Little girl, arise

Dear Prayer partners . . .
Would you take a moment to pray for Harriet Tungu?  She is a five year old girl who has been in a coma for almost a week.  In spite of treating any infections we are equipped to handle she has not improved much.  We are at the end of our strength and would love to see the power of God return her to life (just read in Mark this morning where Jesus says little girl, get up and eat . . .and she does).  Her very caring family has been faithful at the bedside for many days now.  

If you have been reading this blog you know we are under attack on many fronts:  rumors are that the community at the source of the water project has turned off the valve to the pipeline repeatedly, leaving our hundreds of CSB students and our entire town without clean water.  A disgruntled student is trying to sue one of our missionaries for not connecting him with American financial sponsors.  27 of the 200 chicks have died in the last 24 hours as an infection sweeps through the flock.

Jesus raised the little girl in Mark 5 just after storms at sea, demons, crowds, and conflict had assailed his followers.  We could use a similar reminder of Who is in control.
Love,
Jennifer

Wresting rest, crises of the hour

Sunday, day of rest.  Rest implies passivity, but here we have to actively wrest rest from the onslaught of circumstances.  This morning we awoke to find our dinner had disappeared—two catfish we purchased yesterday and were trying to keep in a basin of water for dinner today . . Gone.  Later we found one which had flipped and crawled about 40 yards, still alive.  The other was gone forever.  Dinner ration cut in half, no grocery option.  Then a boy appeared at the door asking for help—his brother had hit him in the eye with a stone, leaving pain and swelling.  Before handing out tylenol Scott pried open his eyelid to find the eye had ruptured.  Saline, dressings, transport costs, referral letter to the regional hospital in Fort Portal, all before breakfast.  Meanwhile Larissa had been notified of an impending C section and went down to help, where it turned out that the young mother had an unrecognized twin pregnancy with one baby long dead, the other severely depressed, infected, struggling to breathe, and in spite of over half an hour of resuscitation efforts the baby died.  On my way to pray with Larissa over this grief I met Stephanie who was mobilizing veterinary help for the chicks—at least 20 were lethargic, dozing, not eating, sick, about to die—count this evening is 16 dead.  Also saw Pamela just off a phone call where she learned that her aunt had died.  Second aunt in two months to pass away, always difficult news when here too far away to join in the family grieving.  Back to church, thankful for the wisdom of the leaders who are helping us this weekend deal with a young man who is trying to take a missionary to court for what he perceives is an attempt to block him from receiving sponsorship for university studies (having already been sponsored completely for six years of secondary school), a distressing situation.  Then home to a message of crisis at CSB.  No water in the tanks means that students go to the river to wash clothes, bathe, and gather drinking water.  Not a healthy practice, and disruptive to the school.  Scott checked the lines and tanks, no flow at all.  So that’s a problem for the water engineers Michael has trained.  Earlier in the week our whole team had come to the end of our propane, used for cooking, so that we were resorting to charcoal, though thankfully Bob in Fort Portal was able to get us a handful of tanks.  Diesel fuel is also scarce in the country due to pipeline problems.  Sometimes just the normal background of life (water to drink or bathe in, fuel to cook with or drive, solar power for lights) comes prominently into the foreground as inevitable glitches in supply throw life into chaos.  Two team members sick.  And so the day went on, ending in a column of swarming winged seasonal insects whose larvae rise from the ground after heavy rain, a grey cloud against the sunset, turn off all lights (they fly towards light) and keep the door closed.  Crises accumulating hour by hour . . .

Mourning, singing

The rain weeps down today, cool and constant.  I have just returned from taking Jonah’s wife Melen and sister Sophia to the second family burial in three days.  First an 87-year-old patriarch died, a clan elder related through Jonah’s grandfather.  He had lived a long and full life and left 107 live descendents!  But last night, as the family was still recovering from the upheaval and grief, and burial of the elder’s death, a child died.  His ten-year-old granddaughter, the daughter of the woman who had been caring for the old man, got a fever yesterday morning.  It did not seems serious until evening when she began to have convulsions.  She was rushed to Bundibugyo hospital for a Quinine drip, but before the full dose of medicine could even be given she died.  

So this family gathered again, this time there was no sense of a life long and full, but a naked bereavement.  I learned that the mother had also lost her two-month-old child in February, something like SIDS, where the baby was put to sleep fine and found to be dead a few hours later.  Not surprisingly the gathering today began with accusation and fear, what kind of curse or neglect could produce three deaths in rapid succession?  I entered the mud and wattle house with Melen.  37 women sat hip to hip on mats on the floor in a room the size of a generous American walk-in closet.  The dead girl lay wrapped with her mother weeping hysterically over her.  Melen wiggled her way up close and bowed her head crying too.  I know we were both thinking:  we have 10 year old girls.  We think they are past the danger of high infant and early childhood death risks in Bundibugyo.  But then this, a normal child, in third grade, with a typical fever and then a few hours later, dead, no more.  Somber faces, bright head scarves against the chinked dirt wall, rustling of legs to make room for more women, wailing, while the men sat quietly outside.

