Thursday, February 14, 2013

GSF And Corinne From Unbiased Eyes

We are greeted with cheers and song by the children and staff as we pull to the entrance of Good Shepherd's Fold.  The mood is festive and full of appreciation for the parents of Corinne, one of their family.  At that moment, the intensity and strains of this GSF work seems as far away as our 24 hour journey.  These brief times of loving communal celebration are the glue necessary to bond this team through the stress of ministering to 400+ children through the staff of 80+ Ugandans. The calling of GSF ministry demands a sturdy and firm attachment to the Vine by each missionary.  This firm sturdiness must produce an individual pliable flexibility necessary to minister together as a team in this environment of life and death (literally).  It's not war but there are similarities with periods vacillating between the total serenity of rural Africa and the life threatening medical crises in this same rural Africa environment.  Only prayer can empower the needed strength and meekness for this ministry.

A week of personal observation evidences a ministry influencing hundreds - likely thousands of people in the surrounding villages.  Aside from the huge variety of employment provided for 80+ Ugandans, many of these same employees have planted churches and are pastors in these villages.  These churches have developed so well that this year, GSF discontinued Sunday services in their own chapel building.  GSF missionaries and orphans now attend and engage with local village churches. The worship and ministry truly embodies Christ in power through His grace in an effective Ugandan way.  The mature understanding of GSF missionaries to engage with the Ugandan church indicates their selfless commitment to build and disciple effectively.  Instead of worshiping conveniently in their on site brick chapel hearing their own missionaries speak and worship American style, they walk about 1/2 mile along dirt (or mud) trails to worship in one of the local villages.  No parking lots, doors, windows or even bathrooms but benches on a dirt floor and real worship in Spirit and truth.

Corinne's primary assignment for her first year has been to organize and grow the Sponsorship program for GSF.  Unlike most ministries, orphanages need a continual outside source to sustain them.  There is good reason the Bible mentions "widow and orphan ministry" as the example for true religion (James 1:27).  These are not able to quickly help themselves and there is an endless supply of this segment of the population in every country.  The sponsorship program provides food, clothes, care and shelter for orphan children that otherwise have none.  The missionaries raise their support for their own travel, food, shelter and ministry.  But funding for the needs of the orphans comes through individual sponsors for each orphan and constitutes the majority of the income for GSF.  In her first 6 months, God has blessed Corinne's efforts by greatly increasing the number of sponsors and streamlining the communication process between the orphans and their sponsors.  This is the kind of job where success produces more work.  Increasing the sponsors results in increasing the need for communication.  Creating meaningful communication results in increased correspondences and packages.  The Post Office employees know Corinne like a personal friend and couldn't wait to meet her parents.  Our hour long Post Office visit filled the back of our vehicle.

Did we mention flexibility? By October Corinne became aware of the need for an operational and facility makeover in the toddler house.  This challenge was far outside her primary assignment but her calling to dive into this was confirmed by the rest of the team.  Youth and inexperience worked in favor toward her optimistic goals to accomplish this makeover by Christmas.  Realism set in as the immensity of the makeover increased to change some personnel. African deadlines for construction completion are non-existent.  So a brief 1 month side-assignment became a 2 month project with the hard relational challenges of personnel changes.  The move-in day was delayed until last Saturday - a process always greater than anticipated.  Then, to top off this huge culmination of 2 months, that evening Corinne was asked the "will you marry me " question by Daniel Iya.  No one, including Daniel and Corinne anticipated these 2 big events happening the same day.  Did we mention flexibility? Oh, the answer is "YES" both to the flexibility and marriage questions.

Prayer from the rest of the body is the source of powerful grace that keeps this ministry in Kingdom work.  The needs are endless, the challenges are immense and the enemy is ruthless.  "We wrestle not against flesh and blood ...... but against the dark powers of this world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms" (Eph. 6:12).  Like each member of our body, all of us are in need of intercessory prayer.  Hopefully this blog will help you in this work of prayer - this means of grace as our body works through Corinne in Uganda.

Merle and Diane

Out to dinner at the Haven!

Right after Daniel proposed

Diane and me enjoying Uganda

Diane and Corinne
Corinne with the toddlers at the opening of the redone toddler house

Tuesday, February 5, 2013

Extreme Makeover GSF Edition

"Praise God from whom all blessings flow.."

His blessings have been especially tangible this month after reuniting with Daniel (my boyfriend) after six months apart - PRAISE GOD! Daniel arrived on January 22 and will spend the next 6 months in Uganda working with a ministry called Engineering Ministries International (EMI). Although he is stationed in Kampala which is about a two hour drive from Good Shepherd's Fold, it feels like he's next door compared to him being in Texas! It's been great to already spend time together (including this past weekend!), and when we aren't together, I'm just thankful that we are at least in the same time zone =)




There are also exciting things happening here at Good Shepherd's Fold! We have been working on renovating the toddler house. The toddler house suffered from a crumbling cement floor, pealing walls, and...well...rats. It was time for some Extreme Makeover GSF edition! After being blessed with some generous donations and a special fund raising effort by my sister Katelyn, we had all the funds ready to redo the cement floor, tile the showers, and repaint all of the walls. It's been a work in progress (we are going on 1.5 months of work...), but it is nearly finished! Soon it will be all ready for the toddlers to move in, complete with a new supply of toys compliments of CEFC and my sister Carly. It's been a blessing to watch the way that God has provided for all of these sweet toddlers, and I feel honored to be a part of His work. 


Breaking up the old floor
Laying the concrete!

Finished floor...ready for the walls to get painted!


The paint is almost finished!

I have a lot to look forward to in the next ten days because (drum roll, please)....my parents are coming to visit me! My mom and dad are actually in transit as I type this. I'm ecstatic and can't wait to share my "Uganda world" with them. My dad actually came to GSF last January without me (not that I'm holding that against him....ok maybe I'm still trying to get over that), but this will be my mother's first trip to Africa! My dad will be working with Sam, the pastor of the new GSF church (read about it here), and my mom will be helping me rearrange and organize the renovated toddler house. I'm very grateful that they're taking the trip out here and cannot wait to see them! Again, I feel so honored and blessed!

So, there's so much to be grateful for this month! But there are also some definite prayer needs.

1. Pray that the toddler house renovations would get finished! We moved the toddlers into a different house during the project, which bumped other kids out of their own house. The project was only anticipated to take 3 weeks, and we are going on 7 weeks. That's a lot of weeks to have 18 displaced toddlers! 
2. All of the GSF kids started school today. In Uganda, the school year coordinates with the calendar year, so they're all starting their new classes and teachers. Pray for them as they transition back into the school schedule! Also pray that our kids would be diligent in their studies.
3. Pray for my parents as they are traveling to Uganda! Also pray that God would bless our time together.
4. Pray for Daniel and he continues to adjust to life here in Uganda!
5. Pray for Sebastian, one of our sweet little toddlers. He is going in for surgery to close up his cleft palate tomorrow. Pray that the surgery is successful!


First day of school!

Sebastian leaving for surgery