journal and that we were to allow God to speak to us in whatever way that He purposed. The time came for us to leave the conference room and head out alone to meet God. In order to get to the bluff, we needed to cross some railroad tracks. As I climbed the hill towards the tracks, I could see a very long train quickly approaching and realized that I would not be able to beat it to the crossing. The train began passing by, but then stopped on the tracks blocking the path. I was already in a quandary. Should I wait on the train? Was God telling me that I had selected the wrong destination? I prayed a quick prayer and felt that I was to press on toward my goal. So, I started walking toward the rear of the train in hopes of crossing. As I was about a half-mile down the path, the train began to move forward again and I was eventually able to continue my journey to the top of the mountain bluff.

There was not a path up the bluff and I was required to make my own way. Much of the climbing was through heavy brush and small scrub trees, and other times it required climbing over huge rocks and boulders. I was working quickly and with purpose, because we did not know how much time that we had for this exercise, and I wanted to get there as soon as possible so that I would have time alone with God. Having just left sea level altitude in Florida and now trying to climb at an elevation of greater than 7,000 feet, I was having trouble with my breathing. At one point, I stopped on top of a large rock (at least 20 feet tall) and sat down to rest and drink some water. I was probably about half way on the journey and about a third of the way up the face of the bluff. As I was sitting there, I stopped to pray again and ask God if there was anything that He wanted to show or tell me. God was faithful to speak. In my spirit, He spoke that all of this time alone with Him was to seek Him and hear from Him. I had set out with a destination and purpose that I contrived. I was not spending time with God as I hiked. Rather, I was waiting for my destination, the top of the bluff, to be with God. He showed me that this is often how I approach life: pressing on toward my goals and setting parameters on where I will meet God and spend time with Him. This certainly does not fit the biblical model found in John 15 of abiding in Him. I can be so goal-oriented that I forget about relationships with people and even God. I sensed Him telling me to be still and stop working so hard to get to the top of the mountain. I sat down and I began to pray. As soon as I called out to God, a strong cool breeze began to blow. The wind had not been blowing any during my hike, but God was already bringing refreshment and comfort in Him. I sat and prayed with my eyes closed for about 10 minutes, and then began to stand and pray with my eyes opened. Though, I was not at the top, I already had a wonderful view of the valley below. I began to praise the Creator of the Universe for His handiwork and allowing me to be in such an incredible place. God showed me that He was with me always, and not just on the mountaintop. He showed me that I needed to slow down and wait upon Him. He showed me that I needed to be more concerned with relationships than with my goals. I died to my vision of reaching the top and decided that God had not led me to go to the top, but that getting to the top was my plan.

After a few more minutes, I began to sense that I needed to move to another place. I prayed and sensed that God said “to just go where I lead you and observe My creation along the way.” I was excited and expectant because I was truly trying to hear and discern God’s leading. Because I had given up on reaching the top, I thought that God would give me something even better. I imagined finding a mountain lion skull or possibly an Indian artifact like a large arrowhead or piece of pottery. I was meandering through the brush and climbing rocks, watching for lizards, birds, and other wildlife and keeping my eyes on the ground for a great discovery. I had no destination and was really trying to sense God’s leading. I did this for about 30 minutes, and without realizing it, I was at the base of the last bluff, almost to the top. I looked up the last 100 feet of mountain and asked God if I should go up. I sat down in a crevice and began to pray again. I wasn’t sure what to do. God had already asked me to die to reaching the top, but here I was so close. I decided that He had already spoken and even though I was so close to my goal and my purposed destination that I would stop. It was cool and comfortable in the shade of the crevice, and I thought of this as a hiding place. While I was praying, I thanked God for what He had been showing me while on my hike. He was faithfully speaking, leading and with me all the way and not just on the top. As I was praying I asked God if could go the top. I sensed God speaking: “Yes, my son. You may go to the top. It is I who created you and placed in you the desire to reach the top. It was Me who placed this purpose within you. Just know that I am with you always, not just on the mountaintop”.

