While I was in Uganda this summer I felt unable to
blog. Whenever I sat down to
write something, forced, stale sentences were all I could get out. Often, no words would come at all. I had a slight fear that I wasn’t
growing or being changed because I couldn’t find words to express what was
happening in me and around me.
As I
sat on a plane back to Boston, the sentences and words I had been looking for
all summer began to speed through my mind, including the following verse, 1
Corinthians 13:13: “And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the
greatest of these is love.� This verse serves as an inspiration and link between my next few
blogs. They won’t be as long as my
blogs normally are, but they will reflect a little bit of what God was doing in
Uganda this summer.
HOPE
On one of our first days of ministry in Uganda the team
based in Lira was able to help out at an HIV/AIDS Club meeting- a time of
fellowship and encouragement for those in the community affected by HIV/AIDS.
After a few people shared some stories of their week and what God had done, an
older woman came to the front of the room. She began to tell us about her week:
she felt really sick and weak, and therefore she couldn’t work. Because she
couldn’t work, she didn’t have enough money to buy food and feed her family.
She paused and then said “but my strength comes my hope in Jesus
Christ!” She smiled a huge, genuine smile and began to shout praises of
joy to God. I sat in the back, in shock. This woman who had nothing, who was
dying and unable to care for her family, was filled with HOPE because of
Jesus Christ. I didn’t know the kind of hope this woman had. I knew Jesus, I loved
Him, but was my hope in Him? And
was that hope the source of my joy and my strength? This is what God revealed
to me while in Uganda this summer- what it means to have my hope in Him. That
no matter the situation, no matter the suffering, Jesus Christ is Lord and
therefore I have hope. Hope that God is in control, that He loves His children,
and that there is more to His Kingdom then my life here on earth. I still can’t fully put into words what
my heart is feeling but something shifted that day at the HIV/AIDS Club for
me. My idea of hope and what it
was, no longer satisfied me. I
wanted more. I want more.
