Difficult Obedience and Righteous Joy

Holy WOW did God do some incredible things this past week in the bush! I could go on and on about the life of simplicity, rice and beans, walking literally uphill both ways to ministry and church, holding babies, playing with kids, praying for healing, and team bonding, but Internet here is incredibly frustrating… so I will just go with the highlight.

 

A big part of our ministry here has been hut to hut evangleism. The culture here is incredibly welcoming, and every hut we went to people were eager to shake our hands and offer us a seat. I have been absolutely astounded as to how well the gospel is received here. I have yet to meet a person who doesn’t believe that the message of Jesus is true when they hear it… but I am equally astounded as to the majority of the people whose response is along the lines of  “I will decide later…”.

 

The verse that God spoke that got me to Africa and taught me a lot about the power of the Holy Spirit within me is Acts 1:8. “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jurusalem, in all of Judaea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” God has completely taken the theme He has given me of  “Empowered” and taken it to an entirely new level. Empowered is no longer about me being empowered… but it is about me empowering others to recognize and see the power they have inside of them from the same Holy Spirit that lives in me.

 

Withing the first couple of days of being here we quickly learned that being a Muzungo (white person), we kinda stick out. What disturbed me greatly, however, was the number of people who would run up to us just begging for us to pray for them.. to pray for healing.. to pray for salvation.. to cry out to our God for them. A lot of the people here believe that because we are white and because we are American.. that we are somehow given more favor with God.. and that God listens to our prayers while He ignores them.

 

I have been praying for the Holy Spirit to use me to empower these people that I come in contact with.. that their prayers are powerful and effective, and that God loves to hear their voice and desperately wants to know them. Abby and I were doing evangelism together a few days ago and we spent about an hour and a half telling the story of Jesus- from Genesis to Revelation- to a woman at her hut. You could see it in her expressions and her emotions that she understood this message and she ended up accepting Christ. A few moments later, our translator said to us “That woman over there has never heard the Gospel either… you must preach to her so that she may accept and believe too!” Of course, Abby and I decided to go share the gospel with her as well. The new believer followed us over there.. and right when I was about to open my mouth to share with her, God spoke to me and said “Stop.. let this woman who has just heard and believed share My word. Empower her to be my witness here.”

 

I did just that. I invited the woman to share the gospel, and Abby and I spent another 45 minutes telling her of the power of teh Holy Spirit that she has inside of her, and how God can use her to be a witness for His Kingdom in this nation so much more than He could ever use Abby and I, or anyone on our team. The woman was afraid to share, and her response was always “I will tell her later, I promise.. I am just afraid.” At this moment, I just asked the Lord “What do you want us to do? Do you want us to share the gospel since this woman won’t?” To my surprise, God was like “No.. she will do it. I want you to walk away.”

 

This has been one of the most difficult acts of obedience I have ever had to do. After I heard this word from the Spirit, without telling her what I was hearing, I asked Abby what the Spirit was telling her. She said “He’s telling me to walk away.” Confirmation. Done. We walked away. Never in my life did I imagine that I would hear the Lord say “walk away, do not share the gospel with this woman.” I mean isn’t that why we’re here? To share the gospel?

 

God has taught me a lot about why I am here. Yes, I am here so that people may come to know the Lord. But a big part of why I am here is so that people will realize that they are empowered. I am here to be used to empower the people in Africa to share the gospel without fear. I have no idea that the woman who came to know Christ ever shared the gospel with her neighbor, but I have to believe that she did. God wouldn’t have told us to walk away if He didn’t have something greater planned.

 

I spent a lot of time in prayer that night and the next morning just asking God for confirmation that Abby and I did the right thing.. that the people of Uganda could actually feel empowered and believe that they are. God showed up big 2 days later.

 

Cole and I were doing evangelism together , and we were to witness a family of believers become overjoyed with excitement to the point of dancing and shouting that their neighbors had come to know the Lord.. they couldn’t wait to take them to church and encourage them! Right then I was like “this is what it is all about.. not getting ‘converts’ but helping to build biblical communities who will encourage each other and spread the gospel!” Not 5 minutes later we were walking down the path and a woman with a baby approached us and asked us to pray for her baby. When we asked if she had ever heard of Jesus Christ, she replied that she had not. At that exact moment a man on a bicycle came up to talk to us as well.. He was a believer. God spoke to me again “empower this man to share the gospel with this woman.” Cole and I explained to this man about the power he has been given by the Holy Spirit.. and that God was telling us to tell HIm that God wanted to use him to share the gospel with the woman. His face lit up, and he began sharing the gospel with her in her language. It was an incredible moment of confirmation, and such a joy to see the gospel spreading in Uganda between the Ugandans! Miles down the road, we could look back and see that he was still talking to her! Amazing. I can’t wait to see what God has in store for us in Tororo! Please continue to pray for me and for our team, and all the people that we will meet. Pray that they may know the Lord, and know that they have received his POWER upon receiving Jesus.

 

Much love,

Lindsay

 

P.S. the internet here is so sketchy.. so sorry for any spelling errors or grammatical confusion.. no time to proofread! 🙂