Uganda Missionary Blog

hey everyone its been a while since I made any updates about the mission work Mary and I are doing here in Africa so I thought Id make a post to let you all know about the crazy adventures of working in Kenya and Uganda. We spent 2 months in a village on the outskirts of Kampala called Kasangati during that 2 months we had great opportunities for ministry with our neighbors and the local children. we formed strong relationships in that town and consider those people to be family. We were able to minister to one man in particular who was a Muslim (one of our neighbors) we are trusting God to water the seeds we have sown and to build on the truth that these people already know. Because of our position on the state of the church and the corruption in churches here, our landlord (a pastor) and another pastor friend of his chose to evict us from our house in kasangati. At that point we didn’t know what our next step was to be, but through prayer and seeking the lord we were lead to travel to Kenya.So we distributed our belongings to the poor and among our neighbors and boarded a bus to Kenya. After arriving in Kenya we stayed with brother Moses and his family for several weeks. then the lord provided a house for us to rent which is over and above the standard we had come to expect. throughout this time we have struggled with spiritual warfare as witchcraft and demonic activity are very open here. We are once again involved with preaching the Gospel of the kingdom to all who have ears to hear as well as a ministry with local children and the street boys here in bungoma. We have been reaching out to the street boys with food and giving them a safe place to come for food rest etc. We have faced persecution and continue to face it ….Just last night at 2 am 2 men broke into our house to rob us i woke up with 2 men standing over me saying we are going to kill you now give us your money. despite the attempts of the enemy we had no fear and rebuked the enemy out of those men preaching the love of Christ to them as they went through our things before our eyes. the peace of Yahuwah was with us and we were divinely protected the men did not lay a hand on our persons and left after taking some small valuables etc. They took our passports and other documents, wedding rings ,some money and a few small things like my mp3 player and a knife. we rejoiced in the aftermath realizing that Yahuwah is our protector and provider and that we have no need of the things which can be stolen God will provide our needs even if we have no money whatsoever. after the men left we prayed asking God to return our passports so that we would not be forced to return to the states early and in the morning the folder containing our documents was on our window ledge. The thieves were supernaturally confused by our prayers and even picked up my laptop cord which was connected to the laptop and replaced it not knowing what it was they also failed to steal our cell phone or the small stash of money i keep with my phone as they were leaving the lord had me shout after them “hes coming for you and you cant hide” Hallelujah!!! please keep us in your prayers as the harvest here is plenty but the workers few. the spiritual opposition to people who seek the will of the master is huge we believe we have been cursed on several occasions but the lord has always delivered us from the hand of our enemy !!! we also went into a village not far from bungoma to visit a school for orphans i will post some pictures of this school and the children please prayerfully consider supporting this project it is not one of our personal projects but is in need of immediate relief due to food shortages and a lack of funding for teachers and other pressing concerns . these children are between 2 years and 6 years old several have no food to eat at the homes where they stay and 3 are simply missing as they were turned out of homes or ran away because of not getting any food.

Dear Friends and family,

I hope everything is well in the States and Canada and anywhere else you might be. We are in Kenya now, as of the 27th. There were several reasons for us leaving Uganda, but the door is not closed there if Yahuwah leads us to return. The Kenyans have been very welcoming and Anthony has had the opportunity to share the gospel of the kingdom with some very word hungry individuals as well as with a mud hut church of about 25 people. Many “muzungus” (whites) come over here looking to set up ministries, help peoples physical needs and they forget the simplicity of the gospel. There is a lot of extortion and prosperity gospel going on in African churches, and the sad thing is that the only ones reaping the rewards are pastors. They look to the west as a model of excellence rather then to the Father. So, we have seen a lot of rejection by pastors and a lot of acceptance by the people. I’m just going to share a pictures of us in Uganda and some of the lives we touched. More about Kenya later.

I

So, we have been cooking on charchoal. It`s different, mainly because you have to light it and it takes about 15 minutes to get hot. Otherwise, we have figured out how to control the temperature by putting ashes on top to smother it if we don`t want it so hot, and of course adding more charcoal to make it hotter. Most of the food here is things like Potatoes, carrots, tomatoes, Matoke bananas, rice, bread, beans and corn. We have been struggling with eating less meat. We eat it about 2 times a week here, and it is such a treat! We have been feeling the starches though and are trying to consume more eggs and beans and such. It`s a lot of work getting used to all the different cooking times and using one cooker for most everything. I miss my 4 burner stove and my oven! Also, not having a refridgerator means we have to buy things like meat right before we eat it, which can be scary here. Buying from the local meat vender means finding one with a fairly good cut of meat hanging up and not to many flies. It`s a good day when they give you a peice without to much bone, fat or sinew, which they like to give you because they charge by the kilo. The other thing is that the smallest portion they sell is half a kilo, which is a lot of meat! (a little over a pound) Oh well. It`s usually good. The main meat they sell is beef. Chicken is available if you are willing to do the butchering, (and eat the whole thing!) and it is a little bit more expensive, so we haven`t tried cooking it yet.

