A Call to Prayer

Quite a lot has happened since I last blogged. In late November I took a two-week trip to The States. While it was great to see family and friends, by the end of the trip I was extremely anxious to get back to Uganda. I returned to the orphanage to find only about half of the children that were here when I left. During the holidays GSF tries to put as many kids back into the villages as we can, with any family that they might have remaining. This is done because we feel that is important that the kids keep any ties that they have in the place that they come from, because at the age of 18 the government forces them out of the orphanage. So with the 50 kids that remained at GSF these last two months have been a great opportunity to spend quality time and pour into the lives of children who have absolutely no one. Thanks to donations and people from back home putting gifts together these 50 kids were able to have an awesome Christmas! Christmas in Uganda is vastly different than Christmas in America, and to be honest it was nice to enjoy Christmas without all of the hustle and bustle that it is accompanied by in the states. There was no Santa Clause, extravagant decorations, or tacky Christmas sweaters, but simply a day that we celebrated the birth of our Savior, and it was a day I’ll never forget. We had a big church service, a huge lunch, and then the kids opened their gifts. The kids loved and were truly thankful for everything they were given, so thank you to all of you who made this possible.
Also since I returned from my visit to The States, I’ve had a change in my living situation. Before I was living at the orphanage in a duplex right in the middle of all the children, but there is a new family coming to GSF next week and they’ll be moving into the duplex I was in. GSF is located 30 km from a town called Jinja where many of the GSF staff members live, so we have a van that commutes from town to GSF every day. I thought it would be quite an adventure and new experience to live in town, so that’s what I’m now doing. This has been a great change. My whole opportunity to minister to others has changed in that now I live and interact with people of all ages everyday. One interesting thing about my small one bedroom apartment in town is that it’s located next door to a Muslim Mosque. When I say next door I mean literally next door, like my bed is 30ft away from the mosque. If you know anything about Muslims, you know about their call to prayer. It starts at five thirty in the morning, then again at noon, three, five, and seven. This consists of obnoxious whaling over an intercom really loudly for about ten minutes saying who knows what. For the first few weeks I was there I found this to be very annoying, but the more I thought about it, it started to become encouraging. I started thinking to myself if these people are praying at five thirty in the morning to Allah and four other times throughout the day, then how often should I be praying to my God, The Creator of the universe. Well funny thing because the Bible gives us the answer to that question, when it says pray continuously without ceasing. The great part about our faith though is that we don’t have to go to a mosque or a chapel five times a day and face a certain direction, all we have to do is talk to our Creator. So I use that five-thirty alarm clock to remind me to pray continuously, and it’s actually pretty convenient.
I have so much more to talk about but I know this is getting long, but also recently have started a discipleship group with the teenagers and got to take them on a weekend retreat to a mountainous area with beautiful waterfalls. It was a great testimony to the beauty of God’s creation. The teens loved it, and he is doing so much in their lives right now.
Also recently got to go on an African safari. Seeing lions, zebras, giraffes, and elephants in the wild was pretty sweet.