faithhudson

It’s Thursday night, and God willing, 25 hours from now I will be on a plan to Amsterdam! With the current COVID protocols, we need a negative test one day before takeoff. We will leave Gulu town around 10 am (after our final session) and hit the road for what we hope is only a seven-hour ride to the test site and a negative test. I don’t have to teach tomorrow; I’m studying for my COVID exam. Carol has been very accommodating, having picked up the virus while I was gone and hopefully happy (and healthy!) to receive me later Saturday evening. Timing is everything. As always, I check the county COVID stats and see the significant spike that is occurring. 

If I don’t get a negative result, I will be having an extended stay in Uganda. I love the country and its people, but I am always ready to come home. Having Carol to come home to makes it very, very easy. 

Today was an important day. We finished our first-time formal evaluations of the Lead Trainers (LTs) that we have been working with. They are the leaders who will carry forward, God willing, the vision of an abiding network of Gospel Centered, Bible Saturated, African Lead churches. They are critical in the African lead part of the equation. We met with each of them over the last two days. We gave them feedback (after asking theirs first) on four areas inside the classroom:

• Classroom management
• Grasp of curriculum
• Delivery of content
• Theological accuracy

This is the area we were most involved in.

We also discussed two facets of their development outside the classroom:

• Communication (with the broader team and their trainees)
• Commitment (how are the sizing up to the promises we made each other)

While all six of our LTs are not ready for prime time, there is still confidence that the building blocks are in place for a January 23 launch of the next cohort with nobody from the US traveling over to teach. Exciting, biblical stuff!

The hospitality here at Abaanah’s Hope remains incredible in this home away from home. I had fun introducing Kris and his family to two new games that became part of our pandemic life: Just One and The Game. Both are cooperative in nature and kids eleven and over were effective participants. I (all of us who have traveled over) have come to love the Mobb’s family and it will be a bittersweet day in May when we say goodbye to them and cohort one of the Living Stones Pastoral Training Center.

Larry Szyman

Pastor for Missional Life

Our first two days of lessons have gone well. I think Monday is the best day of teaching I’ve had so far in my trips out here. I had good energy, used the classroom time well, the pastors seemed to grasp the content and I had a good sense of being connected with them. I have worked with this learning group of thirteen for five trips, so we are becoming old friends. 

Tuesday was a different story. Certainly not a nightmare, everything was more laborious. Part of it is probably due to jet lag and two miserable night’s sleep in a row. The trainees sleep in dorm style settings and they seemed to be dragging a bit as well. So far, we have worked through an introduction to the prophets and given them tools to help them more accurately understand and communicate prophetic writings. We are focusing on passages in Isaiah, but the tools are transferable and should result in being able to help the interpretation process of any prophet. It is amazing how much of Isaiah is found in the gospels, demonstrating a remarkable cohesion between multiple authors over hundreds of years. Teaching these courses are good for my heart and reinforce the divine nature of Scripture.

One of the two Lead Trainers that are assigned to me and my group, Pastor Sunday taught his first lesson in this course today and did a real solid job. He is demonstrating capacities to help continue the trainings at this Pastor Training Center once this cohort is completed and another one begins (Jan 2023). He is a natural leader, well prepared and has the respect of his fellow Ugandans. The future looks good with him and the others we are prepping to ensure this becomes an African lead adventure. 

One of the side joys of these trips is getting to know the families who live here year-round. The Mobbs’s and the Corbin’s have established themselves as serious players in kingdom advancing work in this area of Africa. They are hardworking and given to the task before them-it’s amazing to watch them navigate the cultures around them as they lead a church, a school, a clinic along with vocational training for women, both domestic and on the farm. We have dinner with them once every time we come over. I brought the game “Just One” that Carol and I have been playing as of late. They really liked it, so I gave them the game and will pick up another one when I return.

Today’s 106 degrees should be our last over 100 for the week. One interesting note: our leaves fall when it starts to get cold. The leaves here fall during the dry and hot season. During this time of year, all the local animals are free range, meaning they can go anywhere to eat. This is a favorite place for animals, since the care that are shown the facilities here is really good. Kris Mobbs tells the story that the first year after they built their church building with the sides open. They had to create a fence of sort on the side as they got tired of cleaning up all the dung from the church floor. That’s one area Josh and Donna don’t have to contend with at FCC! 

We only have three more nights crashing here, and one on the plane (I don’t mean the plan crashing!). These trips are both a delight and a grind. A good night’s sleep should help put a little more life in me. The most interesting time in our trip should be Friday, when we must do same day COVID testing, and hopefully not have to stay put and quarantine.

Larry Szyman

Pastor for Missional Life

According to my weather app, there was only a 102-degree difference in our high temperatures in Hudson and Gulu today. Without A/C, things can get a little sticky. So, wherever we go in the guest house (where we are staying) we are each carrying a personal fan and plug it in before we sit down.

Saturday was a mixed bag. It is one of the most crucial days for the week as we meet with our six lead trainers and prep them for the teaching ahead of us. I was responsible for prepping three of them for two lessons (numbers 8 & 9 of ten) they will each deliver. We asked them to come with a decent knowledge of their material, which they did. As I sought to move them through the material, it was obvious that the material was not landing on them. I’m sure it was twice as frustrating for my Ugandan friends than for me. We slogged our way through the day, and as I debriefed with Josh, Stu (my American co-leaders) and Kris Mobbs, our host, we realized that we had failed in a key matter. Because the materials build on one another, they should have become acquainted with all the lessons that preceded lesson eight. The material hung together for me, as I have been through all the curriculum twice in prepping for this week. I went away from the day a bit down, having not equipped them for the task. A key part of our mission is to train these men who will be leading the next cohort: an abiding network of African lead churches. 