Four teenage girls sat along the wall by the door of the room, singing.  Their pure quavering voices in harmony, mostly songs I did not know, then suddenly a chorus in English:  What a song we will sing, the day that Jesus comes.  Over and over they sang that, and I joined them.  They sang hope into the room of death, truth into the place of mourning.  

Goats, God's provision

It was a goat party, one big goat party, the kind God would throw, where mostly widows, orphans, the infected and desperate were invited.  About a hundred adults (which in Africa means at least a hundred kids tagging along) gathered on Thursday for the distribution of 68 specially breeded dairy goats, the fruits of Karen’s Matiti project, purchased by generous donations from friends in the US, and arranged by Karen’s visionary work here.  The goats arrived from a dairy-goat-farm British mission project in Masaka (near Kampala) on Tuesday.  After a day of feeding and sorting and matching ear tags with lists of eligible patients, the community gathered for the celebration.  A representative of the recipients, mostly HIV-positive women and a smattering of grandmothers caring for orphans, got up to say that they would be praying for God to bless our mission.  That was powerful for me, the prayers of the poor extravagantly poured upon us.  For me these were not just names on a list, or faces in a crowd.  I could remember grieving with this woman the death of her child, or celebrating with that one the news that the baby had avoided infection, or struggling to pull another’s infant through severe illness.  Pamela encouraged the people to care for their animals, and Karen drew the analogy to seeds, as each goat could breed with local varieties so that the blessing could propagate on to many, many families.  We live in a district of chronic undernutrition, so that a sustainable source of calories and protein for young children can have wide-ranging benefits for development.

Scott spoke on behalf of the mission, telling the story of Abraham and Isaac in dramatic detail.  If you have never lived among people for whom Bible-story standards are as shocking and fresh as a first-run Hollywood movie plot, you can’t appreciate the gasps and laughter.  And if you’ve not lived among people for whom goats are the traditional currency and source of life, you can’t imagine the relevance of stories like this one.  The child at risk, the grieving and wondering parent, the moment of near-death, the ram in the thicket, God’s provision.  The goat saves Isaac’s life.  What a context for goats being handed out to people with hungry, marginalized children, to save their lives.  Then Scott pointed out that Jesus was the ultimate sacrifice, God’s true provision for our lives.  It was a great blending of real-life flesh-and-blood salvation from starvation pointing to deeper truths in the spiritual realm.

Pamela and Karen and Stephanie tirelessly shepherded the waiting recipients through registration and speeches and a generous lunch, then the group migrated from the community center to the Masso yard where the 68 goats were penned.  Our veterinary assistants were joined by some of the kids (Acacia, Julia, and Jack) bringing goats out of the pen one by one.   It became a nearly whole-team effort to match the goats to the records, the records to the right patient, documenting, handing over.  Rascally goats jumped energetically while women stunned at their good fortune grasped ropes and hauled them away towards home.

A community leader from each of 16 subcounties received males to make available for breeding, while the females went to families whose children needed the protein boost of milk (something to think about when you pull a carton of milk out of the fridge so easily).

God’s provision, but detoured through the efforts of many, many people.  The kind of party that Jesus would definitely attend.  Check out the sidebar for ideas (top blog on the team list).  It was so much fun we’d like to do it again this year, if the money comes in.

New photos: April 07

See our newest photo journal LINK on the right sidebar....

Many photos document moments from this season of Christ School - Bundibugyo soccer ...
This photo includes two of our boys who have been playing soccer with our boys since we arrived 14 years ago (and who we sponsor at CSB)...
#19 - Birungi Fred, is the captain of the team
#7 - Richard Bamuturaki, the team's star midfielder

Therefore be steadfast

The resurrection victory was not very evident this morning. A holiday weekend, in spite of Dr. Jonah’s hard work, left the pediatric ward packed to overflowing. Three sets of malnourished twins—we have an extremely high twin rate here, and many women cannot manage the margin of calories to nourish that second body. One set is 1.5 and 1.7 kg (three pounds each) born to a 16 year old mother-too-soon. Two other kids with kwashiorkor, protein deficiency, weaned too early because their mothers got pregnant again within a year of their births. A dwindling 4 kg (9 pound) one year old whose drawn skin makes his face look skeletal, clutching his mother, probably TB. Another 10 year old with possilble TB, barely responsive, coughing, wasted. A young boy who found an unexploded grenade and with his friend threw it into a fire—the friend died, and he was left with a deep shrapnel wound in his hip. An older kid with sickle cell disease on her third blood transfusion this week. A three-month-old whose HIV positive mother probably has transmitted the virus, leaving his tiny body wracked with cough and diarrhea. A comatose five year old who was fine until a sudden convulsion three days ago, maybe cerebral malaria, the smear negative, not yet awake. A baby whose mother told me that five of her 8 children had died from various diseases. The list goes on and on, more than double what I’ve recalled quickly above. Bundibugyo is dangerous country.

