Greetings friends and family
Sorry for not writing in July and being late with August; maybe the Missionary Prayer cell at the Well, Ansdell is not meeting, being the UK holiday month of August?
Let me start with the 3-week holiday visit of my granddaughter, Hannah and her boyfriend Jack; we were able to take them on a 3-day village mission to Kyamatende in Kumuli District. Hannah stayed slept in a grass roofed house with the older girls of the family, whilst Jack slept on the mud floor of a simple brick built house, sharing with other members of my Village Mission team. The locals (and our Church hosts) loved a new ‘fun’ dimension that Jack and Hannah brought to the three crusade evenings: fun with balloons and very good attempts at doing the local dancing. At our crusades we see a varied number of people coming to Christ for the first time; I deliberately don’t ask how many, but like to emphasise to the local Church the importance of follow up and discipleship. The evening I preached I based my talk around R.I.P. and the chairman of LC1 (Government Local Council, which tends to be, possibly, the most important position in the community), who had drifted away from Christ and the Church for over three-years, made a re-committment. (Also see Encounter Retreat below). J&H also did some rock climbing and pleasure sailing in a local fisherman’s canoe; and Jack drove on of the local Boda Boda motorbikes to the rock climb, and back.
We also enjoyed a day with my long time friend pastor Sarah (Gitti, this is Stephen’s mum), of Zion Blessed Church, Kyabando, Kampala; in her village Lugo. Once a year she invite her Church and the local villagers to her home for lunch and fellowship. This year she arranged it to coincide with a time that I could join them and preach. (Holiness & Intimacy)
We went on safari to Murchison Falls, visited the Source of the Nile and H&J visited the Chimp sanctuary on Ngamba Island in Lake Victoria. Too many other tings to mention…
Let me close by saying that we have now completed third Encounter course in our new Retreat House; first I mentioned in June, the second was with the pastor and leaders of Kingdom Seekers, the Church that we are overseeing in Tororo; and third with Back to Foundations Church leaders from Kyamatende village. We are now managing to do the retreat in two and a half days, which works well with the group travelling her Monday morning and returning home Thursday morning. (Not everyone can read and write)
Please pray for the following up and coming activities:
Me preaching at Rhema Church Overnight on 25th.
Full-day seminar on Saturday 2nd September; just found out that it is nearly 4-hours drive; 1-hour deep deep into the bush. Alex and I will probably start out on the Friday afternoon and get lodgings for the night in Ngoma.
Also give thanks for the week of teaching that we did at Rhema lunch time fellowship. We taught on very basic stuff, which they have asked us to do again for the youth. More and more I’m finding that even seemingly mature Christians here do not really now the basics of faith in Jesus and being disciples.
Love to everyone, thank you for the many ways in which you support our ministry here in East Africa.
Love & Blessings
David T Atkinson