May June 2014

May June 2014 Welcome supporters and prayer warriors - The school year has finished as we slide into our “summer holiday” - strange term considering it is always over 25 temp here - it comes from the British school system! Sharron and I are trying to “come down” off a hectic timetable and let our bodies recover. I have organised a bit of academic work for the mornings and the afternoons are taken up with biking, swimming, football, online games, art, music, drums and reading - plenty to keep 4 high energy children happy! Pauline attends a local preschool to help with the children 2 hours a day for 3 days - she is good with little ones. Sharon is taking all the school kitchen and cleaning staff (8) on safari on the 6th to bless them for their hard work and long hours. They could never afford a safari so all them have never seen a national park or the big five animals. We have hired a mini bus and driver and Sharon has also organised a boat cruise into hippo and croc country up the nile to Murchison falls. The girls are very humble faithful ladies who love Jesus and also live in poor houses with very little - so they are over the moon about their trip!! God has blessed us with access to a house for a few days break from Kampala on a nearby island on Lake Victoria compliments of a generous friend at school - we are also looking forward to a family safari at Lake Mburo (hopefully with Shama) - again we are honoured to have access to the lodge owners quarters in the park - we go walking among the animals and avoid lonely buffalo - it is surreal!! Josiah and I have been planning a hike up Mt Elgon but the park entry fees for all the family are too high (50 USus a day for anybody!). Anyhow, hovering over all of these plans are problems with our old land cruiser’s electronic system - it is right now being diagnosed by Toyota - I have already replaced the ECU computer system 6 months ago but we are still having issues. We had a remarkable time last Sunday at the burns ward - even though we were tired somehow God came through and filled the ward with his presence. Sharon ministered to a frightful situation - a once beautiful lady with a young child and also expecting opened her house door to a madman with a bucket of acid - he threw it directly into her face blinding her and destroying her facial features and upper body skin - she has a lovely husband and they have not caught the offender!! - such a high level of suffering. Before our coming she had not lifted her head or moved out of sheer grief and pain but during worship she sat up and opened herself to Jesus for healing - what a sight and may God honour her with deep healing in and out!! A guy was attaching a tv antennae and it connected with 240 volts which completely burned his upper torso and face - he was crying out for Jesus as we spoke with him. I am heading back there tomorrow with an mp3 player for a young 11 year old boy who has a mental disability. He has regular fit type behaviour and was shaking while I was there - last week he fell head first into a large boiling pot of porridge which burned all his face and head skin and upper body. While we were worshipping I watched him calm and the fits go as his face lit up and they could feed him. God told me he needed the music of worship so I have filled the mp3 with all of Hillsong’s albums and Chris Tomlin. Even more ridiculous were the two twins - 1 year old - who both crawled into a boiling pot of water - where was mum? This is so common here - little children playing in the cooking area unsupervised! oh Jesus have mercy on these burned people and children and forgive me for complaining about anything!! Please intercede continually for the outpouring of healing power and his presence in our ministry - we are mere vehicles or carriers of his love - it is jesus power that is needed to transform the inner and outer. I am learning this as we bring our children together around the word of God and let it examine all of us - Josiah my son has been leading some powerful times in devotions during homeschooling and I have been getting the children to memorise Psalms - we did Psalm 1 and now we are working on Psalm 34. There is something eerie, powerful, joyful and settling about coming around the word as a family and getting it into our souls. Peace pours down over us and enables us all to see more clearly. Sharon and I have been toiling with teen issues, many of them deep seated problems from way back in the village. These issues can be met with strong love and boundaries/expectations but in the end the inner person is only changed by constant and regular referral to Jesus and his word and good music. Music is such a cool way of finding Jesus and family harmony. We now have an old drum kit in our guard house so most of us are learning using youtube tutorials. Josiah and I are jamming away on guitars. We also have a mixture of African drums which fill in the spaces. Josiah and Ken have joined Percussion Discussion a major drum group who perform at the National Theatre. Josiah is currently away in the Congo - a huge trip across three countries - Uganda, Rwanda and Congo - with friends from the drumming group. It is such a dangerous trip we pray constantly for his protection! Josiah is returning to NZ on 30th August and boy shall we mis him. I am trying to get my daughter Shama over to take over from him in the homeschooling. We enter our last year next month being 4 years since we arrived. We never thought we would be here more than 2 or 3 years! We have come to realise that to integrate adopted children into a new family takes plenty of time let alone the social, legal issues and paper work. My next biggish challenge is to convince NZ Internal affairs that the adoptions comply with International Adoption law and also NZ Adoption Act Section 17 - more paper work. Please pray that I can get approvals for NZ Citizenship before we come back and then the kids can get NZ passports. This will require getting the right NZ people connected to our applications who can work with us. We are aiming at returning about September next year - Oh dear I am not sure how we will cope with a colder climate - plenty of woolies and beanies!! Many thanks for your financial support for our projects and other orphans - our John (orphan from Kyazanga) who we have supported right through college has now finished his first year at university doing civil engineering and on practicum now - this is a huge step of faith for us financially as there are no uni loans in Uganda until last month the government announced a new scheme - whether we see it is another story! We also continue to supply the burns ward food, mp3s, bandages and at times bedding. Bless you all Steve