God is at work in Labacoy!

Getting ready to set out for our trek to the village

Separating seeds from the watermelon

Cooking sorghum porridge

Labacoy's family

The shelter where we spent many hours sitting and visiting with the people

Children of the village

God is at work in Labacoy!

Written March 1, 2013 at Lotem, Uganda Bush Training

Today we were able to bring Simon Teko, one of our Karamajong nationals going through training with us and our main translator, with us to the village.  Selvin has had bad back pain but is not letting that hold him back from going!  It was so cool to be able to understand more of what was happening around us with a translator.  Very quickly after we arrived the women wanted me to go back to one of their kitchens (outdoor charcoal fire) to cook.  We made delicious Pumpkin Greens and boiled sorghum porridge.  These greens are my favorite!  As we were still eating this they brought out a gourd of boiled maize.  Abby had been enjoying the other food (complete with metal spoons which we don’t even have back at camp-amazing) but as soon as she saw the corn she exclaimed “Oh!” with a big smile on her face, dropped everything and got a big handful of the maize.  As she munched on it happily, the villagers were rolling in amusement.  

Labacoy’s brother Isaiah came back again today.  SImon translated that all the children, women, and men Labacoy had gathered under the shelter wanted to learn the Christian Karamajong songs and they wanted to pray.  He said that any time we came to his village, all of these people (20+ and mainly his family members) were “our people” and would listen and learn from us.  Labacoy is so good at gathering everyone together for “classes” as he called them today.  We learned through Simon that Labacoy is not a Christian.  But from everything we’ve seen so far he is hungry and wanting to learn!  Thank You Jesus!  Please continue to grant us favor and wisdom on our future visits.  May we always remember the importance of us relying on prayer and Your Spirit.  

Later during our visit, the women wanted me to go with them to get the porridge.  It was already made but I got to sit with some of the women inside their manyata and help sort spinach.  As we brought out the porridge, we were able to have Simon translate our thankfulness for Labacoy’s hospitality.  Simon shared the story of Joseph being thrown into the pit.  Most of the people seemed really interested.  We are praying the story was received well!  

When we left the women and a couple of men wanted to walk us back.  They were all eager to know when we would come back next.  We told them as soon as possible at the end of this week or next.  Thank You Jesus!