Well, we’ve officially been in Uganda for over a week now. It’s definitely been a challenging experience but also a very good one.
We have taught Bible lessons at an orphan school and will continue to teach at different orphan schools throughout the duration of our trip. It’s been a challenge because our lessons and activities don’t go over as well as what they would in the states. They are sometimes hard to transfer cross-culturally. It is also hard because what we say in teaching is translated not once but then twice. We wonder what gets lost in translation. It has been fun to interact with the children. It has been challenging to be white and interact with the teachers at the schools because they often think us being there represents the arrival of money.
However, we have been trying to incorporate Elisha into all of our lessons. He is a photographer for Horizon, an amazing friend, a deep thinker and a great conversationalist. He has been the biggest blessing! His friendship is definitely a gift from God. We have had many great conversations, his heart for the orphans is very evident. He has definitely taught us many things about this culture, the government and its people. We now have Friday night movies with him and Sunday night sermons from Steve DeNeff at College Church.
We have also embraced the African culture and are able to spend much quality time with God and with people. We live with our supervisor and his family so we are definitely immersed and loving the laid back African time contrary to the busyness of American life. The food has been great and praise the Lord neither of us have been sick yet! God has definitely blessed us with rest and time to really spend with Him which we really need as we are challenged by the many differences and frustrations.
God has definitely been providing for us, we made a Ugandan friend named Bridget who we are going to the market with this week and we also met some American missionaries who we will spend some time with tonight. Destiny, who is here with her husband and son, has been here for the last four years and is in her 20s. We are very excited to have dinner with her tonight and fellowship with her!
Overall, we are learning that God provides and that we can and need to fully rely on Him in every situation. He sees the bigger picture, while we cannot. Pray that we can continue to rely on Him in every way.