As for the company (ministry) we are starting, we are still waiting to meet with the Lawyer on Monday, but hopefully it won`t be to much longer before we have all the paperwork settled for doing anything the Lord may be leading us to do. We are considering doing some traveling here in the next little while. Pray for us to follow the vision God has given us. He is strength!

Love you all, and love to hear from you!

Mary and Anthony in Uganda

Hey everyone things are going well here in Uganda we attended the child evangelism fellowship of Uganda’s pastors workshop on Tuesday it was an interesting experience that opened our eyes to the state of the church and of children in Uganda aside from neglect and abuse children here face parents who will sell them as sacrifices. we have been staying in a guest house while we wait for our house in the village to be finished so that we can move in and begin our work with the children in earnest. we will be going to Kenya sometime around the middle of next month as our visitor visas expire on the 13th and we will need to cross the border to renew them please pray that we will have no problems and that the customs agent will give us the full 3 month visa instead of the 1 month one they gave us when we landed.we will be out of internet communication for the most part we will be able to get online a couple times a week i think. please email us and we will do our best to answer it is encouraging to us to know that you are praying and hearing from home helps too. also please keep praying for God’s provision. i will add more updates as we have more to share and as we are able to find an internet connection.

hey everyone its Anthony here with an update … we are actually on the ground in Uganda now. After 3 hours of driving 20 hours of flying and 16 hours of layovers and another hour of driving we are in kampala at the home of an MAF pilot where we will be staying for the next few days. its morning here and we are very tired but too excited to get right to sleep besides who wants to sleep in the morning even if its the middle of the night back home in canada. we havent had a chance to see much of the countryside but we took lots of pictures on the drive from Entebbe to Kampala. The general atmosphere of the city here is very similar to port au prince Haiti but things seem to be a bit more upscale here although i have been told that half an hour out of the city the villages are very rural and many dont have electricity or other modern marvels we cant wait to start meeting people and seeing more of this beautifull country and find out exactly what work the Lord has planned for us

Well everybody, looks like we with be leaving on July 11th for Uganda. Thank you for your prayers and financial support, we really look forward to hearing from you on the Mission field. We will be updating mainly here at this blog, but you are welcome to keep up with us on facebook as well. If you want to get our newsletter emailed to you instead of reading it on this blog, please send us your email address.

Mary and Anthony

Hey,

We are getting ready to take off on Monday for Canada. After two months working in Liberty, MO and some time with my family in Idaho, it’s time to spend a couple of weeks with Anthony’s parents and sisters. So when are we leaving for Africa? Hopefully by the end of June! We will be leaving from Edmonton Alberta, and we’ll let you know as soon as we have a date.

Does everyone know that we are expecting? The due date for baby Reid is November 17th, and yes we intend to have our first baby in Uganda. Please keep us in your prayers.

We have been making first aid kits to take to Uganda. We have about 6 of them now, all various sizes. I am amazed at the money you can save by buying the items at the dollar store and packing them in zip-lock freezer bags. You get twice as much stuff, and a much better variety for your money. We had a big blessing here as well. Some friends of ours were volunteering at a free clinic in Ontario Oregon, and we went along with them to help and came out with children’s vitamins and lots of first aid stuff. Thank you Lord!

Take care, make comments or email us,

Mary Reid

Hey everyone! Most of you know that Anthony and I have a call to work with Orphans in Uganda. We have been researching alternative building methods for a lot time, as we once thought we would build our home in Canada using natural materials etc. Well, we have been praying about it and we really feel that the Earth bag building technique used HERE and HERE would be ideal for building shelter for needy children in Africa. It is being used already in many poorer countries for orphanages and general humanitarian aid. It is ideal for many reasons including -

What we are looking for is someone who would like to build one of these on your own land, perhaps as a garden shed or cottage. We would come and do the work with you, which would better acquaint us with the method and use it as an example for those who are interested in helping with construction and costs of the ones we intend to build in Uganda.

For a 15 ft dome it will cost you approximately $300 in materials.

Click here to see full sized demonstration