Today I travelled from Entebbe, Uganda, to Bujumbura, Burundi. My flight was at 4pm, but I said that I needed to be at the airport by 12 so that I would not have to rush, and also to allow for “African Time” and for any hold-ups along the way. David had said that to be there by 12, we would need to leave at 9. Amazingly, we were out the door at 9!

That good start didn’t last long, however, as when we got into the car we discovered a flat tyre, which of course needed to be fixed before we could start off. About 20 minutes later we actually set off.

Once we got out of the local area, the roads were very good, and “African Time” actually worked in reverse for once, with us arriving at the airport at 10.30. So when I tried to go through the first security point, I was told that I would have to wait till 12. So I sat and played video games on my phone for the next hour and a half.

At 12 I again tried to join the line for the security screening. No, I was too early. I would have to wait till 1. I took the next 30 minutes or so finishing off my daily Bible reading, then I noticed that there was a little food stall in the waiting area, so I wandered over to check it out. They had samosas, so I bought a couple for lunch. Yummy! Some of the best samosas I have tasted. I went back for seconds, and a soda to go with them. By then it was 1, and I was finally able to go through the first security point.

There were no dramas with check-in, but I need to watch the weight of my bag, which came in at 23.5 kg. Not a problem for this trip, as I had a very generous 46 kg allowance, and I think the rest of my flights in Africa are similar, but when it comes to going home I know the Qantas allowance is only 23 kg.

After check-in another security point. Shoes off, watch off, lap-top out of the case. What I don’t understand is, when you have done all this on the way in, and you have been in a secure area where there is no possibility of bringing in anything new from outside even if you wanted to, why is this second check even necessary?

Found the departure gate and waited. Boarding was supposed to be at 3, but actually got going at nearly 4. When I came out of the departure lounge, I was confronted by three huge flights of stairs going down, and no other option to get there. I think I said aloud, “You’ve gotta be kidding!” Then a young lass came up beside me and offered to help, taking my bag while I slowly negotiated the steps holding the rail.

Coming out of the terminal was another shock. A massive hike to the plane – at least 500 metres. Again, You gotta be kidding! This airport has absolutely zero respect for elderly people. My helper walked with me, but I had to stop multiple times. However, it was a God-encounter. She is actually running a ministry to children and women, and wants to link in to the network.

Once I had actually reached the plane and hauled myself up the steps, the experience was quite pleasant. One of the flight attendants quickly brought me a bottle of water, and I settled in. It was a small plane, just two seats either side of a central aisle, and they were “not-so-squeezy” seats with plenty of leg room. The flight itself was only about 50 minutes, and there was quite a bit of turbulence, but it didn’t really bother me. The crew did manage to serve a snack of a sandwich (beef, chicken or something else) and a drink – I chose the chicken sandwich, but it was bright yellow and tasted nothing like chicken. Never mind, I had had my samosas at the airport, so was not at all hungry.

I had been a little concerned about how complicated the visa on arrival process would be at the airport, but as I was walking in a young man in a suit came up to me and asked, “Are you the reverend pastor from Australia?” When I told him I was, he took over. He asked for my passport and took out his phone and completed the application online, then went to the counter and sorted it all out while I sat waiting for him. Easy peasy! Then after we picked up my bag he again had me sit and wait while he took it through security. It felt like I was being treated like some kind of royalty.

Pastor Domitien was waiting for us outside. Praise God, a normal car! I didn’t have to haul myself up into a 4WD. He took me to see Lake Tanganika before bringing me to the place where I am staying. It is currently overflowing as a result of water coming in from the floods in Kenya and other regions.

Bujumbura is a beautiful city, with trees everywhere. Most of the roads are great, the back roads have some potholes but nothing like the goat tracks in Uganda. One interesting aspect is that they drive on the right-hand side of the road, but most of the cars appear to be right-hand drive, which must make driving even more challenging.

I have a whole cottage! With an indoor western toilet! And a real shower! After bucket baths for the last month (except for brief periods in hotels in Iganga and Paidah) I feel clean at last. It even has hot water if I wanted it, but I love my cold showers. I think it is a kind of AirBNB situation, and at around $25 Aussie a day it is a real bargain.

Pastor Domitien took some time talking to me about his work and his family, and showing me photos. He does not have anything planned at this stage, but was waiting to meet me to find out what I want to do.

