The Tuesday we were in Bundibugyo, I spent the morning at World Harvest Mission’s feeding program. This program serves children 0-5 who are malnourished.

The way this program began is really amazing. About five years ago, two women on the team, JD and Karen, were nursing babies. One day, a baby was brought to them. This was in the middle of wartime. The mother had been shot. The baby was four months old. There is a lot of maternal death in Bundi, and babies had been brought to the clinic before, but for some reason this time God spoke to Karen and JD’s hearts. They took the baby in. JD nursed the baby alongside hers in the daytime and Karen alongside hers at night. When the villagers saw JD nursing the baby for the first time (she went into a villagers home for privacy but about 200 people crowded around , in and and on the roof of the house to check out the scene!) they could not belive it. For them there were two major problems. First of all, clearly the baby was cursed as it’s mother had died. If JD nursed the baby the curse would go into her and then out to her baby as well. Secondly, surely the Ugandan baby would turn white if she nursed it!

Over time, the villagers were amazed to see that clearly there were no curses (both babies were fat and happy!) and they continued on in their own skin colors! Then the real fun began as more and more people began to bring babies to Karen and JD. Not being in a position to personally take on more children, the women sought out surrogate “moms” - to breastfeed the babies. And provided extra nourishment and encouragement for those who took on the task.

Eventually, as Kobu (the baby) outgrew the need for nursing and was returned to her fathers’ family, Karen and JD began setting up a more concrete program for meeting the needs of mothers and children, particularly motherless babies.

The program now operates somewhat like a WIC. It is open two mornings a week and services about 100 children each week. The children come on alternate weeks so the total enrollments is currently about 200 (that is such a lot for this fairly small village, many mothers walk over from Congo, about four miles). Of those 200 about 30 are motherless babies under one. As the morning begins the women and babies (or sometimes children and babies and very rarely men and babies) arrive and sit under a covering on mats on the ground. As the place is set up you hear babies crying and frequently see them being nursed. Their is no sense of the lactating breast being a sexual object, so women will just pull theirs out the tops of their dresses to respond to their babies cries!

First the babies are weighed, it is pitiful to watch their mothers pull of the one meager, thin, and ragged garment (if they are clothed at all) to put them on the scale. (as if it’s weight would make a difference). Once a month there height is taken as well. These are charted on a height/growth chart that is specifically for malnourished babies. Otherwise most of these children would not show up on the chart! Afterward the babies have a chance to see the doctor if necessary, and they are given their food. For the very youngest ones they receive formula if there is no one to nurse or if the mothers milk supply is insufficient due to her poor health, malnourishment or a second pregnancy. The babies that are a little older are given goats milk (boxed). The ones who are able to take food by mouth are given a soymeal mixture that they mix themselves in front of the center. (it has been found that unless they mix it before leaving, the additives (sugar and oil for calories and fat) never make it into the babies but are used for cooking, tea, etc.) Most of the children take the soymeal mixture.

Some of these babies are truly in terrible shape, very tiny, or with Kwashiokor (that’s a wasting disease associated with inadequate protein that causes the huge belly you may have seen on malnourshed children). All desperately need this food. For the lactating woman, especially the grandmothers who are balancing both geriatric and lactating needs (!) the program provides eggs to supplement their food sources and provide extra calories.

Working in the program was amazing. Taking these babies from their mothers as I weighed them, despite skin conditions, pee spraying in my direction (no diapers of course), and a fair number of health concerns was faith building. Handing out cookies to the babies post-weighing was SO fun! Most of all, just watching the mothers handle their babies and respond to them was fascinating and enlightening. Having the chance to share a smile, touch, and encourage with my limited Lubwisi was wonderful. They are aching for the love of Jesus.

Their are great challenges in the program. Language barriers (local “translators” are used to help with difficulties, although the women running the program speak Lubwisi pretty well), cultural misunderstandings, and a lack of time. Trying to get the mothers to mix and feed the formula properly with a cup is difficult. The sanitation is not good enough for bottles and cup feeding takes lots of time that they are not used to giving their babies. There are issues with husbands stealing food items or medicines for their own use or for sale to others.

