HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY, UGANDA!


It began weeks ago.  The anticipation of who would win the shoes was high, and so everyone began inviting and inviting.  Our focus for this Independence Day service was first-time visitors.  Ugandans are full of promises, and we hear people promise us every week that they will come.  However, with a Friday service not being a regular church-day service, we were hoping for a great turnout.  Although we didn't get an official final count, we estimated that we ended up with about 90-100 first-time visitors!  WOW!  Both the man and the woman who brought the most visitors were promised a pair of new shows from our local shoe store.  All our people did great, but the man who brought the most?  It was Paul Sserunjogi - the lame man in our church who doesn't even wear shoes!

Paul Sserunjogi
Of course, we will be sure to substitute something equally of value, but wow - how convicting to those of us who do wear shoes and have the ability to walk around to invite people!

Pastor Bernard preaching on freedom
We enjoyed trivia questions with flags and keychains for the prizes, and then our guest speaker was Pastor Bernard from Kitende Baptist Church.

The five finalists for the most patriotic-dressed contest
The most patriotic dressed contests is always great to see, and Sarah Najjuko won for the second year in a row.

Sarah Najjuko and her new umbrella
We had brought 302 Ugandan pencils and gave one out to each person who attended.  However, about 30 people didn't get one - not even counting the three missionary families.  God truly blessed us with a great day.  

We even set up benches outside to handle the overflow.  A great crowd!
In preparing for Independence Day, I started searching months ago for something yellow for the girls and I.  I came up empty, but another missionary was able to bring shirts back from the States for Shae-Lynn and Savannah, and she had a very difficult time just finding them.  I ended up just adding yellow ribbon to my outfit, but I'm wondering why yellow is such a difficult color to find?

Shae-Lynn, myself, and other missionaries
Maybe we should all just wear the football jerseys like the boys.  (I didn't realize until today that Skyler is the only one without a jersey; poor guy!)

Shiloh and Stanley are on the ends with their missionary friends in between
We had a great day, but most of all we hope that the people realize what a precious gift of freedom they have in their country and most of all the freedom they can have in Christ.

Isn't Alvin too cute?

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