Later in the evening his two daughters came to stay in the second bedroom of the cottage to keep me company and look after me.

So far the experience of Burundi has bee so totally different from Uganda, it’s amazing.

This is my last full day in Uganda, and I was preaching at Pastor David’s this morning. As I was praying last night about what God wanted to say today, He had given me the message, or at least the passage that the message would be based on (Ezekiel 47 – the river of God), but also made it clear that there was another issue I needed to address. These people, as everywhere I have been in Africa, are fascinated by my age, and particularly that I am able to stand and preach for an hour. They are also, like the people at home, fascinated by the fact that I don’t use notes, and that I can quote the Scriptures rather than reading them from a printed Bible. I had to remind them about Jesus’ words that those who receive a prophet in the name of a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward, and those who receive a righteous man as a righteous man will receive a righteous man’s reward – in other words, we can only receive from the anointing that we recognize. I told them that this 73 year old woman does not have anything to give them, but the anointed apostle and prophet does, and to not look at the person but at the anointing.

That set the tone for the meeting, and I preached under a heavy anointing. Before the meeting I had worried whether I would be able to find enough to say about the Ezekiel passage to fill an hour, but the Holy Spirit took over and my only problem was not going too far over the hour.

At the end, as has now become my normal practice, I gave an altar call for salvation, but nobody responded so I moved on.

The Lord had told me to give a call for those who wanted to receive the baptism in the Holy Spirit.

About 30 people came out, and some were very obviously touched by the Spirit as I prayed for them, but I had no way of knowing how many received the baptism, as those whom I could hear praying could have been doing so in tongues, or it could have been in their own language. I just trust the Holy Spirit that He will have His way in all their lives.

When I had finished praying for all those who came out, my interpreter whispered to me, “There are two boys who want to receive Jesus.” I invited them to come out to the front, and started to explain to them that I would say a prayer, and wanted them to repeat it after me. Before I could finish doing that, some more kids came out. Then some more. And still more. In all, thirteen of them lined up. I was concerned that maybe some didn’t understand, and had just come for prayer, so I asked, “Are all of you here to accept Jesus as your Saviour for the first time?” All responded yes. So I led them in a simplified version of the “Sinner’s Prayer” and welcomed thirteen young souls into the Kingdom of God.

I am in awe of God’s goodness. There have been some major challenges on this trip so far, particularly here in Uganda, but to see precious souls brought out of the Kingdom of Darkness and into the amazing life that Jesus has bought for us is infinitely worth all of them.

Just for interest, this is the street that runs near Pastor David’s church.

My ministry here in Uganda is almost over for this trip. I have just one more meeting scheduled, tomorrow’s Sunday service at Pastor David’s church. So today is a very welcome rest day. This week has been relatively easy – I have only ministered three times – but the exhaustion is cumulative and my body is letting me know about it.

I normally get up at 5am for my morning prayer time, but because I have today off I decided I could sleep a bit longer. By 6am I felt I couldn’t stand being in bed any longer and so got up to start my day … or so I thought. Turned on the light … no light. Since It was still dark and my little torch gives only a tiny circle of light, not nearly enough to do anything by, there was no choice but to crawl back into bed and wait till either the power came back on or the day grew light enough for me to be able to see without power.

By about 7 it was light outside, and barely light in my room – light enough, at least, to dress. Not much later the power came back, and my day was able to begin.

It’s possible that the outage was the result of rain … it was bucketing through the night, and continued into the morning. One thing of note here in Africa is that it never “just rains”, it pours. Massively heavy downpours which start suddenly and stop just as suddenly. Several times on previous trips I have had to suspend or even end a meeting because the rain on the iron roof of the church building has been so heavy that it has drowned out all sound within the building, even with the use of microphones.

Last night was not a good one for sleeping, thanks to the dogs. I have already mentioned that dogs here are kept for only one purpose, guarding the property. Most dogs in Africa are generic: a kind of light tan colour, and looking much like our Australian dingoes. Mostly they are shut up during the day, and released only after the last person in the household has finished anything they need to do outside. There are always a few wandering around outside during the day, but I don’t know whether these are actually strays of just the result of some people being slack in locking their animals up for the day. Almost all households have several dogs, and because they are in close proximity they join with each other in a fury of barking should anyone or anything move where they don’t think they should. And like most dogs, they don’t see their territory as restricted to the area confined by the fences of their property. Someone must have been moving around last night, because all the neighbourhood dogs kept going off.