But this program is doing amazing work and was started and continues to be run by women with no background in medicine or nutrition. It amazes me to see how God has equipped them.

I find that the biggest obstacle for me in going is the fear of isolation and loneliness. I know the team would be great, but it is a very small group! And the realization that the locals would never be friends in the same way as I might have imagined is difficult. Of course in so many ways this situation is wonderful from a standpoint of contact with people. There are cell phones, an internet connection, and really a very decent sized team. (seven long term adults) There is regular travel to Kampala and opportunities to meet up with others there.

I guess what I am realizing as I think about this and try to look at it headfirst and decide whether it is simply part of the cost, or whether it is spiritual oppression, is that I have always had this fear as part of myself. With each place we have moved as a family, the fear of lack of community, lack of home, lack of belonging has been with me each time. Always, as we settle in, that fear goes away. Clearly there is a pattern here of gaining comfort and security in familiarity and supportive relationships. Nothing wrong with liking those things. But I definitely can see how Satan has continued to convince me that I NEED those people, those familiar surroundings. That I will not be okay without them. I tell my children, “home is wherever mom and dad are”. And more accurately for me, home is wherever God asks me to be, for He is always with me.

I know that there will be a giving up of many things to follow God’s leading. I also know that Satan is attempting to terrify me and take away the power and joy that God gives. When you think of our “call being where the desires of our hearts and the needs of the world intersect” we know there will be costs. But there should not be deep fear.

Please pray, if you can, alongside me that God would clarify that fear and take it away. That if we go, I could go rejoicing in both the desires of my heart and the needs of the world intersecting. “God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, and of love and of a sound mind.

You gotta love the ending of that last blog post. You can just SEE us losing our connection due to some terrible tropical disaster!! Actually the computer ran out of juice and the internet connection was not working well. These are common issues but fortunately not disasters.

As I was hoping to say, the people in Bundi are incredible. When we left our house that first morning and walked up to the road I really could not believe my eyes. First of all the road is not what we think of as road: dirt, muddy, very uneven. And it is generally FULL of people. There are many small children varying in ages from one on up walking in groups from here to there. There are many woman carrying babies on their back using a piece of cloth they call a kitangi. The woman may be carrying one baby on the back and holding one in front (since twins are pretty common in Bundi) and they will usually be carrying something on their heads as well. These women are amazing!! Talk about multitasking. They use their heads to easily carry anything from a single mango or avacodo to large plastic containers of fuel or water, big bundles of sticks, or even huge bags of cocoa beans strapped to their forehead and hanging down their bag. Their will also be men walking up and down the road, peddling bicycles at breakneck speeds, or riding mopeds with three or four people aboard. There are no rules for the roads except watch out for anything that is bigger or faster than you are. They will run you right over if you do not watch out, and I came close to getting hit a few times!!

When we walked down the road we instantly became the object of intense interest. Mezungu (foreigners) are like the reality TV of Bundi!! Children, especially, couldn’t get enough of us and would follow us around in large groups, occasionally running up to touch our skin or peer at us more closely. If we smiled or said hello they would light up with joy. It is a very odd feeling. You find yourself feeling like Princess Diana, and hating yourself for it. After all, why should they care if we notice them, we’re just people like they are. But they do care, immensely.

The people of Bundi love to laugh at mistakes. They love to correct our Lubwisi. They love to be noticed and spoken to. One girl arrived at our house one morning speaking in very broken six grade english (they learn english in the schools there, but the primary schools are of extremely poor quality.) ” I am here. I will be your friend. You will pray with me.” For some Babwisi (as they are called), their need for love and friendship surpasses the cultural tendency towards avoiding standing out.