I ascended rapidly to the bluff and climbed out on a large rock along the edge. I was sitting in the shade of a large pine tree that somehow had managed to survive the harsh environment of the mountain. I praised God and thanked Him for allowing me to get to the top. I thanked Him for speaking to me and guiding me. I was so grateful to have dwelt with God throughout the journey and not just at the final destination.

I began to ask God what all I was to learn from this time. He reminded me that my life has often had visions that had to die. You may be familiar with the concept of the birth of a vision, the death of a vision, and the resurrection of a vision. God showed me that my original vision to reach the top was based both on my own goals as well as God’s desire. I had to die to achieving my goals and my purposes so that God could resurrect/rebirth with His way. This is a scriptural principal that is found in the lives of Abraham, Joseph, the disciples and many others. Abraham had a vision of being the father of a great nation. The vision was from God, but his expectation of how God would fulfill it was from Abraham and needed to die. Joseph had a vision of being a ruler, but that vision died when he was sold into slavery and later thrown into prison. The disciples had a vision of ruling with Jesus, their coming King. However, their vision died when Jesus was crucified and buried. All of these people had a vision that God had given them, but each of them had to die to their expectations. God was faithful and fulfilled each of the visions, but in a way that would glorify Him and reveal that He and He alone had accomplished it.

I share this because God appears to be doing that in our family’s life right now. We have a vision, which we believe is from God, to help orphans, disciple university students, and bring economic opportunities to the Ugandan people. However, we also came with expectations of how God would accomplish these works. We are daily dying to our expectations and still learning to wait upon Him. God will fulfill these things in His time, for His glory, as He resurrects that which appears to be dead.

Our Great Shepherd, Jesus, is faithful to speak to His sheep, and we can hear His voice and know that it is Him. He guides us, leads us, and protects us. He alone is worthy of our lives, our devotion, and praise.

2006-10-24T06:00:00.000-07:00

Tuesday, October 24, 2006

I haven’t been updating much because I keep waiting to report some progress. However, progress comes very slowly in Uganda, and I have to redefine my expectations of productivity and efficiency. We still haven’t moved into our house because our container has not been released. We cannot get our container released until we apply for our work visa. However, we cannot apply for our work visa until we get one more signature from the Baptist Mission of Uganda, who will now be processing our work visa. So…we wait. We do that a lot now.

In the meantime, we are getting the entire interior of our house painted. It is moving along nicely and looks very nice. All of the homes here are white on the inside and white on the outside. It seems strange since Africans seem to enjoy color. However, they don’t use color in their homes.

We met an incredible lady yesterday, Mrs. Suruma. She is Ugandan and started a Christian secondary school (high school) nine years ago. She has 150 students, and over 90% of them are orphans. She has a dorm and classrooms and is paying for almost the entire thing herself. She gave an incredible testimony of how God lead her to do this and how He keeps providing for them to continue to keep the school running. The school is right next to our house and the Suruma’s house is on the campus. Our boys’ favorite classmates are the sons of Mrs. Suruma and will be 100 yards away. We were so excited to meet her and hear God’s calling on her life. We are praying to see if God would lead us to be a part of her work, especially since it is primarily orphans.

We are being advised to get a fulltime armed guard for our home for at least the first few months. New mzungus are often the target of crime and we can help set a tone that our home is secure by hiring a guard. We are praying about how to proceed with this and how much guard work is required.

We visited an international church on Sunday evening and had a good time meeting other missionaries from the States. The boys really liked it and made some new friends.

We had a nice surprise yesterday when we got an email from two of our classmates from Mission Training International. Scott Ickes and Stephanie Jilcott are in Kampala for two days with their team from Western Uganda. We had dinner with them, and were able to visit and pray together when our boys were not interrupting. They get so excited whenever there are white people to talk with.

Finally, whenever Tennessee beats Bama it is cause for celebration, even if the victory margin is narrow. Tell Brian Rhodes congratulations on the birth of his new daughter and condolences on another loss to Phil Fulmer. I think this makes Phil’s record against Alabama 11-3. I know how much the Alabama folks hate Phil, similar to the Vols distain for Steve Spurrier.