The good news is these guys don’t teach till Thursday, so they have plenty of time to prep for their lessons and they will sit through lessons 1-7 before they teach. My hope is that this will provide some “back fill” in order to prep them for their turn. You can be confident I will be checking in with them between now and Thursday.

This morning we attended “Living Stones Church”, the fellowship associated with the Pastoral Training Center we are serving here in Gulu. They are doing a solid job and we saw five people baptized in their service. The service was only an hour and a half. We spent the afternoon/eve studying for our lessons for tomorrow. An afternoon nap was a welcome gift as I try to shake jet lag.

One small scare today…we woke up with no power. With 100+ degree days in the forecast, I got a little nervous. It turns out we have (and tested!) a generator and are good to go. As I carry my fan around the house, it would be nice to have power!

Larry Szyman

Pastor for Missional Life

The rest of our trip from Amsterdam was fairly uneventful. Josh, Stu and I all got a bit of sleep on our last eight-hour flight and arrival in Entebbe, Uganda. On my last trip, my time at the Entebbe was challenging. It was their first day of new protocols which included getting tested for COVID and waiting nearly two hours before moving on. Testing was still required, but once we took our test and cleared customs, we were free to move on with the test results to be emailed to us. If we tested positive, we had to follow quarantine guidelines on our own. Stu got his results Thursday am. Josh got his on Friday am. As of now, I am still waiting on mine. Every time I cough more than once in a ½ hour time span, I wonder if I got the virus. It’s not worrisome, it just crosses my mind and I do some calculations about how that would impact my week and my return home. We probably made it out of the airport and to our sleeping accommodations in Entebbe in about 20% of the time it took me the trip in November. I got into my bed about 12:30 am and sought to sleep until our 6 am breakfast the next day. I didn’t mind the early call as I only slept from 2:30-5:00.  Our driver wanted to get on the road to avoid the morning rush hour. We ate our breakfast on a second-floor patio with fragrant flowers giving us a welcome early morning greeting. 

We hit the road early Thursday and found out it would be a warm one, as the expected high was in the mid 90’s and the AC in the vehicle was not operating. One stop included pork cooked over a charcoal fire on a stick (a favorite of our driver Stephen). Being the dry season, this meant that at about the five-hour mark, we saw about 40 baboons (I think-they were monkey like). They tend to congregate by the road along the Nile looking for handouts. They’re always fun to watch. We all had a nice case of the sweaty backs when we arrived at Abaanah’s hope, 40 minutes north of Gulu, a seven-hour affair including pit stops. We spent the rest of the day getting settled in and doing a little bit of study as Saturday is one of the most crucial days of our time here.

Friday we up on rest. I was in bed from 10-12 and 2-6, which is a nice sleep as the body is adjusting to time change and new surroundings. We spent a fair amount of the day studying, making sure we have a handle on the curriculum. We managed to play some basketball in the afternoon and we were all grateful for the cloud cover. The leaders at Abaanah’s hope to play more basketball next week. I hope we can avoid the day with 107 degree forecast. 

This trip we are focusing on how to understand and communicate prophetic books, working through various passages in Isaiah. I always feel a bit anxious if I can do well enough, but the feedback I have received would say don’t worry. I believe there is a lot at stake. Our goal is an abiding network of gospel centered, Bible saturated, African lead churches. We hope to see churches strengthened and started. 80% of the pastors in Africa have no formal training. If we can up the quality of their handling of Scripture, we can create a healthier church culture in Northern Uganda and the eight different people groups that make up this cohort. Please pray that we serve them well. 

Tomorrow (Saturday) things get serious as we meet with the six Lead Trainers who share the teaching load with us. I will spend the day with three of them, making sure they are adequately prepped for their teaching time. I will go through their lessons with them, give some suggested approaches and answer questions they have. These six are key in the African lead portion of our vision. That is because in January of 2023 they will start another cohort with all African teachers! This means the work will continue (God willing) for years after we finish this May, and they will continue to see the health of the church in Northern Uganda increase.

I went to bed at ten and woke up at 11 and decided to give this update. The picture was taken during our Thursday drive across country.

Larry Szyman

Pastor for Missional Life

Thankfully, our getting off the ground at MSP was not all that difficult, although the paperwork was fairly extensive, including:

• Passport
• Negative COVID test. We took the test a 9 am for our 1 pm departure from MSP. Thankfully they came back negative (and only $200!).
• E-Visa to Uganda (for those who remember my last trip, we made sure we had this before getting to the airport.
• A pre-registration for a COVID test to be taken upon arrival in Uganda. 

We had an incredible agent named Montreal who helped us get checked in and made sure we had all our ducks in a row before heading through security.

The team for this trip includes Josh Montague, who serves with Training Leaders International (TLI), Stu Dix, interim pastor at FCC New Richmond (and veteran Uganda traveler) and myself. The three of us were together once before in Uganda and Stu and I tortured Josh by singing every chorus over twenty years old that we could think of (turns out we remembered a lot). 

For the last five trips we have been working on understanding and communicating different genres of Scripture. This trip we are looking at prophetic writings focusing on Isaiah. I look forward to growing with the friends we have developed over the last few years. One thing I am not looking forward to is the weather. The forecast high for next Wednesday is 107! Escaping the “dry heat” will not be easy as we won’t have access to air conditioning. Could be the beginning of a weight loss program for me! Stay tuned…

Larry Szyman

Pastor for Missional Life