So moving out into this mess in faith that the resurrected Jesus is making all things new . . . Well, it is an act of faith. The celebration of Easter was tremendous, spiritually and socially. But I entered the post-Easter life this morning feeling pretty poured out.

As often happens in the midst of the morass, one infant who nearly died of pneumonia a week ago today looked at me and smiled, a reminder that hope remains. Scott and Pamela traveled two hours (each way) to meet with health center staff in Karagutu for a “performance review”, a day to review data and encourage the staff. Karen received 70 goats this evening, a huge infusion of hope and protein for the suffering, to be distributed on Thursday. So there is some significant abounding going on (1 Cor 15:58). Therefore be steadfast.

Easter Letter

Please visit our "Downloadable Prayer Letters" link to get our most recent Prayer Letter with Easter Meditations and Prayer Requests.
(In living color, it's much better than the b&w version that will come by post).
Blessings to all...

21rst Century Easter Week Equivalents

CROWDS—Yesterday the district held the semi-finals in the soccer tournament at CSB, and there was tension in the air.  One of the four finalists had been disqualified for using non-student “mercenary” players.  This school had in the past threatened riots, brick-throwing, and other violence if excluded.  So we went into the day praying that they would peacefully accept their suspension.  More than a thousand people generally attend these matches, and we are all too aware of the way a crowd can turn from spectators to perpetrators, individually polite people suddenly angrily transformed in the immunity of group action.  As we prayed I thought of the crowds yelling “crucify him”, and had a new understanding of the threat of the mob.  Thank God in our case the school’s new headmaster eschewed the riotous behaviour of past years, and the day was peaceful.  The finals (CSB vs. Bubandi) will occur Saturday, and the crowd could swell to several thousand . . .

SOLDIERS—Seeing soldiers is not rare in Uganda, particularly living on an international border.  This past week in Bundibugyo some isolated rebel bands of the old ADF have tried to move through.  Nothing has endangered civilians, but the UPDF has increased their presence, including guarding our mission at night.  So we now have a dozen or so armed men patrolling in the darkness.  In this case they are on our side . . . But still reminders that we live in a world of force, of political power, of instability, just like Jesus did.

WOUNDS and OFFICIALS and FORGIVENESS—One of our missionaries was riding a bike slowly and gently through Nyahuka on her side of the road when she was hit from behind by a drunk motorcyclist.  Thankfully she escaped serious injury but still has a number of scrapes and bruises.   Such an incident can easily escalate out of control, but thankfully this also occurred directly in front of the police station, so when the perpetrator tried to blame her he was quickly apprehended.  It was still tedious and a bit nerve-wracking to be interviewed by the police and give statements.  And wounds here frequently become infected and more serious.  Like Jesus she was an innocent victim, serving others, but wounded by evil.  And like Jesus she had the opportunity to forgive her wounder, as he came the next morning and met with her and Scott and apologized.

INJUSTICE—Today Jonah called all of the staff to a long meeting at the health center, for many issues, but prominent among them the way our health center is suffering because of district administration desire to see him pushed down to failure.  The event that led to the meeting was that a “big man” in government called the driver of the hospital “ambulance” pick-up truck to take him somewhere, just when I was trying to send a newborn baby to the hospital for oxygen, and when the driver chose to serve the politician instead of the patient, the patient died.  I was pretty upset about the whole sequence of events.  To top it off there are rumors that all the money to run the hospital will soon be cut off from Jonah’s control and remain in the hands of potentially corrupt administration in Bundibugyo.  We had a productive time of discussion, but in the end Jonah reminded us that even though Jesus was trying to do good He met with opposition from the leaders of the people.  We prayed together for deliverance!

DEATH and MOURNING—A few hours ago I held another baby as her mother screamed, and confirmed that the infant had died while getting a blood transfusion for severe anemia (hemoglobin 3.8).  This was the 5th child that mother had lost, and my heart went out to her in her grief.  Death is an ever-present reality here.  Pray for all of us to cling to Jesus who bore our sorrows, who suffered our wounds and infirmities, who passed through death for us.  

