THE ORANGE GIFTING... UGANDA BOOK PORTION

Another true portion of the book.  Exactly true.

 

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Filled with frustration, Cary left the office with her back pack and a pile of extra notebooks in a satchel she dug from the used-clothes stack in the office.  When she reached the street corner she saw David with his bike.  She let out a "whew" and headed to him.  “David, can you take me?  I can't carry all the books to the compound."

“Yes, Madame.  Good to help you.”  He put the back pack and satchel on the front of the bike and Cary sat on the back, fairly comfortably as she had done it more than once now.  She no longer was worried about people thinking how funny it was to watch an older-looking white woman side-saddled on the back of a bike.

Suddenly, while riding past some vendors sitting not far from the IDP camp they would ride through, she tapped David and asked him to stop.  “I want some oranges from this lady.” 

Cary hopped off the bike, grabbed some shillings out of her backpack, and turned to the woman who had the oranges in a black plastic bag at her feet.  “Madame, I would like ten of your oranges.”
  
When the lady looked at her, she realized the English hadn’t been workable.  She called David over.  “Will you ask her for ten of the oranges?  You work out the cost.  Obviously, I don’t have much money on me.”  David “teso”’d her, their language, and Cary could tell he was bartering the cost.  He finally turned and said, “She will take 1,000//.” Cary nodded and handed her the money.  She knew the cost was a bit high, but she also knew the woman needed every shilling she could earn and Cary also knew that it was assumed that because she was white she was rich.  As much as she tried to fight that mentality sometimes, she couldn’t other times, and this was one of them.  She took the oranges that the woman put into another bag and climbed back onto the bike. 

When David rode past the IDP camp, Cary started tossing the oranges to the people standing near the pathway.  They started laughing and cheering and jumping to catch the fruit.  Cary saw a pregnant lady standing near the path under a tree, and she tapped David and had him stop, and took an orange over to her.  The mom broke into a huge smile and gripped Cary’s hand tightly.  Cary grinned and winked and headed back to the bike.

Everyone waved at her as David started riding the path again.  When Cary reached the compound she could hardly believe how happy she was now, after being so stressed and sad when she left the office.  David was, also, obviously very pleased, as he gave her a big smile and wouldn’t accept a tip when she paid him for the ride.  “I will watch and see if you ever need a ride, Madame.  I so like to take you.”

DARKNESS TO LIGHT ... PS. 103

YES,  I WILL BLESS THE LORD...

HE FORGIVES ALL MY SINS...

PSALM 103:2-3

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TURNING ME FROM...

 AND

THANK YOU, MY LORD!!

ROMANS 11:36

AMEN!!!!

CHILD SERIOUSLY INJURED ... UGANDA BOOK

And, this was NOT fictionalized.  This is a true portion of the book.  Info immediately emailed to my husband and friends from Uganda ... slightly re-written just for you, to readjust the amount of space.  But the reality is the reality.
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 [This child is not the one from the story, but the same age.  A dear one Jill and I met at the Rescued Children's Camp, mostly teens, but a few like this one who had somehow been lost from parents when running from the rebels.  The fact that she smiled has always amazed me.]


.. Cary turned around and wandered through Pastor Justin’s area.  Everyone stopped and stared at her because they so seldom had a white person in their part of the country, especially those who had been living in the villages.  She was a whole new experience for them.

While looking at the cement pad next to Justin’s place, just a few feet away, she suddenly noticed a young child laying on a straw mat.  At first she assumed the child was sleeping, although she wasn’t sure why it would be outside, but when she looked closely, she saw tears on the child’s cheeks.

She interrupted Joseph and Justin.  “I noticed that child there is crying very quietly.  Can you ask why?”

Joseph set the papers aside and walked to the mother and the two of them spoke for just a short time.  Joseph turned to Cary.  “They were heating water in a kettle on the 3-rocks

At the Refugee Camp, too large, of course, but example.

fire, and as the water began to boil, a stone fell over and the kettle hit the floor and the water splashed on the girls neck, shoulder, and chest.  It happened not long before we came.  She is in great pain.”

