Day 3: Blog Post by Valene

July 9th, 2009

Yoga! That’s how you say hello in Kumi. We all had an excellent stay at the City Royal Hotel (check out the hotel here) in Kampala. This was actually not the hotel we were going to stay at, but because our original hotel did not end up having room for us, we had to come here. It was a blessing in disguise, as the City Royal Hotel was nicer than the one we were going to stay at. Therefore, after hot showers and comfortable beds to sleep in, we were refreshed and ready for the start of a new day.

After breakfast we gathered for a devotional time led by Aeri, who reminded us through Psalm 139 to continue having conversations with God, our creator, throughout the day. Then we were off to the Episcopal Office for the United Methodist Church, East Africa Annual Conference.

There, we had an amazing time meeting with Bishop Daniel Wandabula, his staff members (Robert, Francis, Paul, Sarah, David, and Samuel), and Reverend John Kiviri and Reverend James Mwoho. Much sharing happened between the three groups present: CCUMC, UMC of East Africa, and YCVM members. It was a big blessing to connect YCVM with the UMC in Uganda as they are actually doing a lot of the same work with meeting the physical and spiritual needs of orphans, through putting them into schools and helping them develop a relationship with God.

Bishop Wandabula also said something that connected me right back to CCUMC. He reminded us that John Wesley said to do good wherever you can, just as my dad had said during his sermon the Sunday before we left for Uganda [click here to listen and view the sermon "Flawed Humanity" delivered by Rev. Dr. Jeffrey Kuan on July 5th]. Praise God for the United Methodist brothers and sisters we have here in Uganda, and for the connections of ministry that are being made!

A lot of information was shared about the state of the UMC here in Uganda (and in East Africa) that I want to relay to you all:

- The East Africa Annual Conference consists of 5 countries: Burundi, Kenya, Southern Sudan, Uganda and Rwanda, and that consists of over 116 million people .

- There was actually no planned growth of the Methodist Church in East Africa. We were told that there was a group of Methodist in Burundi. Then when war caused people to flee Burundi, some that fled took their United Methodist beliefs with them to neighboring countries in East Africa.

- 14.97 is the median age in years for the population of Uganda.

- Most of the churches consist of mainly women and children. The members of the churches are poor and therefore church leaders lack regular income.

- There are very few ordained ministers in the whole East African Conference. In Uganda, there are 80 United Methodist Churches, but there are only 8 ordained ministers. In Rwanda, though, there are 71 churches, and 59 ordained ministers.

- There will be a conference in Uganda during August 18-20 to discuss the current status of the churches in East Africa and how to address theological education and training for the ministers of these churches. (Burt shared that Jeffrey Kuan has been a part of helping set up this conference on the U.S. side)

Questions from today:
1. Who found out today that he/she knows Bishop Wandabula’s sister and personally served with her at a conference?
2. Who was told in the van that “It’s ok if when you fall asleep you lean on me, just don’t drool.” AND who said it?
3. Who has the most mosquito bites so far?
4. Who is the same age as Bishop Wandabula and was given the privilege of riding in his car?

As you all can see from the small bit shared here, there was so much we learned about our church family here in East Africa. We see this as just the beginning of a relationship with them. After our time of discussion together the Bishop brought us to see two very important projects they have been working on in Uganda.

The first place we went was Reverend John Kiviri’s church that is in the process of being built. It has been 4 years in the making, but the last major thing needed is a roof. Their congregation has already starting meeting there for worship, and Rev. John said that there have been great things happening since they started worshiping there.

The second place we went was Humble School, which is an elementary school the UMC built in about 2001. Most of the students at Humble are orphans or from very high need families all over East African. There are about 200 students living and studying here. This was definitely the highlight of my day.

The children are so beautiful and you can see their joy and love for God in their genuine smiles. The choir at Humble School sang and danced 6 pieces for us. I truly felt like the heavens were opening up in praise to their singing! I didn’t want to leave!

However, seeing the Humble School, I think God was allowing us to see what the school we’re building at YCVM can become. Much like Humble School, YCVM hopes to eventually have both the school and dormitories built so that children from all over Uganda and farther can come and be cared for both physically and spiritually.

We had another nice meal at a hotel before leaving for Kumi. During lunch, we were able to talk to a team of people from Crossroads Church in Virginia that are volunteering at Humble School doing construction work.

After lunch we took our long car ride into Kumi – after many hours (maybe about 5 or so), we arrived! We had dinner with our YCVM team and then were sent to our rooms for a good night’s rest. (Dustin is snoring away under the mosquito net as I write this.) I look forward to a mosquito-bite-free night!

Thank you for continuing to be prayer warriors on our behalf! Specific prayers that were shared today by us, UMC of East Afrifca, and YCVM:

-Pray that wars will stop in East Africa and peace will prevail (esp. in Southern Sudan)

-Pray for the challenges in East-Africa that were written out and handed to us in a document about the UMC of East Africa:

1) “Caring for the psycho-social needs of the desperate, hopeless population”
2) “Provision of basic livelihood of such communities”
3) “Enhancing the capacity of communities to provide for the social and economic need of the vulnerable members”

-We learned today that Northern Uganda has been in drought. This is causing severe famine and deaths in the areas affected. We read today in the newspaper that some people have taken to eating plants that end up being poisonous, which has led to deaths. Please pray for the people of Northern Uganda and the especially hard times of this year that have hit the area.

-Pray for our weekend coming up: We will be doing a VBS on Saturday full of songs, skits, and activities for the children. Then on Sunday we have been asked to present our songs with movements and drama piece for 2 back to back services, each service being 2 hours long. Also, please pray for Dustin who will be speaking during the Sunday Service.

Here are the answers to yesterday’s blog questions:
1. Burt pointed out a woman’s headdress that looked like bubble wrap on our flight to Entebbe.
2. Ben was unable to be recognized by two members of RTC because of his new haircut.
3. Pete opens water bottles with a knife.
4. Dustin fell asleep on the bus and almost tipped over onto one of the host team members.