“As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.” (James 2:17 NIV) “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith-and this is not from yourselves, it is a gift of God-not by works, so that no one can boast.” (Ephesians 2:8-9 NIV) We are saved by grace but…… we are to be engaged in Kingdom work. These two Scriptures are often the source of Christian contention. But they work in harmony with each other and you cannot have one without the other.

 Our works over here in Uganda don’t make us any better than others doing works in America. Coming off the first real respite we have had since coming here 2.5 years ago, we came back hitting the ground running. We are realizing how important self care is and we also have discovered how lousy we are at it.

We can get so wrapped up in what we are doing that we forget to rest and allow the Lord to refresh us. Yes, we are all called to do the Lord’s work and there is that cost of discipleship that Jesus tells us about along with that Great Commission.

There is also that grace we are saved by. I love that! We don’t have to focus on our works as a means to win God’s approval and be MORE saved than someone else. Grace takes care of that. This makes it a lot easier to serve the Lord. He is our boss and He employs us. His Spirit lives in us and guides us.

All we have to do is answer the call and partake in the amazing life He offers us.

Living here is in many ways much harder than living in America but the blessings we have received far outweigh any discomforts we experience. The noise, dirt, inconveniences, dangers, difficulty in trusting & constant challenges on the ministry home front make what is called life; just life in a 3rd world country.

We get those respite moments as well.

We were able to go out for a short tour on a boat to see the Source Of The Nile where Lake Victoria ends and the Nile river starts. I was amazed at how peaceful it was and it struck me that we just don’t do this as much as we should. We lose our effectiveness. We enjoyed having that brief 4 days to just not have anything to do.

We live in a beautiful country which we have yet to explore. We are seeing so many good things happen here. The first 2 and a half years has been spent getting established and getting a good hold on what we are doing. We are excited to see what the Lord will do in the future!

We want to thank all of our financial partners for making it possible for us to serve here and those of you who pray for us. We could not do this without each and every one of you! If you would like to partner with us, please go to our giving page to do so! You can also find it through the Donate & Links page above.