“She’s hardly crying, though.  If that happened to one of my grandkids, they’d be screaming their heads off.  Why isn’t the family doing anything?”

“In our culture, if a child is hurting, it is right to be as silent as possible.  One reason is because our people are so poor they can’t afford to go to a doctor.  In fact, one is rarely around.  So, they simply learn to live with their problems.”

Cary said, “Well, this time that’s not the way it’s going to be!”  She looked intensely at Joseph and said, “Tell them that I will take her to the clinic the ministry supports not far from here... I think we passed it, didn’t we?”  She paused and Joseph nodded.  “OK.  Have them dress her and we’ll go.”

He told the family.  An older sister brought out a dress to put it on the little one.  The dress had a tight-looking neckline and tight sleeves.  Cary remembered that the skin on the girl’s shoulder was sloughing off already, and she knew that this dress would cause a lot of pain.  Before she even processed it all, Cary said, “NO!”  Everyone froze.  She turned to Joseph.  “Tell them that would hurt her.  Have them put a loose top on her.  She doesn’t have to be very special-dressed to go see a nurse.  They need to understand that.”

He explained.  They did what Cary told them to do, then the wounded girl, her older sister, Joseph and Cary got in the van and went to the clinic.

When they pulled up under the trees on the edge of the clinic site, people were sitting in the shade.  A number were lined up being examined by a nurse.  She would determine where they should sit and wait for the next nurse to care for them.  When Cary climbed out and took the girl’s hand and walked towards the nurse, she stopped what she was doing and came over.  Cary told her, “This little one has been burned by boiling water.  Her family has no salve or other medicine to help her.  I knew you would be able to do so, so I brought her here.”

The nurse smiled very gently, moved the shirt away from the wounds, and looked a bit startled.  “Yes, Madame, this is serious.  I will do so right away.”

The nurse quickly went to the medicine area and returned with a creamy salve.  She gently spread it over the entire area.  Then she found some gauze and tape and covered it loosely.  She gave the sister some pain pills, and, Cary found out later, told them in Teso, that they should come back the following week and that they would reassess the burns.

When they returned to their home, everyone was very happy, so pleased that their little one had been helped.

Later Cary realized that she knew no names, nothing.  And they didn’t know her for more than that hour.  She wondered if the years would come along and they would think that God had dropped an angel into their lives.

Cary, exhausted and so filled with weakness from that intense, but helpful time, thought, “Well, I sure don’t look like an angel, don’t talk like an angel, don’t walk like an angel, but am blessed that they appreciated my entry into their lives.

Cary relaxed.

NEW TESTAMENT... GIVEN TO AND GIVEN AWAY

When I mentioned on Facebook today that I was reading a portion of the Revelation, and that the translation I am reading this time is JB Phillips.  Then, my mind was buried in the miracle.

On Friday, April 15, 1966, at 6:30 PM, when I came to the Lord, the man, Stan, who had led me to Him, gave me a Phillips New Testament.  I was 20 years old, from a rough "world", and this truly became a whole new blessed world for me, instantly.  AND Stan's Word/verse, chosen specially for me, referenced in the Bible was this:

Philippians 2:13: For it is God who is at work within you, giving you the will and the power to achieve his purpose.

That was my special Bible.

Almost a year later -- February, 1967 -- I had been shifted from Tacoma, WA, to East St. Louis, IL.  I was living with a friend the first couple months, and working in St. Louis.

Then, during May, life changed again.  I was spending time out and about in the downtown area of East St. Louis, mostly as part of a serious gang-and-racial-and-poverty ministry.  I was a serious, tough-cookie oriented person, and very few times was I hesitant or frightened by what others were doing towards, around, or about me.  I was amazingly protected by the Lord, believe me!