We miss our families at holidays, and mine more this holiday than many others, since it is my Mom’s birthday today and we remember my Dad’s Easter death a year ago.  But in the midst of that I’m grateful for concrete reminders that the story of Good Friday occurred here in our real world, and means something to real people.  May you also see reminders of the story around you this week.

Distant Grief

Yesterday I picked up a book I had not read in a long time, and read it cover to cover. A Distant Grief by Kefa Sempangi tells the story of the early 70’s in Uganda as Iddi Amin’s reign of terror was unfolding, and the impact on the church. I have not yet seen “The Last King of Scotland”, but this book is a true-story eye-witness account and it’s hard to imagine the movie being any more chilling. Sempangi moves back to Uganda as a university professor and rides the wave of a movement of the Spirit as people throng to the Lord in the midst of the country’s descent into chaos, until he escapes with his life by about a half-hour margin in the Fall of ‘73.

Two of the most moving parts: on Easter of 1973 as he prepares to preach, he is drawn to the passage of the five loaves and two fish from Matthew 14. He feels overwhelmed by the needs around him, but writes “It was Jesus who provided the bread for the crowds. The disciples’ task was only to distribute what their Master had already given them. It was God who sustained his people. He was not asking me to feed His children from the words of my own heart. He was only asking me to distribute the living bread He had put into my hand.” I thought about that today as nearly 50 desperate families showed up for nutrition, draining the huge supply of milk Karen has bought. Somehow we made it through them all. I need to be reminded over and over that we are not sufficient for anyone’s needs, we’re merely handing out the Bread of Life. The symbolism of Passover permeates this concept—it is Jesus who breaks and blesses and gives.

That evening five armed thugs of Amin’s come to kill Sempangi, but end up accepting his prayers, and one even becomes a Christian. He writes about the atrocities he witnesses, and the second part I want to quote comes in response to watching a man beat to death, which also moves me to think of Jesus being whipped and beaten:
“In that moment I learned a new truth. I learned that just as there is a boundary beyond which human beings cannot comprehend the glory of God, so there is a boundary beyond which they cannot comprehend the evil in the world. There is a boundary beyond which everything is a senseless chasm. It is here in the nightmare of utter chaos that human feeling dies. It is here, where death and terror seem to have full dominion, that even the deepest of human sorrows becomes but a distant grief.” Like the rest of the world watching Uganda in the 70’s, Rwanda in the 90’s, Darfur now, we cannot comprehend the depth of evil and suffering, and it is at best a distant grief. But Jesus went to the bottom of that chasm on Good Friday. The book answers the question of “where was God” with the affirmation: here, with us, in our suffering, defeating evil once for all by dying.

Kefa Sempangi was instrumental in the founding of World Harvest Mission, because during his exile he studied in America and he drew Jack Miller into ministry to Ugandans displaced by Amin .. . . I met him a few months after graduating from high school, not knowing how my life would later become so connected to all of this. In the cover of the book is written “Jennifer, please when you come through college could you come and join me in Africa for service in his Kingdom. K Sempangi, 15 October 1980.”

Palms and Peace

Palm Sunday begins a week of remembrance of the pivotal events in Jesus’ walk towards the cross. Here in Uganda we have palm branches in plenty, so we pulled several down from trees in our yard this morning, to take and wave at church during the singing, and they became props during the sermon telling the story of Jesus’ journey. Jesus entered Jerusalem that Sunday morning on the back of a donkey, the posture of a King who comes in peace. The idea of coming in peace really jumped out at me today. As king, as God, He could have come in a posture of war, with horses and chariots, angels and thunder, fire and smoke and judgment. In fact that’s the way I’d like Him to come into this district, with serious force, and immediate results! Instead He came quietly, humbly, rocking on the back of a slow donkey, surrounded by excited children. This evening we gathered again for team worship, and a Tim Keller sermon (Redeemer in NYC) reminded us that love, true sacrificial love, is the only force that defeats evil. So here comes Jesus, to conquer by dying, to win by laying down his life, to make a way of peace, to fulfill the birth announcement of the angels “Peace on earth, good will towards men.”

But the next time He comes as King, He won’t be riding a donkey. The second time He rides into our earth, His coming will be one of judgment and drama, of finality. Tim Keller’s sermon also reaffirmed that the line between good and evil runs through every human heart—there are no wholly “bad guys” that deserve judgment while we “good guys” ride off to glory, all of us depend upon the faithfulness of the sacrificed King.

The donkey-riding King who offers peace will one day return at the head of His army to finish the war, and who can stand the day of His coming?