One of the good things about having a day off is that it is a day when I don’t have to haul myself up into a 4WD. Because my leg strength isn’t great, particularly on high steps, this process falls back to my right arm pulling me up using the hand-hold inside the cabin. Like the rest of me, my right arm is grateful for a rest.

Although some people here do drive ordinary cars, a 4WD is really essential to negotiate these roads. All the people who have been my drivers while I have been here have the most amazing driving skills. I watch them squeeze past each other on roads that are barely wide enough for one vehicle, let alone two, and I think, “How did they do that? The cars must be elastic!” And it all happens without any trace of angst or road rage.

As I write this I am waiting for breakfast, which usually happens around 10am, and is pretty much the same every day: two boiled eggs, a couple of bananas, maybe some chapatti, maybe some “Irish” potatoes (as opposed to sweet potatoes) which are cooked in a kind of tomato sauce. And hot milk/water for my coffee, which I bought because I can’t do without my morning fix.

My supper, which they insist on giving me even though I have tried to tell them that I don’t like to eat at night, is basically the same as breakfast, so most days I end up eating four boiled eggs and four bananas – I think I’m starting to look like a boiled egg and a banana. (Lunch is also much the same every day – rice, potatoes, a kind of green vegetable that is like spinach and is sometimes cooked with beetroot, and some kind of meat in a sort of soup to serve over the rice.)

Since the rest of the countries on this trip are French-speaking, I’m wondering how much French influence, if any, there will be on the food. I guess I’ll find out in a couple of days.

After the intensity of the time in Paidah, and the drama of the trip back to Kampala, I was very grateful to have a couple of days off on Monday and Tuesday. Apart from anything else “nanna naps” were definitely the order on both days.

On Monday morning I was able to tune in to our Board meeting back home. The eight hour time difference between here and Victoria meant that 8.30am here was 4.30pm back home, so that worked quite well. The WhatsApp connection was not good, it kept dropping out, but at least I was able to have some part in the meeting, as well as getting to see the girls.

I caught up with my prayer partner back home on Tuesday, later in the day. Again, the connection was not good, and I kept losing him (although he said he was able to hear me clearly) but just to be able to talk was an encouragement. Loneliness has become a major issue for me here, which I find rather surprising. I am not normally someone who suffers from loneliness – I’m a classic introvert: self-contained, enjoy my own company, not normally really fussed about having a lot of people around me. But here I feel isolated. I’ve already talked about the situation in the house where I am staying – I feel distinctly unwelcome, so spend most of my time in my room. Then there is the language problem – 95% or more of the conversations around me I don’t understand. There is nobody here with whom I can just sit and share my heart – and nobody with whom I can pray together. So every contact from home is super precious.

This morning I was also able to call Linda, my Associate Minister. I had of course spoken to her at the Board meeting, but there were a few non-KOGMI things that we wanted to catch up on. Another bad connection, but again just good to hear a familiar voice and see a familiar face.

On Monday I go to Burundi, and it and all the other countries I will be visiting on this trip are French speaking. It will be interesting to see how much of my 60-year old French from high school I can still remember – and whether being able to understand at least a tiny fraction of what is being said around me will make any difference to that sense of isolation.

Here in Kampala I was supposed to minister last night, then Friday and Sunday morning, before heading off to Burundi. Last night there was a break down in communication – I thought Ronald would be picking me up for the meeting, as he has been my driver the whole time I have been here, but when he had not arrived by 6pm I asked one of the young guys here if he had a contact for Ronald, so that I could find out what was happening. Instead he took me to the meeting himself, and when I arrived I discovered why Ronald hadn’t come – he was leading the worship. Whether David had forgotten about this, or whether it had been arranged for the other guy to take me but I hadn’t been told, I don’t know. The communication (or lack of it) is one of the major frustrations here.

During the course of the meeting last night Ronald announced that I would be speaking again tonight and tomorrow. Again, I don’t know whether this had been planned and I simply wasn’t told about the extra day, or whether Ronald misunderstood the plans. And I have no idea what is happening about getting me to the meeting tonight.

