When we first arrived in Uganda, we had a time of debrief for our whole squad (the entire group of 24) to come together and talk about what the Lord has been doing in and through each of our teams! We were blessed to stay in a hostel on the Nile River, and I woke up every day to stunning views and lots of monkeys!
It was during this time of debrief that I was asked by leadership to step into the position of squad leader. For the past three months, I had been serving as team leader for our group of six, which entailed responsibilities such as communicating with our hosts and ensuring we had adequate team time, etc. The role that I have now stepped into, as squad leader, is a bit different. My two co-leaders and I travel from team to team to check in with everybody and do whatever we can to help the health of the team! My life on the race looks quite different now as I continue to serve locals in the communities where we are positioned but place my primary ministry focus on the squad. I will no longer remain with the same group of people for months at a time, and sometimes I may not stay with the same ministry for a whole month.
(^my new team!)
Ministry in Uganda was my first experience with this new role. After debrief, my co-leaders and I had a training process, and then we set off to different teams to do our job! It was a month with a lot of variety, and I was never in one place for too long. I started off in Jinja, Uganda, living at a church while working with at-risk kids. From there, I traveled to Kampala, Uganda to spend Christmas with my fellow squad leaders and one of the teams; while there, I made lots of Christmas cookies and helped put on several Christmas celebrations for children in the community. From there, I traveled to another team in Kyampisi, Uganda to partner with an organization that is fighting the existence of child sacrifice. This is a time that really affected my heart, and it is something that I want to share with all of you.
Child sacrifice is a horrific practice still affecting the world today. It is especially prominent in the region of Mukono, which is where God led us. Child sacrifice entails witch doctors kidnapping vulnerable children to cut off specific body parts, drain blood, or even murder them as a “remedy” for some illness or problem. The organization we partnered with is called Kyampisi Childcare Ministries (more on this can be found at their website: http://kyampisi.org) and is run by an amazing, God-led man named Peter Sewakiryanga, who has quite the story to tell. While there, we were able to sit in on meetings about child protection policies and KCM’s fight to make the world a safer place. With every day spent in Kyampisi, my heart was broken a little bit more. What affected me most of all was the time we spent with survivors of child sacrifice, as well as other traumatized children.
Here are a few stories of the people I met on the day after Christmas:
This is Hope. She was kidnapped by two witch doctors at 1.5 years old. They tied her up and continuously drained her blood for an entire year. When they realized they couldn’t get anything else out of her, they put her in a sack and left her for dead in a swamp. But God guided footsteps that led to her being found and saved. The smile on her face in this picture is a constant one, the laughter and joy unlike anything I’ve ever experienced. I’ve never met a more aptly named individual.
This is Shafique. His brother was murdered by his father to serve as a child sacrifice and now Shafique’s mother is too traumatized to care for him so he lives at the rehabilitation center.
This is Promise, a victim of chronic sexual abuse. One day, I sat in a small room with her for hours as we watched cartoons, her hand tightly squeezing my own the whole time. I prayed over her as she switched back and forth between a stoic gaze at the television and a smiling one at me, and I was struck by the beauty in the simplicity of that sweet time.
The other stories were equally as heartbreaking. There was a boy who ran away from home after watching his father shoot his mother; when he was eventually passed on to the rehabilitation center, he didn’t speak. Another boy can no longer walk because his neck was cut with a machete. Still another was found abandoned in a rubbish pit at five months old.
One day, we hiked up a mountain to pray. As I literally stood on the ground where vulnerable children had been abused in such heinous ways, I was overcome by emotion. It was hard for me to reconcile what I know about our good Father and my new knowledge about something so horrendous. But then I thought of all that he has done in even this situation. I thought of my broken heart and what that must mean about his own heart, and I thought of how he made a way. I thought of Peter, who was protected as he went undercover to approach a witch doctor since the government refused make an arrest based on the child victim’s testimony – Peter, who single-handedly rescued six girls trapped in sex trafficking in a foreign country despite the risk to his own wellbeing. I think of the woman who happened to find Hope in a swamp, moments from death. I think of the good fight that this organization is fighting. I think of a simple day holding hands and watching afternoon cartoons, and I think of what my good Father designed my life to be lived for.
Thank you for reading; stay tuned for updates about Kenya as well as Thailand, where I am currently serving in month eight of the race!
*I received permission to share all names, photos, and stories.
