God with us.

All of my posts are things that are continuing to change my life, now that I am back in America, but this story really stands out in my memory of this trip. It is such a demonstration of reliance on the Lord and just the real, life-changing power of God. I know I am going to butcher this story to pieces, but I'll do my best!

Meet Emmanuel.

(Photo credit: Allison)

Emmanuel was a victim of the war in Uganda; the L.R.A. cut off parts of his nose and upper lip when he was younger. Despite this traumatizing event, Emmanuel chose to dedicate his life to the Lord. He was blessed to receive plastic surgery to mend his face and allow him to speak normally again, and he has used this gift in huge ways! He has learned all 38 Ugandan languages, English and is currently learning French. Why? So that he can counsel other children and victims of the war and share the love of Jesus Christ with them.

We visited with Emmanuel in his father's house and heard his story. He didn't seem like a victim, but a conqueror. He had been faced with adversity, but chose to work hard to overcome it; when we asked him how he did it, he answered simply, through prayer and relying on God's strength. He told us that the Lord had given him all of the languages, he could just understand when people spoke to him in foreign tongues, and he used that gift to give back to God.

I told you that his name is Emmanuel, this means "God is with us," and it suits him perfectly. His life is a perfect example of what can happen when we allow God to be with us and we do life with Him. When we trust God and cast our burdens on Him, we open ourselves up to God-sized lives, instead of just human-sized lives. In John 10:10, Jesus tells us that life with Him is the fullest most abundant life there is. I can see that in Emmanuel; he has an absolutely abundant life full of amazing blessing because of the complete reliance that he has on God.

This idea isn't unique to Emmanuel; everywhere we went, we met people who had been faced with adversity and overcame it through the strength of Jesus. We met women who'd had their children killed. When we asked them how they coped with this, their answer was always the same: Prayer -- and trusting that God actually is big enough to solve their problems and get them through their lives.

I want to challenge you with these stories. When you are faced with adversity, do you trust the Lord to be your strength? Trust Him to get you through? Trust Him to be big enough? He is, I promise. I have experienced it in my life, both in America and overseas.

The Lord is able to heal the brokenness in your life, and the beauty of it is, He wants to. You have a choice to make: Will you be defeated by adversity in your life and allow it to bring you down, or will you let God strengthen you and love you and help you overcome hardships? He wants to help you, will you let Him?

Psalm 28:7-9
"The LORD is my strength and my shield; my heart trusts in him, and he helps me. My heart leaps for joy, and with my song I praise him. The Lord is the strength of his people; he is the saving refuge of his anointed. Oh, save your people and bless your heritage! Be their shepherd and carry them forever."

Day 3

This day was our first full day on the ground in Uganda, and also our first full day of service! We woke up at 8a to be at breakfast by 9a, so we could adjust a little easier to the time change. We had scrambled eggs, toast, potatoes, and this mango juice (super delicious, by the way) at our hotel.

This is also the first real time I had to get to know my team. My team is a lot younger than I expected. When I went to Cambodia, everyone was older than me by at least one decade; however, on this trip, I was about the middle of the pack. Also, my team was mostly girls, which was another change from Cambodia. I'm not going to lie, I had a hard time feeling like I could fit in anywhere that first day or two!

At 10a, we loaded up onto our buses and drove for about an hour to a village west of Kampala, called Wakiso. This drive was way better than our drive in from the airport because it was during the daytime so we could actually see the stuff surrounding us! The landscape reminded me of a cross between Austin, TX and Cambodia (my two favorite places); there are so many beautiful hills and vegetation. Mango trees, banana trees, flowers, and so much more cover every inch of ground! Everything was green and luscious! The weather was very pleasant; it was in the mid-eighties every day with medium humidity. The driving really caught me offguard! I forgot that people in different countries drive on the other side of the road. I also forgot that in those countries, the drivers sit on the right side of the car. I tried to get in the wrong side all the time. There is tons of traffic as well. There are very few traffic lights, but tons of roundabouts. There are also all different types of taxis; there are vans and boda-bodas, or motorcycles.