The good news is that one of the things that has been a concern for some weeks now has finally been resolved – I was able to use PayPal to seen our pastor in Ghana the money for my visa, and he has spoken to his contact in the Ghanan Immigration Department, and she assures him that my visa will be ready by the end of the month. That means there is only the Liberian visa left to deal with, and I am still trying to find out about how to get it.

Yesterday I woke up at 3am feeling as sick as a dog. I felt like I wanted to throw up, I had diarrhoea, cold sweats and shaking. Several doses of GastroStop eased my tummy a bit, but I still felt awful when Ronald came to take me to breakfast before this morning’s meeting. Putting food in my tummy when it felt like it did would have been an invitation for disaster, so I just asked him to get me a bottle of lemonade, and otherwise went without breakfast.

I felt so weak that I didn’t think I was going to be able to stand to preach, but fortunately it was a three-hour service, with two hours of praise and worship before I had to get up, most of which time I spent praying, “Holy Spirit, either You have to take over or I’m going to land flat on my face – both literally and metaphorically.” Well, of course the Lord always answers such prayers, and by the time my turn came I was fine, and ended up preaching over an hour. God is sooooo good!

At the end I prayed for this young lady in a wheelchair – from her appearance I would guess she has cerebral palsy. I would have loved to see her get out of the chair – I long for the day when that will be the norm.  That didn’t happen, but I believe she received a real touch from God. She had been crying out in the meeting, and after I prayed there was peace on her face.

After service we went for lunch. Even though I was feeling much better, I didn’t want to put God to the test by eating too much, so I just had a few spoonfuls of instant noodles and a little avocado (one of the great things here is that avos are plentiful.) Then we said our goodbyes and set off on the ten-hour drive back to Kampala.

The rough roads that had been a nightmare on our way to Paidah didn’t seem nearly as bad in daylight, and we were fairly soon back on sealed road. What we hadn’t realized on our way there was that part of our journey passed through a game park. Ronald’s sharp eyes caught site of an elephant some distance away, and there were a number of baboons along the roadside. This old girl came right up to the car hoping for a treat (and we would have given her one if we had any bananas) but by the time I took the phone out and turned it on she had decided that we were a lost cause, and moved some distance away.

A bit later in the journey we crossed the Katonga River – a magnificent, wide river with lots of rapids. My first thought was how awesome it would be to go white-water rafting on it. After we crossed the bridge, we pulled over to take a better look. Within minutes, two guys with automatic rifles were at the windows of the car, accusing us of taking photos (which is apparently forbidden, even though there is no sign to that effect.) My phone was turned off in my bag, I hadn’t even taken it out, and David and Ronald had not taken any photos, and offered to show them their phones so they could check. It was a pretty hairy few minutes before they were finally convinced and went away.

That was not the last of the drama. Some distance further on Ronald pulled the car over, saying it was overheating. We had been there with the hood up for barely minutes before a gaggle of young men had gathered around, offering “help” – and later extending their hands for payment. It turned out that a connection to the radiator had shaken loose on the rough roads, and it had boiled. So now it was top up the water and limp along to the first service station, stopping every so often to top up the water further. Finally they were able to get it patched up well enough to get us back to Kampala safely.

We arrived here around 12.30 – not as bad as our arrival in Paidah, but I was still very grateful to be having a day off today.

The best description I can think of for Paidah is “Africa meets the Wild Wild West.” The streets remind me of an old cowboy movie (see pic in the previous post) but there is a distinct African flavour to everything. Roads are in an appalling state of disrepair, rubbish litters the streets, and there is an air of neglect over everything. There is very little traffic, other than huge trucks and motor bikes, and people walk everywhere. Even when we arrived at 2 yesterday morning, there were people walking in the streets – in fact there were even people walking down the roads on the way here, in places where there were no apparent signs of habitation at all. Wattle-and-daub huts stand next to western buildings, goats straggle along the streets, children run everywhere. And remember what I said a few posts ago about Africa being noisy? Double it for Paidah!

At the hotel where we stayed Thursday night (well, actually Friday morning by the time we got there) my room was upstairs. There was not downstairs room available. I almost cried when I saw it. After ten hours in the car, when I got out my legs simply didn’t want to work. Walking on flat ground was challenge enough, without having to climb a flight of stairs. But one of my mottoes in life is “you do what has to be done” so with help from the two guys I somehow managed to get up there.

