ch-ch- changes...

Hey everyone!
So, here's the deal.. I wanted to wait until I got pictures to post, but that doesn't appear to be happening... but we've had a change in our team. Pastor George will no longer be going with us.. and instead, our friend Jared from Kenya will be coming! Very exciting! Also, it appears that the phone number I posted before was wrong. So here is the correct one: 011 (0 or +) 256775571802. It has been officially decided that we leave Monday morning, though the time has yet to be decided. Ummm... I don't know what else. Passion is still up in the air... so please keep that in your prayers. I still can't believe that we leave on Monday and that we are now finished with lecture phase!

I know I said I'd post and update about the last 2 weeks soon, and I hopefully will... but we're at Fast Net right now in Jinja and it's just too hard to concentrate on things like that with so many people everywhere! So.. for now..
love you all!!

Outreach!!

Fort Portal / Mityana Outreach Team 2008
Back Row (L-R) Me, Mark, Bernard, Brenda, Mercy, Catherine, Sandra, Steve, Millie, Pastor George.
Front Row (L-R) Tim, Ryan, Msaki, Persis.


Hello fantastic friends and family!
I have a lot of information to give you in a very short amount of time.. life here can change pace quite rapidly... and we are often informed of things at the last minute.

Outreach is here. nearly.
we are on our last week (it may not be a whole week, we're not sure!) of Lecture phase. Originally we were told we would leave .. well, it doesn't matter, but the last thing we were told was that we would leave Monday May 12th. (our time, not WA) Our team will be going to Mityana & Fort Portal (yes, where I went for Mini Outreach in March.) We will be in both places 3 weeks each. I will not have internet access at all during those 6 weeks. (We are scheduled to arrive back at Hopeland June 22nd or 23rd.)

The good news is, that we have an AWESOME team! We are 12 students & 2 leaders making a grand total of 14. 6 guys and 6 girls. 6 Africans & 6 Muzungus. Well balanced!
Here's who we are:
Ladies:
Catherine Bules (Canton, OH; USA)
Brenda (Kenya)
Mercy Ogalla (Kenya)
Persis Tusubira (Kampala, Uganda)
Sandra (Jinja, Uganda)
KatiRose Johnston (Laurel, WA; USA)
Guys:
Mark Pouteaux (Swift Current, SK; Canada)
Bernard Edwards (Capetown, South Africa)
Ryan Pauls (Saskatoon SK; Canada)
Tim Falk (Saskatoon SK; Canada/ Peru)
Steven Honest (Jinja, Uganda)
Pastor George Solo (Jinja, Uganda)
Leaders:
Emma Msaki (Arusha,Tanzania)
Millie (Uganda?)


So, more about outreach. We'll go to Mityana first. I don't know too much about it, other than we will probably stay in the village. Mityana has a major problem with witchcraft, is what we have been told, and that's about all we have to pray into. We stopped to get "fast food" there on our way to FP last time (fast food African style is meat on a stick or chapati or matoke shoved through your window.) Then after 3 weeks, so approx. June 2nd? We'll head on to FP.

Fort Portal. So far we have heard that we will not necessarily (meaning unless God tells us to, which we really hope He does...) be going back to Kijura & Kahuna to do any follow up on the ministry we did in March. The plan is to stay in the town of Fort Portal. Drunkenness & hopelessness are going to be our big enemies there.

We also have an awesome opportunity, which at the moment is still a huge maybe (Mugaya is still praying into it.. ) that would be absolutely amazing. Here's the deal, May 30 & 31 in Kampala there will be a Passion Conference. (http://www.268generation.com/worldtour/lowbandwidth/index.php?filename=kampala-english.xml) And we have the opportunity to staff it. 30,000 university-aged students are expected to attend from all over Uganda and East Africa. And we could have the opportunity to go and minister to them.. to pray with them and share the awesome hope of Jesus with all of them! It would be AMAZING!

Outreach Prayer Requests:
* health for the whole team (this seems to be the enemy's favorite tactic of attack at the moment... )
* hearing God's voice & discerning it well
* LEADERSHIP
* Unity among the team
* That God would fill our hearts with His COMPASSION & GRACE
* unity among our team & the pastors/ translators/ bishop we will work with
* God's creativity in reaching these people
* Physical, Spiritual, & Emotional Strength
* that we would rest in the peace of God, especially about situations with family & friends at home (the other favorite tactic of the enemy for now!)