2006-10-18T06:31:00.000-07:00

Praise and Prayer Needs

We have much to be thankful for and we want to acknowledge our Great Provider! I know that our testing is not over and that God will continue to refine us as silver and gold in His crucible. We desire to remain moldable as clay and desire also that we will be clean vessels for His work and His honor. It does appear that there was significance in the 40 days since the 40th day was the day that God returned Pamela’s bag and it was also the day that we found our home. We have not rushed forward with the house and have continued to pray and wait upon Him. We feel strongly that this is God’s provision and we will be signing a rental contract today. We were able to negotiate to $1350/month, which was also an answered prayer. We are very excited about having a home. We took the boys by to see the house for the first time on Saturday, and they were so excited! They didn’t get to see the inside, but they loved the yard, front porch, and the rooms that were visible through the windows.

We cannot move into the house until our container is released from customs, and we cannot get custom’s clearance until our work visa is submitted and stamped. This is very complicated right now because we are praying about how to submit our work visa. We had planned to submit our work visa through Makerere Community Church (Martin Ssempa’s church), but are considering a different option that we are praying about. We have been staying at the Baptist Mission guesthouse, which is run by IMB missionaries (Southern Baptist). They have invited us to pursue getting our work visa through them. This would place us under their authority, but would also allow us to continue to work with Martin’s church. We have discussed everything that we can think of, and we have no disagreements in approach or doctrine. We probably need to make a decision this week and are fasting and praying as we seek God’s face. We have been so encouraged by the IMB missionaries and leadership teams that we have met here. We have met over half of the IMB missionaries in Uganda and have enjoyed our time with all of them. It really seems as though God has us in this guesthouse for six weeks in order to make these relationships. We have been praying about this for four weeks, so we have not made a hasty decision. We believe that what originally appeared to be delays were actually God’s protection.

We know that God has a work for us here and that even as we left the States it was not totally clear what all that we would be doing. We felt much like Abraham as we left our home and family to go to the land that God would show us. We are trying to follow Him each day as He guides us…neither lagging behind or rushing ahead. We really, really desire to find Him and His will. God has been faithfully speaking, guiding, and leading, and though it is not easy right now, we know that He is here with us and went before us. Please join us in praying that God will make His way clear and that as we seek Him that we will find Him.

We are so grateful that we have had some phone calls from America. We have spoken with Tony Gibson, Pamela's dad, and the entire Shelton Family.

2006-10-13T04:53:00.000-07:00

I Once Was Lost But Now I'm Found

Yes, just like Pamela's suitcase. We just returned from picking it up at the airport. All of the contents appear to still be there, though the suitcase itself looks like it has been through a war. It had been sent to Aberdeen, UK by mistake, but God lead them to it. We are so thankful that God chose to return it. Praise Him for all things great and small! "You give and take away, but my heart will choose to say, Lord Blessed be Your Name."

Also, another huge praise. We think that we have found our new home! It has not been finalized, but we have looked at it twice and are ready to close the deal. We really like the house and it is everything that we have prayed for: large yard, big driveway, 5 bedrooms, nice kitchen, and clean bathrooms. It is a very pretty home and even has a modest view of the lake from the master bedroom balcony. The owner is in Malawi and we need to work out the final details with her. We are praying that we can negotiate a very good price.

I have to run now, but hope to provide more updates later. I must mention,though, that today makes 40 days since we left the states on September 4th. Maybe we really were enduring 40 days of testing and this was the time for God to reveal Himself through His wonderful provision. Thank you all for your prayers in these things. Lets all join in giving thanks to the God who brings salvation and deliverance to those who wait upon Him.

2006-10-12T02:30:00.000-07:00

Thursday, October 12, 2006

We were sad when we learned two days ago that my maternal grandmother passed away this weekend. It is hard to not be there for the funeral, and especially to be with my mother. God was gracious by allowing my mom to be with her mom in her last hours, which allowed her to talk with her and pray with her. She shared that my grandmother was praying for others, even in her last hours. We are praying that God will provide encouragement, comfort, peace, and grace to all of our family during this time.

