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(I wrote this blog on Friday but haven't been able to post it until now. After 40 hours of air travel, we finally arrived in Atlanta, and I am headed to Calgary tomorrow! Enjoy this last blog, and thanks again for your support! See you so soon!!) I can't believe this trip is actually coming to an end, and that I'll be back in Calgary in just a few days. I say 'trip', but after living somewhere for over 3 months, it starts to become your home, your normal, your usual life, and leaving the place also means leaving people and things that have become comfortable and loved behind. Things I will miss about Uganda: Seth, the 19 year old Ugandan boy who lives with us to take care of the house and help us where needed, but who has become part of this family of me and the 14 …

As the trip has come to an end there are so many things I have truly loved and will miss terribly that I never thought I would. I never thought I would be physically exhausted and sweating after worship at church from so much singing and dancing. I never thought I would find myself leading worship in front of the entire Makobore student body. I never thought I would look forward to drinking porridge and eating posho and beans with Ugandan teenage boys every day. I never thought I would make friends with a man named Pius that works at a gas station in town and look forward to seeing him every morning and evening when we walk to and from school. I never expected that an all boy’s high school would become my home and I would leave with 200 brothers in Christ. I never expected to fall…

As I prepare to go home, I am bracing myself for the countless times I will be asked "How was Africa?" by people who expect a short 1 or 2 minute response summarizing the past 4 months of my life. Africa is somehow indescribable, but the following list is my attempt to put words to the incredible things I have seen, felt and done throughout this season of my life. Africa is sitting in a classroom for hours with 19 year old Benedict as he shares how God has worked in his life, walking 11 year old Rechael to school, holding partially naked toddler Shelly while she sings and babbles in Runyankole, hearing her say "I love you!" as you walk away. Africa is precious orphans like Moses, who were found tied in a plastic bag and left to die in the swamp, but are living happ…

As I sat in the middle of a worship service at the prison in Rukungiri with the African sun beating down on me, listening to dozens of inmates praise the Lord in Runyankole, I scribbled down a note that read "God can redeem anything." Over the course of these past 3 months, my heart has been overwhelmed by the brokenness that saturates this place, the darkness that is real and tangible and hangs over your head like a blanket. But this week, as the trip draws to a close and we prepare to leave Uganda for home, God has been faithful to burst into that darkness with marvelous light, reminding me that He is moving here. There is nothing He can't make new, and nowhere He can't work. When I first traveled to the village a few months ago, and nearly every other time I've…

Wow. Where do I even begin? The last couple months have been all over the place. I have been happy, sad, frustrated, excited, and every emotion in between. As amazing as this adventure has been so far, I have experienced more weariness than I think I have in my whole life. There has been weariness in every form: emotional, spiritual, physical. The emotional has come from everywhere. First of all, living in a house with 15 other people, not the easiest thing to jump into! Not that I don't love showering in a room where 3 other girls sleep without a door on the shower, ha! But yeah, it is hard never getting a single moment to be alone. And learning to have grace towards people that never refill the toilet paper in the squatty or don't wash their breakfast dishes, so you have no d…

2 and a half months ago, Collin met a high school student at the cathedral where we attended a church service. Today, after visiting 2 primary schools and 3 wells, I bounced around in the bed of a pickup truck headed for the Congo, having to stop on our way home to let herds of elephants cross the road. To anyone else, these 2 events might seem like random snapshots of my life in Africa. But to me, and 5 of my teammates, the chain connecting the two were so clearly and undeniably orchestrated by God, to lead us exactly where we needed to be, at exactly the right time. Though our story had its beginning sometime back in January, I didn't come on the scene until several weeks later, when I was walking home from ministry and got stopped by a man asking where "Collins" was. T…

Our team has had the opportunity to go to Omukalere village a few times a week throughout this trip. We attend Sunday services at the church there, do door to door ministry and love on the many children who are orphans there. In one of my previous blogs I talked about Dorcus, a little girl from the village I bonded with instantly when I went the first time. Dorcus understands almost no English, but through her countless hugs and smiles, her sitting in my lap and being more than content in my arms she has shown me great love and hope. She gives me hope that there truly is joy everywhere.  I went to this village two weeks ago and was completely broken. Almost every adult there struggles with alcoholism and it is spiritually the darkest place I have ever been. And that day as s…

Had an amazing couple of weeks filled with cool experiences. It's amazing what can happen when you just let God lead and stop trying to do everything right! And it's ridiculous to think that I only have 2 weeks left in this country to have these experiences. I got to preach to about 400 high school students about the fact that God cares for them and has a purpose for them, and the words just kind of came out of my mouth without me having any idea beforehand what I was going to say – thank you Holy Spirit! Afterwards, about 20 girls came over and shook my hand simultaneously and I almost fell over, and the joy radiating through each one was so beautiful. I also got to visit the needy childrens home again that we went to a while back, twice, and sing and dance and play with these …

Life has been a whirlwind these past few weeks; ever since our debrief in Jinja, our time here seems to fly by at a faster pace every day. The thought "we only have three weeks left" pops into my mind unexpectantly everyday and I begin to feel the urge to push 100% of myself into my ministry. I realize more and more how great of friendships I have made with the boys of Makabore High School. It is strange to think that soon I wont be hanging out with them everyday. At 7:30 I wont be leading devotions with them. At 1:00 I wont be sneaking away from eating lunch with the staff to eat lunch with the boys. I wont be playing volley ball with the competitive boys at 5:00. I wont make random trips to a town 6 hours away to support the Makabore futball team in quarter finals. L…

If someone told me three months ago that I would be completely filled with joy when stepping into a prison in Uganda to preach to over one hundred criminals, I would have thought they were crazy. As soon as I walked through the gates and heard these men and women worshipping God, I was overwhelmed with peace and comfort from The Lord, and all the nerves I had about preaching vanished.  Preaching has been a fear of mine God has been breaking down this whole trip, so when I was informed I would be preaching at the prison as we were on our way there, joy and peace were not the first emotions I felt. Normally it's pretty easy to pick a verse in the Bible to talk about but this time I wasn't sure what to preach on. I asked myself, if I was a Ugandan prisoner what verses …