[Here's a request: would someone be amazing, and please take this info and make it into prayer cards & pass them out. I have no way of doing it from here... thanks! You're awesome!!]

Ready for some more good news?
For my birthday, my amazing friend Penny, is loaning me her spare cell phone, and she got me a sim card, which means... that while I won't have any internet access, you could call me while I am on outreach! This is a great website (which I do not have at the moment, but will post asap) that Catherine's mom found, and has been using to call her for the last 3 months, where one can purchase international calling cards online quite cheaply! My phone # is +2567775571802... I can receive text messages and send them, but it is a bit more expensive and I can't really afford too many. All incoming calls for me are free... so, if you really miss me and want to chat sometime in the next month & 1/2, you can give me a call! I'd love to hear from you!

And, for those of you who were wondering, here is an overview of what the next 4 months of my life look like (as in, the whole rest of the time I am in Uganda!)

So, then, after outreach, we have debrief week. Hopefully, we'll go rafting on the Nile that week! (23 June-27 June). Then on the 28th is our Graduation. 30 June we leave for Kenya. A bunch of us (Catherine, Kendra, Meg, Penny, Ryan, Mark, Tim, Kristine & I ) are going to Mombassa for a week to relax, and hang out. We will "hopefully" get to visit some of our friends in Kenya while we are there too. We should be back on 7 June.

After that, as in, 8 or 9 July, we head up to Pader for a two week outreach in the IDP camp. In case you were wondering what the story is there, I'll tell you! IDP stands for Internally Displaced Persons camp. They are the result of the LRA (Lord's Resistance Army) and all the havoc they have wreaked on Northern Uganda for the last 20 years or so. They have been in exile in Sudan for the last two years or so, but there is SO much of the mess that they have left behind. They would raid villages, kill people, rape women, and abduct the children and brainwash them (as well as involve them in witchcraft) and then force them into being child soldiers. The people in these camps are squished in (houses are ridiculously close together, and FULL of people) scared, and hopeless. They have lost everything, their houses, farms, businesses and communities. They have nearly no future. The camps are government "sponsored" which means that the soldiers guard them from possible attacks from a new tribe who is taking over and inflicting terror, the Karamajong, but most of the food (one meal a day) comes from relief organizations. The people have nothing to do.. nearly no jobs, and there is no return to their "homes" or what's left of them in the foreseeable future either. These camps are places of great spiritual darkness and many are demonic strongholds.

Apparently, most of Hopeland's work there in the last 2 years or so has been very discouraging and spiritually depressive, but with the last team that went, things changed. They had been praying for the joy of the Lord to invade that place and all the people there. (An outreach team from Scotland and another from South Africa had been there for 3 weeks before the team from our base headed up) (Hopeland has been going up and showing the Jesus film as well as building a school!!) And the joy of the Lord came! Apparently, before the children that lived there wouldn't even play, they would all just sit there. This time though, the kids were playing! They had planned to show the Jesus film, but God had other plans and broke all of their equipment so they ended up doing dramas about the life of Christ and many came forward and were saved and there were many who were healed. Anywho, they really want to send up more teams to support the new baby Christians and disciple them. So, lots of us want to go up to the camp and work there... hearing about these camps was a big part of what God used to break my heart for Uganda.

our work in Pader will be...? Well, it's up to God to show us what He wants us to do. We plan to work with the kids, do some sports ministry, help with the school building, do some AIDS presentations, and also some discipleship classes/seminars, as well as..? all sorts of other things. We'll see where God leads. It's a 1.5 day drive up to Pader (the roads are not so good, and we'll have to stop in Kampala for supplies & such.) We plan on coming back around 22 or 23 July.

After that, sometime between 28 July - 3 August, I'll start my work with Spring of Hope. [http://www.springofhope.org.uk/].

Ok... well, that's enough about outreach. I'll toss up another update about the last week or so soon.. before I leave!
love you all!!
-Ket Rose