We continue to look for a house. We decided yesterday that we needed to expand our search area, in spite of the advice that some were giving us. We began looking yesterday in a village called Bunga. It is closer to Lake Victoria and about 10 minutes from the boys’ school, and also about 10 minutes further from town. We had looked at one house 4 weeks ago in Bunga, but did not feel that it was in a neighborhood that we would feel safe in. We have viewed three houses in Bunga since yesterday, and all of them could work. Two of the houses have nice lake views, but have small yards and the houses are not as big as we hoped. We just returned from partially viewing a house that…hold your breath…may be the one! It has everything that we have been praying for except mature trees. It had a very large private yard, a large driveway, a garage, and is new. The front porch is huge and wraps around the sides part ways. We were not able to go inside yet, but what we saw through the windows was very nice. We are supposed to get to see the inside sometime later today. We are told that it has five bedrooms. We are very excited and hopeful about this one. It appears to be clean and well finished.

God has been good to us this week by giving us peace and assurance in Him. We don’t doubt at all that He will provide in His time all that we need. It is still difficult to be so unsettled, but we don’t feel that we have missed God in any way. There are still many, many decisions to be made about ministry and even logistics. God will make a way! Every scripture that has been shared with us via email and by other local missionaries has referred to God as our refuge, provider, shelter, and deliverer. Thanks for sharing with us. I was especially thankful for the verse that Jan Orr emailed: Jeremiah 32:27 "I am the LORD, the God of all mankind. Is anything too hard for me"?

We know that God can do the impossible and “Call into being that which does not exist” (Romans 4: 17). We need Him to do that with Pamela’s suitcase, which has been MIA for 5 weeks now. Pamela has released it to the Lord and is trying to be at peace knowing that it may never return. However, we are asking for a miracle and that it would be found, unharmed, and returned. There are many needed items as well as sentimental ones in that bag, including the running shoes that she ran her marathon in.

I had an excellent conversation yesterday with another missionary, Jonathan Mayo, who has ties to Niceville. He had been unable to sleep Tuesday night, and so he stayed up for many hours praying. God was leading him to pray about the need for business development in Uganda. He had just returned from Zambia (where Heart of the Bride is also doing much work), and God had been showing him how much economic development needs to be a part of their ministry. He was praying that God would show them how to move forward. I called Jonathan yesterday to talk for just the second time since we have been here and shared with him my vision for business development. We were both very excited to hear how what God was showing each of us similar things and that I might be the answer to the prayer that God was leading Jonathan to pray.

I still haven’t heard back from the company in Florida that does electricity, but believe that God is still leading me to pursue this for Uganda. It would be incredible to be a part of a solution to such a huge need for Uganda, which has a severe energy crisis.

I really miss football. I mostly miss getting to watch our four sons play for the Niceville rec league. Next, and almost as close, I miss watching the Niceville High School Eagles continue their unbeaten record. Finally, I miss watching college football, especially the Tennessee Vols. I couldn’t believe it when I heard that they beat Georgia 51 to 33. Next up is Alabama. I just wish that I could be there to enjoy watching Tennessee beat the Tide and seeing the look on Brian Rhodes face. Brian was with me in Tuscaloosa last year when Bama kicked a last second field goal to win 6-3 and got to see that same look on my face.

2006-10-10T02:48:00.000-07:00

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

Yesterday was a holiday and we spent the day in Jinja, Uganda. Jinja is a town about 1.5 hours from Kampala and is the source of the Nile River. It is a beautiful place! We saw waterfalls/rapids, gorgeous landscapes, tea and sugarcane fields, Lake Victoria, a forest, and even some monkeys. It was nice to see real Africa and get out of the busy city for a day of retreat. After seeing Jinja, it makes us want to be there. There was so much open land, many trees and flowers, and incredible views of the Nile River and Lake Victoria. It is also much less expensive there. We know that Kampala is our home for now and that God has placed us here, so we only dream of Jinja. It will be a nice place to vacation in the future.

We had lunch at a resort in Jinja and vervet monkeys were coming around to try to get some scraps. Our boys were so excited to get so close. Two of the monkeys were carrying small babies with them.

