Harvest and Holiday

The kids are finishing their second term of school this next week and are looking forward to a deserved holiday. However, this holiday will be a VERY BUSY one!!!!! Hang on - - - here's the list: Two weddings, an outreach for EYO, an IY retreat, "mini-envisioning"staff meetings, visiting relatives of our children--especially aging grandparents, but also aunts and others, a worship conference, shopping for banquet dresses for the girls in our family that will be finishing their 4th year of secondary school this year, the return of the Dangers' family, our New Hope founders and the exodus of many others who are taking home assignments in the U.S., saying goodbye to the Brown family who is moving to Kampala to start another extension of the Invesment Year program, the special week of activities for the Primary 7 students which we call "p7 week", our Annual General Meeting and special New Hope Thanksgiving Sunday celebration, and lastly, Luganda language lessons for our Britton family. WOW. We won't be involved in all of the above, but it all makes for a busy atmosphere!!!!!

The above photo is from our recent maize harvest from the David family gardens. We celebrate as a family each of our two harvest with a bonfire where we roast fresh maize--yumyum.

Dodovico enjoys roasting the maize for us.

Also during the holiday we will continue our piano lessons with our teacher who comes weekly from Kampala. He teaches our three and one other from a fellow staff family.

The kids' favorite part of the maize harvest is taking a stick to the cobs. Instead of peeling the kernels off the cob, they put them in a bag and beat them with a stick. Joel (Brown) and Toby are having a great time here while Acacia, Kevin and Medie load the kernels into a sack.

Kevin and Acacia take a turn . . .

Toby and Acacia

In our own personal garden out by our school banda, we found monitor lizard eggs (at least according to our compound helper) Acacia and Kevin dig up the eggs

We are also growing pumpkins in our garden! If you've never eaten pumpkin plain, you're missing out!!!!

We've had a great personal maize harvest this year. Geoff estimates we may get around 50 kg!! This really helps offset our food bill! We also have recently harvested ground nuts, pumpkin, tomatoes, herbs, sweet potatoes, beans both black and red, sweet bananas and cooking bananas, onions and greens (collards).

Please continue to pray with us as our most important harvest focus is the effect of the Love of God in the hearts of the kids to whom we minister. Currently our devotional focus in David Family is Ephesians 6 regarding the armor of God and His power in us.

Happy Birthday Kate!

These are "Fifteens" and are a dessert unique to Northern Ireland. I had them for the first time on Saturday at Kate's Birthday Tea. They are made of 15 marshmallows, 15 cherries, 15 digestive biscuits(like a graham cracker) and mixed with condensed milk. Then shaped into a log, rolled in coconut and placed in the frig for awhile. When they are served the log is cut into 15 pieces. Yummy!!!

Kate's (our lovely woman who heads up our special needs department here at New Hope) birthday was Saturday and she and a few friends celebrated with a true English style tea (with, among other yummies, the above pictured "Fifteens".) We ate a lot of sweets, talked, ate some more sweets and talked some more!!! It was an enjoyable afternoon and we are happy to have celebrated our friend Kate!!! The Friday night before, the David Family and our family snuck up quietly to her house and startled her with a shower of balloons and our loud rendition of Happy Birthday!!!!! We shared cake and smiles and left the balloons to decorate her house while the kids went on to our Friday night prayer meeting. (The last week of every month is a week of prayer in which we dedicate each night to prayer at the church structure. The turnout lately has been encouraging as the kids have truly enjoyed going!)

This picture is a classic!!! Benel dropped some of his cake on the floor! His face says it all!!! :)

on being thankful . . .

I am dedicating this blog post to dear Aunt Olga K!!!!!!! It's her birthday today!!!!!!! Happy 27th birthday!!!!! She also told me today that she faithfully reads this blog, so if no one else reads this, at least I know she'll see her birthday greetings in print!!!!

I wrote this a few weeks ago and decided to post it today in honor of being thankful for Olga!!!! She and her husband, Godfrey are staff members with a deep passion and heart for the vision of New Hope Uganda and it is a privilege to serve here with them!

Thankfulness. Simple? Easy? Hmmmmm . . . It is simple AND easy once you DETERMINE you are going to be thankful. If you don’t consciously make an effort to be thankful, you will default into grumbling and complaining. I know that personally to be the case and I do not think I’m alone in my observation.