However, the guys had pity on me and decided that I should not have to tackle the stairs after a day of ministry, so when we went for breakfast they found another hotel for us. My room in this one has a squatty toilet, which I could have done without, but it is downstairs and otherwise comfortable – and it’s a bit away from the noise I endured the first night.

The church building here is a simple wattle-and-daub structure. (“Wattle and daub is a composite building method used for making walls and buildings, in which a woven lattice of wooden strips called “wattle” is “daubed” with a sticky material usually made of some combination of wet soil, clay, sand, animal dung and straw.” – Wikipedia) There were only maybe a dozen adults, plus the pastors and heaps of kids, at the meetings yesterday and today. I taught, rather than preached, on spiritual gifts yesterday and on the prophetic today. The response from those who were there was good.

The only musical instruments they have are drums, one of which is an old metal barrel, which was banged with great enthusiasm. It was actually surprising what a good musical accompaniment they made. Like all Africans, these people worship and praise with great energy – I feel tired just watching them.

The church here is actually an outreach from a church in D R Congo, and the pastor of the mother church is also here for these meetings, which is nice. Hopefully he might also decide to join the network.

The routine for the past couple of days has been pretty simple. Around 9.30 they pick me up and we go to the pastor’s home for breakfast. This morning this was chips and a tomato and onion salad, with the obligatory chapatis and bananas. Also a kind of chai, but served black and unsweetened (add sugar for yourself), unlike in Kenya where chai is normally served made with milk and already sweetened. This version is quite nice, although I don’t mind the Kenyan one either.

After breakfast I come back to the hotel to do some preparation before being picked up for lunch at around 1.30. Lunch today was the Ugandan version of ugali, rice, chapatis, a small meat dish, a bean dish, avocado and bananas. Straight after lunch we go to the first session, which was supposed to start at 2 but is just getting going at 3. After prayer and worship I minister for an hour, then there’s more praise and worship, then I minister for another hour before the closing worship. Since I’m not eating an evening meal, they bring me back to the hotel.

That will change tomorrow, as it is the Sunday service, which is supposed to start at 9, so I will be picked up for breakfast at 8. After the service we will have lunch and start on the way back to Kampala.

A couple of updates: First, my ATM question from Thursday. When I was finally able to get on line and check my account, everything was fine. The amount withdrawn corresponded to the amount I received from the machine. Much relief and a very loud “Thank You Lord”.

On my visa for Ghana it is mixed news. Our pastor there has contacted an immigration official, and yes they can organize a visa for me. The bad news is the cost is three times what it would have cost me if I could have got it from Australia before I left. Never mind. I am currently trying to find a way to send the money to him to begin the process. Can’t send from my bank account, because it’s a new recipient and they want two-factor authentication by sending a code to my Australian phone number – which I can’t access. Tried to send it from Western Union, funding it from my bank account – same problem. Tried again with my international debit card, it was refused in spite of having ample funds. Tried a third time using my credit card, it was refused, again in spite of ample funds. So the saga continues …

And for my visa for Liberia, our pastor there contacted someone and they told him that I need to contact the Australian Embassy in Ghana to arrange it. That doesn’t make any sense to me, but I have emailed them and asked if they could at least advise me. I’m awaiting their response.

Yesterday we travelled to Paidah, in the far north-west of Uganda, around 400kms from Kampala, on the border of the Democratic Republic of Congo. One of our newer affiliated pastors is located here, and I felt it was important to meet him, regardless of the distance involved.

We were supposed to leave at 9.30am. However, they had taken the car in for a service the day before, and it was not yet finished. “There’s just a little bit to finish. It won’t be long.”

So, because I was expecting that we would go any minute, and I didn’t want to begin something important and have to stop in the middle, I decided to while away the time playing games on my phone.

The morning passed playing games. No sign of the car.

Lunchtime came. I ate. Still no car. “It won’t be long now.” More games.

By four o’clock I was getting pretty cranky. I texted the pastor to suggest that we abandon the trip for the day, since even if we left then and there it would be well after midnight when we arrived, and that we go up today instead. “No, we have to go today. It won’t be long.”