There is a huge bungee jump over the Nile River, but we did not allow anyone to try it. We also saw a man who was lame in one leg doing incredible acrobatics. It was amazing to see what he could accomplish with just one working leg. He was incredibly strong and muscular and did things that I would not think possible if I had not observed it. Another man said that if we gave him $5 that he would go over the rapids on the Nile with just a 10-gallon water jug. He does this for a living and we paid up. These are huge, Class 5 rapids. He dove in and went through (unharmed) the rapids with just his water jug.

Yesterday was a good day of encouragement and refreshment after several frustrating and trying days. We thank God that He provided this to us when we needed it most and that we were able to enjoy His marvelous creation and handiwork.

Please pray for us as we seek to see where to minister. There are many needs and opportunities and we need clear direction from the Lord. I also need direction and wisdom as we pursue business opportunities here. I continue to make good contacts and meet people of influence. I really believe that the electricity opportunity that I have written about previously is a great alternative for Uganda. Having seen Jinja yesterday, where their hydroelectric plant is located, I saw that the land surrounding it is perfect for the energy crop. The fields of that area are full of sugarcane, which is the same type of climate/terrain that is needed for the energy crop. Being located close to the power grid is ideal, too.

We are totally locked out of our Yahoo email account and cannot send or receive now. I have no idea how to fix it.

2006-10-10T02:46:00.000-07:00

Sunday, October 8

This has been an extremely frustrating week, and it is very difficult to not be discouraged. We have only had internet access twice, and neither time had email, so communications with America have been non-existent. We cannot access our Yahoo account, apparently because there are so many emails with large attachments. Our account piled up while we did not have internet for 5 days.

I did finally get a cell phone. I wish that I knew how to call it from America. It is outrageously expensive to call from here unless you get a special service, which I am pursuing. Our local number is 0774-368867. The Uganda international access code is 256. I am not sure which numbers drop off the front of the number when you add the 256 prefix. I will try to find out today and get out a message. Even as I compose this, I have no idea when I will be able to post it. I hope that I can get internet access soon just so that I can find out the result of the TN v GA football game yesterday. Kris McDorman has been faithful to keep me up to date on the results of the Niceville High School games. Every Friday night, we think of NHS and wish that we could be there with our friends cheering for the Eagles.

I forgot to tell you about getting a haircut. I went to a local shop and was the only mzungu (white person) in sight. Every man getting a haircut was either getting shaved totally bald, or very nearly bald. The man cutting my hair was holding only electric clippers and didn’t speak English very well. I was quite thankful to see him add a guard to the clippers before he began shaving my head. In the end, it was ok. A little shorter than I usually get it cut, but it is fine. I was sweating bullets until I got out of the chair, though.

Pamela found out about a traveling manicurist/pedicurist who comes to your house. She was able to get a very complete pedicure for about $8. At least something here is less expensive than in the US.

I was supposed to teach their Sunday school hour this morning, but for the 2nd time in 4 weeks, they never got around to me. They have two services, with Sunday school in the hour in between. They didn’t finish the first service until 15 minutes before the start of the second service today. This has happened twice. The two other Sundays, I was supposed to have the full hour, but only got around 25-30 minutes. I just go prepared to speak now, but with no expectations. We are learning that it is best to not have expectations for anything, less you get disappointed.

The Ugandan “4th of July” is October 9, their day of Independence. They celebrated in church today by having an African heritage day where everyone wore African clothing, the songs were sung in African languages, and there was a lot of traditional dance. It was a fun day, but we didn’t understand much of it. We joined in the celebration by dressing our whole family in African clothing. Our kids and the students seemed to get a big kick out of seeing us dressed like the Ugandans. We were able to purchase clothes yesterday at the annual fair, that I think is part of the Independence Day celebration. Pamela found a beautiful skirt/blouse combination and looked quite African…at least for a blonde haired, green-eyed mzungu.

Yesterday was my mom’s birthday and because we have not had email or internet access for days, I was not able to even wish her a happy birthday. I had hoped to call yesterday, but was unable to do that either. Lack of communication is very frustrating. I cannot imagine what it was like being a missionary before the advent of the internet and email.

