I have been with a team in Hoima, Uganda, and like much of my time ministry in Africa, I had spent the previous days doing door to door evangelism in small villages and spending time with the community at an evening open-air crusade. The ministry is intense and very exhausting in Africa. The days can often be very long and draining. It’s a culture that’s fascinated with mzungus (white people), and wherever you are, a crowd will be there also. The last night of ministry in Hoima was very unique. We had just finished going door to door and had some great conversations about Christ and led a few children to the Lord. The night was going to be a busy one so I took some time before dinner to just relax outside. There was a huge thunderstorm rolling in, and I sat down on a mat next to a few children to watch it. The kids here are so amazing. They don’t know any English, and they quickly learn that I don’t know much of their language so they usually end up just sitting there and staring. Today wasn’t any different. I was having fun teaching the kids new handshakes and more and more started to come up and take turns staring at me. Pretty soon one of the adults came over and asked me to pray for her. 
After I opened my eyes, there was another person there. And then another. And then another with her children. It was so much fun to pray and pray and pray for person after person for healing or simply that the Lord would continue to provide for them. It was one of those unexpected moments in ministry that turns out to be so memorable.
The following day was Sunday and is the one that I was talking about being one of the tough ones that come around from time to time. We were up at 6 AM to be ready for the first of three church services in which we were going to be singing and preaching. The first service started at 7 AM, and the last one ended around 1:30 PM. They were good, but after the intensity of the previous days, we were exhausted. We were relieved to hear that our ministry contact was giving us the rest of the afternoon off before making the two hour trip back into the city the next morning. I sat down to watch Die Hard 4 on the computer with the other two guys on the team (great movie, by the way). This is the point where the day went south quickly. Just as the movie ended, our ministry contact rushed in and said that we had to leave immediately to catch a ride in a van back to Hoima. In an instant, we went from “relaxing/enjoying the day off” mode to “throw all of your stuff in the pack and pay your bill before you miss your ride” mode. Chaos.
We made it to the van and did the usual African routine of trying to pack in twice as many people as the capacity would allow. I was sitting in the front seat in the middle and getting more and more frustrated about being so hot because I was sitting on the seat directly above the engine and had my backpack sitting on me while also having to move my leg every time the driver needed to shift gears. I was so tired but quickly rea
lized there wasn’t going to any sleeping on this two hour journey…or at least we thought it would take two hours. Apparently a lot can happen in a short trip. This particular trip included getting stuck for a half hour in the muddy road because of the rain. Shortly after that, the other van ran out of gas to cause the second major delay. Finally, to complete the trip, our van got a flat tire about a mile from our destination. Our team was so tired and frustrated at this point that we were perfectly fine with leaving the van behind and walking the last mile to the church. It was late, and we didn’t have a place to sleep yet and were hoping that we would be taken straight to our beds. Not the case. There was a welcoming party with singing and hugs and a meal waiting for us at the church. Let me take a moment to say that I genuinely appreciate and love the African hospitality. It was just a rough time for the team to be the center of attention. Things didn’t get much better. I found out that I lost a pair of shorts that fell out of my bag because I didn’t have time to pack properly in the frantic departure and even shot a bottle cap off my face because I used a bench in the church to try to open it since a bottle opener was nowhere to be found. By the time we got all of our bags moved to the rooms, the level of exhaustion for the whole team had reached its peak. I can remember just sitting on my bed underneath my mosquito net staring at the ground for a number of minutes being too tired to unpack anything from my bags. Krissy, my fellow squad leader, glanced in as she walked by, and we both took a second to make sure the other was ok.
Looking back, now that I’ve caught up on rest and my spirit is restored, I can smile when I think about the day. It was just one of those days that happens no matter where you are in the world in which you expect one thing (rest, in this case) and then the opposite happens. That’s it. If there’s a deep lesson to be learned there, I don’t have it yet. The Lord is still good. He’s still doing incredible things. He can still be honored when the days are hard. I just wanted to give you a complete picture of the great days and the harder days through this blog so you can better understand the experience of The World Race!!
