Monday, November 17, 2008

2008 Mission Uganda Report

On October 19th. myself and 3 others left for Uganda via JFK and Dubai. We arrived on Tuesday 10/21 and met our colleague Rev. Davis Matovu. (Alpha Omega Seminary 2006 graduate and Valdictorian) He and his family housed us for the next two weeks.

During this period we conducted 3 Nexus Seminary Uganda graduations totaling 44 graduates of our 20 course Certificate of Ministry program. This program has the goal of strengthening the rural churches of Uganda by providing a free education for pastors and church elders to train them for the calling they have received from God.

In addition to these graduations we each preached in rural churches in Kasangati/Gayaza and Kikyusa areas. We conducted a one day legacy symposium, taught classes for two groups in process of their certificate training and also met with a new class group in the area called Caini. I was also privileged to meet again with the new church started last year in Kkata which graduated 3 people in the Kayebe group. It was great to see the progress and feel the love of Love of Christ Church.

Our veteran traveler Dr. BJ Norrix returned with me this year and we also had Rev. Wayne Grow and Ray Gilman IV who came as a layman and media specialist. After discussion and retreat with Davis we set some priorities for the coming year.
· Set up another group in Gomba, Kayebe and Luzinga and to start two groups in two new locations.
· Have Davis train several assistant tutors(Nexus Graduates) who would teach some of the classes in place of Davis, but under his supervision.
· Have at least 3 graduations in Fall 2009 and surpass the mark of 100 rural pastors trained. (our goal remains 2000 trained in the next 20 years)
· Produce a Luganda – English parallel Bible and Theological primer for use of our students. Including 300 – 500 word definitions, brief Bible and History summaries. We plan to keep the English level at about the 6th grade level.
· Complete a Nexus Seminary office for Davis, make 20,000 bricks for building a resource center in 2010.
· Pray for all of the above and to pray that Davis will be able to get a visa to travel to the US in Fall 2009.
· Take the next steps in our plan to provide Worship Leader training and set up a special Women’s Studies program.

We thank God for the privilege of this ministry. We are making an incredible difference in the villages and we continue to be some of the first whites that have visited many of the churches and villages we go to. Yet we seem to make only a small dent in the work that needs to be done. It will take so many groups working at training. We feel it so important that we will train women, those with no English and also those whose education stopped at a very early age. Of course, we provide this all at no charge.