Caleb's Time in Uganda

Thanks to so many of you who have prayed for our precious son as he has spent a month in Uganda. He is due home the 11th! Plans for picking him up are in limbo, but that is on Kregg's list because Hannah's due date is the 8th and so we are simply in a holding pattern until she goes into labor. Lots going on in our little Antbed. :)

The baboons beside the road made Caleb feel right at home ! :)

We have been so very blessed to be able to talk to Caleb on Skype several times while he has been gone. But it will be wonderful to hug his neck. (I am a big hugger.) He never knows what the schedule will be for each day and can't really give us any idea when he will be able to contact us next, so we just leave the computer on all day with Skype up so that, if he calls, we hear him. 

He has shared a few of his adventures with us, and that is when I appreciate Skype the most because I can see that he is okay while he relates some of these tales. A few days ago, he and another man were walking through an area of the town during the evening. They came up on a robbery and rape, in progress, and were able to stop it and run off the assailant. One day, they found a huge dead cobra while they were out and about.  

Then yesterday, he told us about someone coming to the home of the missionary he is staying with, requesting help. A young lady, between 15 and 17 years of age, had gone into the water and drowned because she couldn't swim. The family was requesting help in retrieving her body because none of them could swim either. Caleb and the missionary headed that way. Before they got there, the body was located. 

The Lord has filled him, and us, with such Peace! Caleb simply doesn't fear any of it, believing he is in the center of the Lord's will, which is the safest place for any of us to be, regardless of what is going on around us. 

Jeff, the missionary, has given Caleb a very expansive view of what life as a missionary is like. There is another intern there, too, and Jeff sent the two out on a scavenger hunt one day. They had to use public transportation to go around the city and find specific things, like the three hospitals, and take pictures of them. Then another day, they had to go into the market and buy food to feed the family they are staying with. Caleb spent a night out in one of the villages to experience what life is like there. 

I think this is his bed, complete with mosquito netting

The family he is staying with has not had an outside supply of electricity for 6 months. They use solar panels and then fire up a generator once a week, or so. Laundry is done by hand and water is heated for bathing. None of it phases them. 


The hardest thing about trying to disciple people for Christ in Uganda is the basic moral fabric of the society there. Jeff has been there only a month less than the longest resident missionary in the country, about 20 years. Many times, missionaries just lose hope and give up. Even after years of working side by side with the people there, believing they have been changed, there comes a time when those people will betray the missionaries. It may be after fifteen years of daily contact and discipleship where that person has access to your home all the time in a position of complete trust, but one day they will come home to find that they have stolen everything. It happens again and again. Trying to build any kind of facility to bless the people there is almost impossible because, once the missionary leaves the location, the people that worked with him to build are often the ones who will steal everything they can remove. They believe, somehow, that they are owed whatever they want to take. 


To add to the challenge, the people stateside who the missionaries report to don't always understand the cultural dynamics that are being dealt with. Often the "measurements of success" that would be valid here are not valid for use in another culture. And trying to explain the situation just does not seem to translate into a true understanding of the circumstances being faced. All that to say, missionaries all across the world need our prayers. They need to be covered with protection and given wisdom and sustaining Grace to continue ministering to those they are called to serve. 

Caleb says it is quite beautiful there and he has enjoyed the family very much. He has been invited to come again. Jeff thinks it would be a wonderful ministry for Caleb to come back and set up swimming lessons for the people there to help prevent many of the drownings that are unfortunately not uncommon. 


I know when he comes home, part of his heart will remain in Uganda. And I wouldn't be surprised at all if he returns there someday.


Thank you so much for all your sweet words of encouragement and prayers while he has been gone. They have been such a blessing to our family!