There are so many things for which to be thankful, yet being consistently thankful takes unrelenting effort. That is a fact of life. None of what I am saying is new to anyone of us. However, realizing how very negative and unexercised in thankfulness I had become led me to a fresh determination to look for God’s good in all circumstances. The good is there along with the negative, but what is more prominently in our view? (and spewing from out mouths????) From within only myself I can’t tell you exactly why I came to a reawakening for the need to be thankful, but from the perspective of a loving Father who wants the best for us, I see that the time for thankfulness was long overdue. He didn’t force me to become thankful again, but began gently placing in my path His truths regarding how thankfulness is the key to unlocking and keeping open the doors to joy, peace and a calm that is stayed regardless of the circumstance. I took notice when I began seeing the theme of thankfulness being woven before my very eyes through Bible studies, friends’ comments, worship songs, devotional books and scripture, so I responded. I took those God-given opportunities to step up and put the extra effort into looking for reasons to give thanks. Yes, initially, I had to really look for reasons to be thankful. As I began, I found it difficult to quickly list reasons to be thankful. Reasons did not fluidly stream into my mind. For so long an “under the radar,” low-level of grumbling permeated everything I did and thought which made my determination to be thankful a task at first. But, I knew I had to do something or I would continue to have the life drained slowly out of me. My life is God-given and He desires to bless me abundantly, but if I have a wall of dissatisfaction up it presents a barrier to me SEEING His abundant gifts and inhibits free-flowing thankfulness. So, I began to not just list things silently in my head, but took pen to paper and began writing. God’s goodness impacted me more throughout my day and set a tone for joy when I wrote about God’s goodness in what I saw and experienced. I found that by writing them I was breaking the negative thoughts that can so quickly follow a positive thought. You know how it goes, “Lord, thank you for X, though it often is a struggle because . . . “ and off goes the mind to negative land.

God takes things out from under the blanket of discontent where we’ve stuffed them and blows off the dust as He infuses us with real joy in His truths. We don’t even realize our negative bent until He opens our eyes to see things that have always been there. It’s as if we walk shrouded in a vision-reducing cloud of negativism until we look clearly again at Him and His truths in scripture and allow Him to sharpen our eyesight to His blessings--real blessings we have simply walked by unable to acknowledge.

His truths don’t change. We, unfortunately, change our perspectives and our focus and what follows is trouble. Lord, I ask to have my eyes opened every moment to Your goodness that surrounds me. I do not deny that this life is challenging, difficult and often tragic, but You, God, are always good, always present and always the truth on which we can stand strong. In all my days and in every situation may I be settled and stayed on the truth that You are good and in everything there is thanks to be given.

Waitin' for friends . . .

The beauty that is all around us is staggering if we actually OPEN our eyes to enjoy the view!!!

Today we are "hanging around" enjoying the beauty of FRIENDS!!!!! Our good friends, The Browns, are returning today after being on home assignment for three months. The kids are so excited for them to arrive that they don't want to come home for lunch, but instead are waiting for their friends by hanging in their tree. At first sighting I expect to hear shrieks of delight!!!!!

Tradition here at New Hope is to welcome back friends by posting notes on their door. These are some of the well wishes awaiting the Browns.

Some flowers from our garden were an appropriate welcome gift as we reflect on the beauty of our friendship with the Browns. We've enjoyed the past five years -- here's to many more!!!!!!!!!

Mine! Mine! Mine! Mine! Mine!

Mine! Mine! Mine! Mine! Mine!

Who can forget the seagulls in “Finding Nemo”?! Their annoying and seemingly unending screeching of “MINE! MINE! MINE! MINE!” as they fight for what they want around a small buoy serves as a not so gentle reminder to us. How often we ourselves screech MINE! MINE! MINE! We don’t even realize the annoying noise we are making because we are so focused on ourselves. If we take a quick glance at Colossians 3:18-21 it’s as if the brightest lighthouse light illuminates our vast selfishness trying to balance on a tiny little buoy of self-focus in a huge ocean of God’s truth. Wives end up not willingly submitting to their husbands because they are set on their own ideas of what is needed; husbands don’t show love to their wives because of their own agenda for themselves; children don’t obey their parents because they are determined to get what they think they need and Fathers end up frustrating their children to the point of discouragement because they are so focused on themselves that they can’t see how they are too hard on the kids.

This morning, as the Britton family, we visited a few scriptures in an effort to set our focus on God and His ways rather than allow our focus to remain on our own selfish interests. Take a quick tour here of the truths we sighted along our journey to selflessness.

After we read Colossians 3:18-21 and saw how each one of us is called to live a life for others beyond seeking what WE think we need, we took another important stop in Galatians 2. In verse 20 we see that we ourselves no longer live—as Christians our own selfish desires died and now Christ lives in us. The life we now live in this body we have is lived immersed in faith, not pushed along being directed by cues given us by the flesh. We remember that Christ Jesus is the Son of God and He loves us and willingly gave Himself up for us. Moving on to Colossians 3 we see that we were raised up with Christ and so now need to set our sights on things above—where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. We are to set our minds on things above, not on things on the earth because we died and our life is hidden with Christ in God.

As we were reading this section at the beginning of Colossians 3 regarding “set your minds on things above”, I heard “set your MINES on things above.” Your “mines”, your selfishness like the seagulls who fought for what they wanted for themselves, need to no longer be set on things of this earth, but on things of Christ Jesus. But, how do we shift from the screeching selfishness to the selflessness of those in Jesus? Well, in two ways that are shown in verses 8-10 and then in verses 12-17, we see what we shouldn’t do and what we should do.

What we are NOT to do: live in anger, wrath, revenge, filthy language, deceit, lying. All those are born of selfishness and a focus on ourselves rather than out of any effort to seek what would be good for those living around us. We need to have an intolerance for any of the above finding a safe harbor in our lives.