Now I was really cranky and upset. I felt that he was showing absolutely zero concern for my welbeing, in that I would get very little sleep ahead of a full day of ministry. And when I was bundled into the car at 4.30, I told him so in no uncertain terms.

So my journey began angry and upset. Then it got worse. I needed to withdraw some cash at the ATM. I find the conversion to local currency confusing at the best of times, but was pretty sure I had worked out the amount I needed correctly. The ATM itself was difficult, with a non-responsive touch pad that had to be poked several times to get it to enter a figure, but I was sure I had entered the right amount. But when my money came out, it was a fraction of what I had asked for. I felt sick on the stomach. If this was the machine that had given me the wrong amount, I stood to lose around $700 – money I definitely could not afford to lose. Had I, after all, entered the amount incorrectly? I was sure I hadn’t. And I kept remembering the currency exchange in Kenya at the start of my journey that short-changed me by $200. There was no way I could check the current transaction till I could get online, so I spent the first part of the journey angry, upset, and feeling sick on the stomach at my possible loss.

As the trip progressed I was able to hand it all over to the Lord, repent of my reactions (and later apologize to the pastor) and trust God to work it all out one way or another.

For about half the distance we had good, fast roads. Then we turned off to come to Paidah, and things went downhill very rapidly. The roads from rough to goat tracks. Every time a car (or more likely truck) passed us, a cloud of dust totally obliterated the view. Add to that the habit of African drivers of not dipping their headlights when approaching other traffic, and our driver, Ronald, had his work cut out for him.

The laughable thing was that, even on these appalling roads, there were speedbumps. Really? I would have thought the road itself was all the speedbump that was needed.

As the night wore on, we passed through multiple small settlements, and with each one I wondered, “Is this it?” No, time and again it wasn’t.

Finally, at 2am, we saw a sign saying Paidah. The pastor and his wife had waited to meet us, and took us to the hotel. At 2.30 I finally got to my room, but that wasn’t the end of the day. A rowdy party (disco?) downstairs kept going through the night. I looked at the clock at 5, my normal getting-up time, and noted that they were still at it. After that I drifted to sleep out of utter exhaustion, and woke around 8.

Today I had two back-to-back 1-hour ministry sessions in the afternoon.

The pic is looking down the road from the hotel.

Sickness and Salvations

On Tuesday I was not feeling very well – tired, aching and an upset tummy (this latter was helped by several doses of GastroStop, but the sick feeling remained.) I would really have preferred to rest rather than minister, but I felt it was important to go ahead with the meeting, even though I advised the pastor that I might not be able to speak for the full hour. I did end up speaking for the full hour, but by the time I finished I was ready to collapse.

Yesterday I woke up feeling somewhat better, but still not on top of the world. As the day wore on, however, I was feeling worse and worse, till by the time came for me to minister I felt every bit as bad as I had the night before. The only thing that carried me through the session was the anointing.

Then, when I gave an altar call, a young woman came forward to receive the Lord. I am in awe that God can work in spite of what I personally might be feeling or going through.

Actually what is happening with people getting saved amazes me. I am not an evangelist, and I don’t preach an evangelistic message – in fact I regard most of the evangelistic messages I have heard over the years as froth and bubble. What I preach is a solid, often heavy, message to the saints, yet people are responding to it.

Over the years I have very rarely given a salvation call, simply because I am normally ministering in church or conference settings, where I have assumed everyone is a Christian.

But now the Lord has made it clear to me that I must not do that – evidence: nine salvations over the past month, all in Christian gatherings.

This has led me to thinking about the number of “fish” that I might have missed over the years, just because I have failed to throw out a net! I have had to do some heavy-duty repenting!

I am still not an evangelist, and I will continue to preach solid, and at times heavy, messages aimed at the saints, but from now on a salvation call will always be part of my ministry.

Incredibly, today marks the half-way point on this adventure. On one hand, the time has gone amazingly fast; but in another way it feels like I have been in Africa forever.

Of the fourteen countries planned for on my original itinerary, three have been dropped – two of them, sadly, because our only pastor in those countries has died, and one because our only pastor in that country is too busy with other things and not able to host me.