When we got to Wakiso, we met Pastor Patrick and saw his church. The actual church building is just a pole frame with a sheet metal roof. We worshiped with the body of believers there and it was awesome; those people have some serious rhythm! As a random side note, I really love the Ugandan style of singing in groups...One person sings something, and everyone else repeats it (with plenty of clapping, stomping, and dancing tossed into the mix as well).

Next, we walked to the water source of the people in that village. It was at least a half mile trek up and down steep hills along a narrow path. I am amazed that women and children can do it several times a day with a jerrycan on their head (an average jerrycan weighs 40lbs with water in it)! When we got to the source, I was amazed! The water was shared between people, fish and animals. It was very brown and murky; even after boiling, the water is still brown with solids in it.

We hiked back to the church, and began to distribute filters to the people. Our filters don't eliminate the need to go and get water from the source, but they do allow families to have clear, clean, safe water to drink without boiling! This is a huge thing for a few reasons. Boiling water takes a huge amount of time; this is time that the people could spend working to earn money, going to school, or doing other chores around the house. Boiling water is dangerous; we saw several children with burns from accidents with boiling water. Lastly, boiling water is expensive; it either requires coal or wood, and both are resources that cost money which could be used for school, food or medicine. So, these are a few reasons why clean, safe water is such a big deal here!

We distributed filters to over twenty families while we were there. We also got to meet a few of the families personally and go into their homes. They are so hospitable! Everyone greets you with a smile, a hello, and a long handshake.

When we got back to the hotel we played mafia for about an hour, which was an answered prayer for me because it really encouraged bonding with my team! Although, it was very exhausting to go from loving and serving people all day, back to your hotel to spend more time having to be intentional about building relationships. It was very emotionally exhausting for me.

Vulnerability time...I was also struggling at this point in the trip with my purpose for going on the trip in the first place. Things that the Lord has really been opening my eyes to before this trip even came up, is that the Lord doesn't need me to do his work. His work would be done whether I was a part of it or not. So, I was struggling to figure out why God had so clearly called me to go on this trip. God doesn't waste stuff, and I know He wouldn't just waste the $3500 it took to get me to Uganda, but I didn't see why He had called me to go on this trip yet. I knew that there had to be a bigger reason than being white and bringing water filters to people; but, more on that later!

We ended the day with a group debrief and worship time. Everyone said why they came and what they wanted to get out of the trip. I said I had been called by God, even though I never desired or planned on going to Africa, and I just wanted to glorify Him through my trip, whatever that looks like. That really was true; I had no expectations for what was going to come out of this trip, besides that!

Daniel, an employee of TivaWater, and his wife led us in worship for about an hour. It was easily my favorite part of the day. We sang modern American songs, Swahili songs, and old hymns. It was a beautiful time, and it was exactly  what I needed at that moment!

We wrapped up our day, with some more mafia before everyone got too tired and went to bed. Thus concluded our third day of the trip!

Now you are African, too.

I have a challenge for you today. It'll make a little more sense when I get around to telling you all about Day 4, but I want to go ahead and get the idea going in your head. What if we actually loved others as ourselves?

Jesus challenged us in Mark 12:31 to "love your neighbor as yourself,” but how often do we actually follow through on that? How often do we "love our neighbor as much as our neighbor loves us?" How do we treat strangers? How do we treat people who we disagree with? Enemies? People we do not even know?

When I was in Uganda, I was loved unconditionally by the people I met. No one knew me; few people could speak to me. But everyone loved me, and this was not because of anything I had done or because of who I was, but just because I was there and I was with them.

On Day 4, I was dancing with some children while a filter was being installed (more on this later). A few adults joined in and ended up teaching me how to dance. By the end of it, we were all laughing so hard that tears were streaming down our cheeks while we danced together. Before it was time to leave, one of the women I was with told me something I will remember forever: "Now you are African, too."

This is easily the biggest and best compliment I have ever, and probably will ever, received. She had told me that I was one of them. Love had united us. I spoke a different language, came from a different country, had a different color skin and different style clothes; yet, despite all of this, they had loved me. Just because.

This got me thinking, how often do I love people just because, and how often do I love people because of what they have done for me?

How about you?