The people were very welcoming, very friendly . One woman invited me for lunch in her home. Their homes are very small and often not enclosed. They are made using bamboo stuck in the ground vertically and then interwoven horizontally, then with mud pressed in everywhere to form a dry, cracked surface. In the nicer homes they will have one window and perhaps wood around the doorway. The kitchen is always to the side of the house. The lunch I was served was a true feast by local standards (and in my mind as well!): metoke (mashed banana, not sweet), rice, a green spinach like mash, and ocoka with soupe (chicken with juice/gravy). Thankfully, I really enjoyed the local food! This woman proudly brought out several plates of various types, and a few spoons. She had also carried benches into her home to use as a table to meet my needs. In general the people eat on mats on their dirt floors, sharing one communal dish and eating with their fingers in a specific way. I was worried about not being able to finish the enormous amount of food Mejilee had put on my plate, but no worries, all leftovers would be eaten. (this bothered me at first, thinking of them eating my leftovers, but I soon realized that with their communal eating it would not be in any way disturbing to them.) One funny thing was meeting this woman who hosted me (Mejilee) my first day there. She told me she had just bought the chicken for my meal and showed me it running around in her yard!

More thoughts and stories later, along with pictures!

Wow. Tomorrow we begin our journey to Uganda. How do you prepare for something like this?? Something you didn’t even know about one month ago?? (we first spoke with one of the mission team leader’s on October 17th, tomorrow, November 17th we travel)

If I try to think about what it will all be like, try to visualize, try to be prepared, I get overwhelmed. There is no way for us to prepare for this trip. Someday, cultural and language school may help prepare us for long term ministry. But right now we just are who we are, we have what we have. God is enough.

A friend sent me John 6:29: Jesus says . . .”this is what God wants you to do: Believe in the One (Jesus) He has sent”. Believe. That’s all we have to do. Believe, trust, depend. He’s got answers to questions we don’t even know to ask. He has solutions to problems we have yet to encounter. He is sufficient. No worries necessary, no fears needed. He will provide. We believe.

I received a note with a verse simply penciled on the envelope. Mark 9:23

It tells the story of a boy whose father brought him to Jesus, filled with demonic influence. The father says to Jesus, “do something, if you can. . . . .”

Then in verse 23 it says: ” What do you mean ‘ if I can’? Jesus asked. ‘Anything is possible if a person believes.’ The father instantly replied. ‘I do believe, but help me not to doubt!’”

‘anything is possible if a person believes’ - - that is what this journey has been teaching us, the way it has been growing us. The depth of possibility if only our faith is present.

But that ever present hanger on of doubt!! Satan is so ready to thrust doubt back in our faces with each little challenge, each small discouragement. Despite the ongoing confirmations in tangible ways of God’s call on our hearts and desire for us to be on this path . . . . .

We so desire your prayers, your hearts, to be united with us in this journey. We are so thankful for the ways God uses you to encourage us. By His power, in His strenth, anything IS possible.

In an email that came from Bundibugyo (BGO) today we got more insight into the culture there. Insight about both the native culture and the missionary culture, and how the two intertwine. It’s a tough situation being plopped down into another culture with the job of loving and blessing those around you!

BGO is one of those untouchable parts of Uganda. A part that most Ugandans prefer not to think about. The place and it’s inhabitants have been mostly given up on . . . but not by God!! He is continually working out His plan for that place and those people. And our destiny’s have been eternally linked. Pretty amazing stuff.

In a truly life changing book that I read this summer (TrueFaced) there is an opening paragraph that talks about our futures. When I read it this summer I was hungry, eager for the fulfilliment of that destiny. I was waiting on God with such anticipation. This week I reread that chapter and realized how God is making that true in my life RIGHT NOW!

“God dreams that you would discover your destiny and walk into the reasons he placed you on this earth. God has a ticket of destiny with your name written on it - no matter how old, how broken, how tired, or how frightened you are. No matter how many times you may have failed, God dearly longs for the day when He gets to hand you that ticket, smile, and whisper into your ear, “You have no idea how long I’ve waited to hand this to you. have a blast! I’ve already seen what you get to do. it’s better than you could have dreamed. Now hurry up and get on that train. A whole lot of folks are waiting for you to walk into your destiny and into their lives.”

God’s plans for us are diverse throughout our lifetime. But it’s so exciting to know that He is beginning to reveal to us His plans for this next part of our lives.