What we ARE to do: remember we are of God, holy, loved and therefore asked by God to show kindness, patience, humility, forgiveness, love, thankfulness and to lovingly endure others when they are failing to live up to how they should behave. Above all we are to love and let God’s peace and wisdom have the most prominent place in our hearts.

I pray that we all set our “Mines” on God’s ways that are above what our limited eyesight can see. Our prayer is for a selfless, thankful outlook that will enable us to honor God in all that we do. I’ll finish here with Colossians 3:17, “And whatever we do in word or deed, we do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.”

Language Challenges and the "Cone of Shame"

Here we are in Uganda . . . serving alongside Ugandan staff and loving the children --with whom we live and we are privileged to know. Some of you may think our lives as missionaries are difficult, beyond what you might want to endure, but our reality is one of enjoyment, fulfillment and contentment as we are where God has called us. The days do not come challenge-free, however. And all the challenges do not exclusively fall to the ex-patriot types such as ourselves. Take our dear fellow staff member and friend, Isaac. In the picture you see his broad smile--mostly a permanent fixture on his face--he and his wife, Christine just had their first child within the last few weeks. He and his wife are not originally from this part of Uganda. They are northerners who have come to serve the children here in the central area of the country. Yesterday Isaac sent a message for Geoff to come quickly as he was dealing with a frustrating situation. Seems he had ordered 4 kg of meat for a special meal for the Sunday School helpers whom he leads. Seems the butcher heard 40 kg. Isaac is a dear friend whose 4th language is Luganda! He only wanted 4 kg and only budgeted for 4 kg, but the butcher who is used to larger orders heard 40 kg. Who was to blame? Probably both of them. The difference between 4 and 40 is very slight and extremely subtle in Luganda. Isaac did his best, but as so frequently happens, the language challenges rose and conquered. Not to worry, though, Geoff and Uncle Simon were able to talk the butcher down on his price and made a quick decision to buy all 40 kgs, giving the extra to our children's family groups. All and all it came at a good time as they are beginning midterms this week and can use a few extra grams of protein!!!! When you pray for the work here, please remember the Ugandan nationals who are from other areas and tribes and are not familiar with the culture and language of this area. There is almost MORE pressure on them to "perform" as they are given less grace than we are by the villagers of this area when they make mistakes.

Twice a week I read to the primary school students. On Tuesdays I read the selection in the Chronological Bible reading to the students in the primary 2 class. We are reading through the Bible together as staff, children and church members and will conclude this November! It has been exciting and wonderful to see the story of the Bible unfold as we read together. In these three pictures, I am reading to the primary 5 class (Toby's class). On Thursdays I choose a book to read that will, hopefully, get them excited and interested in reading on their own. So far we've explored with Marco Polo, visited ancient Pompeii at the base of Mt. Vesuvius and in these pictures we went to Egypt with Howard Carter as he uncovered King Tut's tomb. And speaking of language challenges, I have to be careful what I choose and must be aware of words in the book that may not translate easily to Ugandan English. It is a welcome challenge, however, as I love seeing the joy in their faces at having "explored" yet another foreign land!

Bubbly and Geoff share a moment. Geoff was heading off to weigh our black bean harvest. We started with a Walmart package of black beans and our harvest this year is approaching 30 kg!

Ahhhhh....here we are at the section of our blog entitled, "Cone of Shame" (phrase stolen from the wonderful movie, "Up") Just look at that face . . . our little kitties were spayed last Friday and in an effort to keep them from tearing out their stitches they are wearing these plastic cones. It's been quite a conversation piece around here. Some thought we were putting special hats on them for decoration!!!!! And the heaviness of the cone makes them walk a bit funny as well, so a lot of laughter has been directed their way! Poor little kitties. We will be able to take the cones off later this week. A little comfort for all the mocking that has gone on . . .
commiserating together out near the bamboo in our yard . . . The rest of the pictures are from Toby's birthday party we held on Saturday. Just as it was starting a huge rainstorm came up and they all ran around trying to catch leaves and raindrops! After the rain we went back outside to swing on our tire swing--freshly up and running just for the occasion!!! They also played a local version of hide and seek called kick the can, and our own Britton version of basketball, called "Verandah Basketball". We served them frozen juice pops with the cake and it was new to many of them as ice is not common out here in the village.

Stuart guards the can during hide and seek

The awesome tire swing!!!

Sammy hiding in the bamboo

Lots of fun for everyone!

Stuart swings as he swings

Toby guarding the can

Abraham is spoon fed his juice pop

Stuart

Buyinza

Emma

The whole gang trying to get the most out of the ice pops!!!

Time for CAKE!!!!!!!!!!!!

Abraham plays Verandah Basketball

They each cheered the other on! It was great to watch!

Kakande heard the cheers and came running over to be a part of the fun! The kids were so gracious and cheered him on as he took his turn. He was SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO excited. I love his face in this picture!

Abraham and Kevin

Catching leaves and raindrops

This invited friend walked 5 km to come to the party. He arrived more than one hour late, having been caught by the rainstorm. Geoff and Toby took him home on the motorbike and visited briefly with the grandparents who care for him.