I haven’t had a shower in a week,
and the last shower I took included splashing myself from a bucket. A toilet is definitely not happening any time
soon. I am living in the bush of Uganda
with the village people. There is not electricity, and we sleep on the
floor. We have something somewhat like
tea with breakfast, lunch, and dinner everyday when it’s already almost too hot
to function.
These might sound like complaints,
but they’re not. There is nowhere I
would rather be right now. The scenery
here is as close to Heaven as any place on Earth can possibly be. The people are kind-hearted, gentle, and
desire to serve me when I came here to serve them.
I spend time playing with kids who
know almost no English. I’ve found that
you don’t have to speak the same language to communicate. They may not say much more than a greeting
and their names, but I don’t need them to speak to know about them. I know they love nail polish. They’ll scratch it off just so I give them
the attention to paint their nails again.
I know they love singing. I know
they love tickle fights and playing swords with bamboo sticks. I know they love to form a circle and play
repeat-after-me dance games.
Kids come from farther than my mom
would ever let me walk when I was their age because they heard rumors of
mzungus (white people) in the village.
When they see us drive by, piled in the back of our white pick-up truck,
they run in the red dust that the truck spits out with more endurance than I
have ever had. Some stare in amazement, others cry out of fear. The really courageous ones approach us to
shake our hands.
On hut-to-hut ministry visits,
we’ve met elderly men and women who have never seen an American before. They cling on every word we say, and they
desire Christ because of us. We’re
praying that each individual that requests salvation after hearing from us is
sincere. We’re trusting God that He
works in their hearts. We want the
Ugandan people to know Christ because we know He is the only God, but sometimes
we’re just a way for the translators to guilt people into agreeing because
we’ve “come all the way from America.”
The smell here is something completely
new to me, yet it’s so familiar. The
dirt is red, just like all the rumors. Six months ago if you told me this is
where I’d be, I would have laughed. I never dreamed this would be a reality,
but it is. Today I’m feeling
overwhelmed by how blessed I am to have been chosen to be here right now.
