Crying inside, mad at myself, angry at God.
My alarm didn’t go off today, not that I slept through it, or hat I didn’t set one, it didn’t go off and I slept right up until we had to leave. I missed breakfast, the fellowship and conversation of the team, and barely caught the morning devotional. I spent all my time this morning, which wasn’t much, writing and attempting to relay my thoughts. I had someone grab me a few slices of plain bread to eat so I wouldn’t pass out today. Mike Partain bought me a Mountain Dew, sweet man, and we hit the road with fire in our bellies for the work ahead.
We were greeted at hope by 13 happy, healthy African children! They sang us a song and the hope on their faces: you couldn’t help but smile in return. They blessed us with several songs that they sang and we sang with them. These kids are our legacy, they will continue our work here, and seeing the growth in them in just a year, it’s amazing! There were more than a few tears shed among the team, especially among the members who had never seen these kids, their love for total strangers. God used these kids to a blessing when we thought we came to bless them.
Due to our ministry’s regulation on media on Hope property, only the media authorized members of the team were allowed to capture footage of this. So none of this was taken by myself.
One of the first things you’ll notice after staying on Hope property for a decent length of time is that there is not a bathroom at Hope, but there is a pit toilet.
Pit toilet: a concrete room with a single hole in the floor, sitting on top of a large pit in the ground.
Essentially it’s a stripped down porta-potty. You will never meet a greater “hold your breath challenge” than when you use a pit toilet.
The women’s ministry that the ladies of the team went to accomplish was as much a blessing to our women as it was to the Ugandans. Mom told a story after the conference of how they gave each of the 180 women a gift, some hotel soap, a toothbrush, and toothpaste. Something as small and insignificant as that could be used in such a powerful way! As the story goes, there was a group of women laughing after the conference. Mom went over to ask them why they were laughing and it was because they had never smelled anything as good as soap before. They were so happy they couldn’t stop laughing. Something as small as soap could bring something as big as hope to these women.
In other news, the team from Atlanta finally arrived at Hope! Now all except Vicki are here safe and sound. We are still praying Vicki arrives quickly and in good spirits to begin ministering to the people of Uganda! The luggage of the Atlanta team is lost somewhere between here and Washington D.C.. We hope it finds its way here soon as many of the medical supplies are in the luggage.
As always, thanks for reading.
–the anonymous novelist
the anonymous novelist 