Always Learning

“ This is the day the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it.”

The days are going by fast here and God is revealing more to me in this short time than I could ask for. Sometimes I think of it as unreal or a dream, I mean I am living in Uganda being able to love on children and teach them about Jesus. The first few weeks Satan was attacking what was going on here and we were in a fight. Only to be won with prayer, it was a fight, not physical of course but spiritual. I realize that as Christians we deal with this daily we might not know it but it does happen everyday we are in a battle and we learn we aren’t alone as we have brothers and sisters of Christ dealing with the same thing. It’s a sacrifice we encounter because God sacrificed much more for us because he loves us way more than we can comprehend.

I know I probably am not making much sense but I learned something this past week I never knew before and I want to share it. Jonathon and myself are starting a bible study with the older boys here and this past week we talked about the fall of man and the sacrifices God made for us. Many of us know the story of Adam and Eve, how they were tempted by Satan and went against what God had forbid them to do. They fell to temptation and were punished by God but in Genesis chapter 3 there is something I never knew before or never really studied it till this week. Adam and Eve were supposed to live forever as it says in scripture and also it describes what God to give up because of this. So after the fall to the temptation and God told them what would happen as their punishment he made a sacrifice. “ The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them. And the Lord God said, “ The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.” God made a sacrifice allowing them to fall into temptation and now they wouldn’t live forever. Now stay with me please if you go to 1 Corinthians 15:20-23 Paul talks about the fall of man (Adam) and how the death came through a man that also the resurrection of dead also comes through a man. So in those two scriptures it shows how God made two sacrifices, he had to sacrifice Adam so that he could sacrifice Christ for us. I then began to think why does God love us so much? To sacrifice for us. He is so amazing and to see this in scripture I should already know that God loves me and everyone else so much but I didn’t fully comprehend that till the other day in the bible study.

Also that God sometimes has to bring us out of our comfort zones to truly speak to us. But why though? Why can’t he speak to us in our comfort zones? Because the way I see it now is that following God isn’t comfortable it isn’t easy, that’s why it’s the road less traveled. He had to take me across the globe for me to understand how much he loves me. And as I sit here typing this I can truly say that I am so blessed as everyone else should be how lucky are we to be loved by the amazing creator when we definitely don’t deserve it. We turn on him, we push him aside because we are so busy in our lives and sometimes we hide that we even follow him. But still he is there and embraces us, to me that is the coolest thing and for some reason it is finally clicking in my head the seriousness of his love, which is crazy because I have known about it since I was young.

The other day one of the girls here who since the day I got here and everyday since I have been here hugs me for about five minutes at a time. She called me her dad, which I think she knows I am not because she is a little older but also because I am white and she is not. But it wasn’t about the fact of that it was the fact that she loves me and I love her as I love all the other kids but she expressed it in a way that I couldn’t comprehend. I mean I didn’t know what to say because I didn’t want to be like “no I am not” with a smile on my face but I just embraced it as a beautiful experience. So that’s how I think about it with God he created us yes but in an earthly standpoint everyone of us has a father but God loves us and we should love him enough to call him dad. I know this might not make sense and I don’t know how to make it sound easy to understand but in the end God loves us and makes sacrifices for us everyday so we can do as he has called us to do, To be fishers of men and share his gospel.

Yesterday was one of the best days here so far, we went to a baby’s home in Kampala and were able to love on precious babies that may not have parents or do but their parents can’t take care of them for whatever reason. We also did some painting in one of the rooms, but we were getting ready to go and get lunch and come back to finish the painting. Then our friend who works there asks if we would like to take babies to lunch we were taken back by it because we didn’t want to be rude and say no but we were nervous at the same time. So we started getting things ready to take three babies with us to eat lunch and spend time together, also one of these babies was 5 days old which is crazy to think we were taking him to eat with us. And being so little they just slept while we ate but what an experience to have walking with beautiful babies and spend time with them getting them out of the home and letting us love on them for an hour or two. We were so nervous because what if something happened thankfully nothing did but we were just to cautious I think and it turned out to be an awesome experience. Then after leaving the babies home we went back and bought popcorn and sodas and had movie night at one of the houses with the kids. They were so excited because they don’t get this treat as often as some kids do in America. So after dinner we sat there eating popcorn and drinking sodas watching a movie as a family. The age didn’t matter, the race didn’t matter we were a family and spending time together as one. It turned out to be an amazing day and it reminds me of how blessed I am to be given the opportunity to be here.

Again thank you for the prayers and support from all the family and friends. Sozo is having an adventure run as a fundraising opportunity. If whoever reads this please keep the event in your prayers that everything goes well and that it turns out to be a great experience for everyone signed up or the people making it all happen. May the Lord bless each one of you this week.