I know one thing for sure, the love they showed me is the same love that Jesus had for all of us when he died on the cross. We didn't do anything to deserve his love, but he gave it to us, just because. We don't deserve to have our sins forgiven. Every last one of us is a sinner, an enemy of God, and the wages of sin is death, or eternal separation from God. Yet despite all of that, God loved us, His creations, so much that He sent his one and only son to trade places with us. We got Christ's righteousness, and he paid our debt.

"But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us." Romans 5:8

That is real, unconditional, perfect love.

Strive for that. Love your neighbor, whomever that may be.

Day 1 - 2

Now I will tell you about my actual trip! The first two days were all traveling, so I'm sorry if you find this post boring!

We were on planes for a long, LONG time! For those of you who are interested, we flew from DFW to Chicago to Brussels, Belgium to Rwanda to Entebbe, Uganda. I met my team for the first time when we were in Chicago, so that was nice!

On my flight from Chicago to Brussels, I sat next to a man from Cameroon. It was really fascinating to sit by him! He had been living in America for twenty years, during which time he attended college, got his MBA, became a successful businessman, and started two of his own companies! It was interested to talk to him about what life was like coming into America for the first time and a few other random philosophies.

When we arrived in Brussels, we had one goal: Eat a Belgian waffle. Unfortunately, on our side of security there were no fresh waffles. We had to settle for a prepackaged 'Belgian' waffle; it was actually very tasty! Brussels was not my favorite stop... We couldn't find the bathrooms and once we got on the plane, we had to stay on the ground for an hour waiting for them to straighten out our luggage. Also while we were in Belgium, we found out that they combined us with another flight so we ended up having to fly all the way to Rwanda (which is south of Uganda) before we could get off in Entebbe! Crazy!

When we got off the plane in Entebbe, at long last, we were greeted with an hour long bus ride to Kampala, the capital. If there was ever a time that I didn't want to sit down, it was then! Yet despite my discomfort, I was very much captivated by what I could see of Uganda in the evening light. It was beautiful, but more on that later!

We finally arrived at Adonai Guest House at about 11PM Uganda time (Our journey began the day before at 1PM America time. That is about 26 hours of traveling). We all got a roommate and I ended up with Allison, who turned out to be a good friend to me on this trip! More on that later...



This is my team at Adonai Guest House.

The Great Exchange

So, I'm really nervous to write this blog for a couple of reasons: 1. I just got home from Uganda, so I am still very tired and it is pretty hard to organize my thoughts about this trip in a way that is coherent to other people. 2. I don't know what people are going to think about this particular post anyways. I just want to start off by saying I love America and Uganda! ;-) Here goes...

So, what is the first thing you think of when you think of Uganda, or any part of Africa for that matter? If you're anything like I was before this trip, the first thing you think of is some kind of poverty; I would think of a skinny child with a swollen stomach sitting alone with flies on his face, or some small mud huts, or people drinking dirty water. These were all things that were prevalent in Africa during my time there, but these things are not what define Africa to me now.

In America, there is a very individualistic and materialistic culture. We think that happiness is having this thing or accomplishing this task (I am using 'we' as a general stereotype; I realize that not all Americans fall into this category); so often, we only allow ourselves to be happy when we are perceived as successful by those around us. But, how many wealthy Americans do you see that are really, truly happy? That are really, truly satisfied with what they have? I don't think it is very common. There is always more to be obtained and achieved; new goals are being made just as fast as old ones are met, so there is always another level to reach before we are satisfied with where we are.

In Uganda, I found a more community based, relational culture. The people will stop what they are doing to have a conversation; in fact, it is rude not to! They don't have much at all, but they so appreciate what they do have; for example, we saw several mud huts with dirt floors that were swept clean every day. The compliments that they gave each other were deep, instead of just surface level. "Your house is very clean." "You look very smart today." The people were so joyful and contented just to be with each other and with us. It was so beautiful.

So, confession time: I am having a really hard time writing this blog. I think I'm just going to stop here; I just know that no matter how many times I reword what I have written, I will never capture the essence of these people or of what I am trying to say. I hope you understand! I am just trying to emphasize that these people get their joy from love, and that they are the happiest and most accepting people I have ever met.

Earlier, I asked you what you thought of when you thought of Africa. Well, I hope something else comes into your mind first now. I have a few more posts where I will try and get this message across, because it was my number one take away from this trip, so just bear with me!