Getting used to cultural differences and once again trying to feel at home in our new country has been difficult. Our first day, we were asked to stay up until midnight to eat supper even though we weren’t hungry and simply wanted to sleep. It’s been tough working out our ministry plan to stay within our budget, and we feel like our contact is often very controlling. I want to just rest alone at night, but many of the Ugandan people that are part of our brand-new three-week ministry team want to hang out until we go to bed. Our schedule is tightly dictated, and it seems like a huge hassle to get permission even to go running. And when we do, our contact feels for our safety that he needs to come with us, frustrating me because I just want to run much faster and farther than he is willing. I think I really want the independence that I’m used to. And it’s tempting to get frustrated, angry, and rebel.
And yet I’m learning this year that our love for one another in the body of Christ is just as important as our love for those we’re sharing Jesus to. I think God’s giving our team this challenge to minister to the preachers and evangelists we are working with just as much to the people of Bugiri, Uganda. I’ve been reading the Ragamuffin Gospel lately and in it Brennan Manning says,
“Quite simply, our deep gratitude to Jesus Christ is manifested neither in being chaste, honest, sober, and respectable, nor in churchgoing, Bible-toting, and Psalm-singing, but in our deep and delicate respect for one another. Even Sunday worship is subordinated to reconciliation with others.
‘If you are bringing your offering to the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your offering there before the altar, go and be reconciled with your brother first, and then come back and present your offering.’ (Matthew 5:23-24)”
Already, this month is teaching me the hard transformation of loving my brother by laying down my rights to independence, being right, and wanting things “my way”.