We were told yesterday that our container will be released very soon. Right now, it would be best if it was delayed until we found a house, which may occur sometime during 2006. Actually, since 40 is the number of testing (e.g., 40 years of wandering in the desert, 40 days of rain, 40 days of testing in the wilderness) I am wondering if we are being tested for 40 days in our search for a house. I cannot say that God has shown me anything, but the thought has occurred. Whether it is of my flesh or the Spirit, I am not sure.

2006-10-06T05:22:00.000-07:00

Friday, October 6, 2006

Well, this week has certainly been a test. I feel like we are making so little progress on any front. We still don’t have a house or Pamela’s suitcase. Today, when I spoke with the baggage-handling department at the airport, they said that the suitcase that they thought was Pamela’s actually belonged to someone else. I have no idea whether or not to believe this report because we could not confirm the accuracy with British Airways. British Airways is closed on Tuesdays and Thursdays here and hopefully we can find out more tomorrow. It has been over 4 weeks without her bag. Their maximum payment for lost luggage is $670, and she has well over $1000 worth of stuff in it. Additionally, you can’t get much of anything here that she had in her bag. It was very depressing news, and we can only hope that it was inaccurate. However, when they supposedly found it almost 2 weeks ago and we still don’t have it, it is hard not to wonder. (we just returned from British Airways and they are telling us the bag is missing)

On the housing front, we can only wait on God. We do not believe that we are supposed to take any of the houses that we have seen because they are either too expensive, in poor condition, or too far away. God keeps speaking to both of us to “wait upon Him”. It has been God’s pattern in our lives to come through at the last possible moment in ways that can only be explained as being from Him. We are reminded of the children of Israel when they left Egypt. They had just observed the plagues, had the Egyptians lavish them with gifts as they left, and even seen Pharaoh finally agree to let them go after the Passover. As they are trapped between the Red Sea and Pharaoh’s army, they cry out that God has lead them in the wilderness to kill them. They forget all the miraculous things that God has accomplished in the days leading up to this moment, and lost their faith in Him. Yet, God remains faithful and commands the people to be still and silent and watch His work. We are at that same point. God has done amazing things to get us to this point, but we now feel desperate for deliverance. Our container will be released in the next few days and we have nowhere to put the contents. We really don’t have a good place to put the container, either, even if we decided to purchase it (which I don’t want to do because it is so expensive and would require two moves). Our time in the guesthouse is running out, and we are sooooooo ready for a home. Yet, we need to wait upon Him. Everything in our flesh wants to run out and take the best house available, or to spend every waking moment hunting and searching. God promises that if we leave mother and father or brother and sister to follow Him that He will take care of our needs (Matthew 19:29). We believe that He is going to provide for us in a way that glorifies Him and demonstrates his marvelous provision. Sometimes we wonder if we are being too picky, or missing Him. Yet, as we pray, we are in agreement that He is guiding us and giving us confidence to trust in Him. We need God to come through quickly if all of this is going to work out.

We are also praying that the agent that we have been working with will see God. His name is Richard and we have prayed while he was with us for God to lead and provide. We were able to talk with him some today about our faith, as well as his belief in God. I don’t think that he is a Christian, but he is certainly open to talking about God. He needs the money that he would receive from a sales commission since he is helping send his sisters to school because his father died. He has been with us a lot and knows all that we are facing and going through. We want Richard, our sons, and even the students to see God’s provision. When we left Florida, God did things that even non-Christians declared to be the work of God. We desire that He do the same thing here, so that we can “sing a new song” of His great works…all for His glory.

As I was reading scripture this morning, I returned to the passage in Exodus 14 when God parts the Red Sea. I was reminded that when they felt trapped by the sea, that God had instructed Moses to take them to that very spot so that Pharaoh would see them “trapped” and pursue them. We are exactly in the place where God has lead us and He will have to lead us out. We are not to worry about our material needs, for God has promised to provide. “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” (Matt 6: 33-34).

Psalm 66: 10-12
For you have tried us O God; You have refined us as silver is refined. You have brought us into the net; You laid an oppressive burden upon our loins. You made men ride over our heads; We went through fire and through water, Yet you brought us into a place of abundance.

We are looking to God to deliver us from this time of refining into a place of abundance in Him.