So far I have been to six of the eleven countries left on my itinerary, and twice to Kenya. I have ministered 72 times, in 21 different churches, including five conferences for pastors and leaders, and two youth conferences. Eleven people have found Jesus as their Lord and Saviour – and whilst an evangelist might not be excited with that number, I am thrilled with it.

Praying for a new Christian

I have been on 11 different flights, and three very long bus trips, as well as multiple long trips by car, in some instances over some of the worst roads in the universe.

Some of the biggest challenges have been mosquitoes (in spite of Deet and my mozzie-zapper bracelet, I look like a pin cushion), and cockroaches (having to chase cockies out of my suitcase was definitely not on my wish list of things I wanted to do in Africa. The only solution has been to keep the cases closed when I am not actually putting stuff in or taking stuff out.) And of course African Time, which I have already talked about elsewhere.

Physically, I have had to contend with muscle cramps (which mercifully passed after the first couple of weeks) and the infection in my leg (now fully cleared, praise God) as well as a small dose of “international belly” and the general tiredness that results from a very busy schedule.

There are also the ongoing challenges of visas, communication from home, and communication with the people here.

All that might sound like I am trying to deter my readers from considering missionary service, but I’m not – I’m just being realistic. Sometime people have a very false view of missions as being glamorous, and all about “cuddling babies.” It isn’t. What it is, is an amazing privilege the joy of which far outweighs all the challenges. I think I have said before, I know without a doubt that I am exactly where God wants me to be, doing exactly what He wants me to do – and that is more than worth all the challenges that this beautiful continent can throw at me.

Yesterday I ministered at the church here in Kampala. Before I left Australia for this trip, the Lord told  me that while I am here in Africa He is going to begin healing people as I minister, without me praying for them. Because of this I felt to do something in the service yesterday that I have never done before – at the beginning of the service I asked all those who need healing, whether physical or mental/emotional, to stand in their places (almost the whole congregation stood.)

I told them, “I am not going to pray for you for healing. Rather, I am going to ask the Holy Spirit to release to you a gift of faith, so that you can take hold of your healing for yourselves.”

After I prayed, I told them to be conscious of any changes in their condition during the service, or anything that they couldn’t do before but could do now. I went on and preached about healing from the aspect that our bodies are not designed for sickness, and that healing is simply restoration to God’s original design.

I haven’t (yet) had any testimonies of healing, but as is now becoming my habit I gave an altar call for salvation, and one girl responded. Another girl, who I learned this morning is her sister, was so excited she was jumping up and down all over the place. Apparently she has been witnessing to her sister for a long time, without response, so she was totally thrilled to see a breakthrough.

I am likewise thrilled to see this development in my ministry, with salvations becoming the norm rather than something that only happens once in a blue moon. Praise You, Lord!

Something I am not so thrilled about is the visa process for Ghana. Because the visa is only valid for 90 days from the date of issue, I could not get it before I  left Australia, as it would have already have run out by now. There is no option of a online application (why? These days setting up an online form with a payment option attached is such a simple process that a kindergarten child could do it.) An online search revealed that there is a Ghana Consulate here in Kampala. OK, I thought, I’ll just get all the stuff together and apply there. I downloaded the application form and filled it in, and made arrangements to go and get new photos taken and forms printed before going to the Consulate.

But no, this was not going to happen. It occurred to me that maybe I should make an appointment rather than just bowling up to the Consulate. An online search for a correct phone number turned up a page where I was actually able to chat with someone. Normally I hate using these chatbots, but in this case it offered the possibility of some immediate answers, so I asked my question.

No, the chatbot told me, since I am not a legal resident of Uganda I can’t apply from here. I would have to reply from my country of residence.

I told him I can’t do that, as I will be going on to Burundi, DR Congo, and Benin before going to Ghana. I can’t send my passport back to Australia to get the visa, as I need it for entry to those other countries. (What I didn’t say is that there is no way I would trust the postal system to safely get my passport from Uganda to Australia and back again, even if I were not going on anywhere else.)

The next piece of advice was to contact Ghana Immigration about a visa on arrival. So that’s where I am at. I’ve sent off an email to them, and am praying that they will receive it and respond positively. I’ve also forwarded it to our pastor in Ghana and asked him to intervene on my behalf.

If you are reading this close to the time of writing, please pray for a good outcome.

I still have to find out about the visa for Liberia …