Anyhow, I remember walking around downtown.  Casually.  A scruffy middle-aged man was standing on a corner, and asking for money.  A homeless man, same as today.  I had almost no money, couldn't help him.  I might have been able to give him a buck or two, but that was all.  THEN, however, while sharing the Word with him, just a bit, for a couple minutes, he said he couldn't keep knowing more; he didn't have a Bible.

I reached into the top pocket of my jacket, removed my small "Born-Again gift", and gave it to him, told him it was easy to read and that he could learn more of the Lord, that it was small enough that he could easily keep it in his pockets.

He thanked me. We smiled at each other. I left.

I haven't known anything further, of course.  I hope it entered into his heart.  I'll find out for certain sure whether this gift to him, one of the first personal spiritual ones I ever gave after my salvation, changed him. I sure hope to meet him again -- 

in heaven.

 

"TRIP" WITH SUSAN, EVERY DAY

This is how it began.  Worth a grin.

Downtown Lake Superior Area, Grand Marais

About a dozen years ago, Dave and I, were up on the North Shore at Lake Superior, Grand Marais, MN.  We dropped in again at one of our favorite touristy sales stores, Blue Moose.  I saw something I thought would be neat for Susie's Mom, Etole.  She, because of stroke-related illness, she had moved in with her daughter, because serious illness had forced her out of her own home.  Susie was more than a blessing in helping her mother.  With both of them in wheelchairs and life not very "easy", we were always just amazed at how the Lord would provide protection and support.  Etole died near Mother's Day, 10 years ago.

Well, while Etole was at Susie's, the gift was over the kitchen sink, facing the east, and at sunrise it could be a bit shiny.  And, as the day increased, the colorfulness and sparkliness was a treat.  Anytime I visited, I couldn't help but smile and smack it a bit so it would twirl around and watch the "jewels" send their sparkles around the room.

When Dave and I were up there a couple weeks ago, looking

forward to seeing her, of course, but also "meeting" Caleb since his birth, spending time with his parents/Susie's dear family, and running and about a bit to see others.  We had a wonderful time, in spite of the fact that the weather was pretty stormy and we couldn't "play" very much.

Just as we were getting ready to leave, Susie told me that the "jewels" in the kitchen were now mine.  I was so very blessed!!  Could hardly NOT feel guilty, because I know how much she loved it.  But she insisted, so I did.

Well, on the way home [550 miles], I decided to hang it from the mirror.  So, I did.  Originally planned to take it in when reaching home and hang it in our kitchen.  But got side-tracked... my personality issue ... and then over the days it was left in the car.

It will be forever.  And today, when going out and about to do basic shopping, while on one of our main streets, I looked at it and though, "Oh, Susie and Etole are with me ALL THE TIME now."  Been smiling about it ever since I got home a couple hours ago, so decided to share it with the rest of the world, too.

I met Susie and her mom in the summer of 1960.  Her mother was a very important person in my life then, and forever.  And Susie, too.  

When I'm driving through Klickitat, WA, next month, on my birthday, 68th -- ouch!! --showing my grandkids where I lived and where their "Grandma" Susie lived, it will be shy of only a month before she entered my life 53 years ago.  [The first time I saw and

met Susie was when I was being shown around and was taken down to the Klickitat River where the swimming "pool" was.  She was walking up from the river.  We were introduced.  I immediately was amazed at her beautiful red hair.  I never forget where I met her.  -- While living there, I swam across the river, dove from the low rocks, name is somewhere, maybe, even after all these years.]

So, during my drive in July, I'll be taking "her" with me as she "jewels" herself in the window. 

[PS.  Can't get the font colors to work out.  Oh, well.  Computers are wonderful sometimes; drive me nuts other times.]

SIMON, ANOTHER UGANDAN SON

When Dave and I were officially at New Hope Uganda ... had been in and out of there for several months before, but were in the Kampala area and just going back and forth a couple days a week ... and now living in a teacher's home, we were so blessed by seeing more and more, day by day.

 

Simon, I would estimate, was in his late teens and his sister was one of the teachers.  He lived in another part of Uganda and arrived about the same time we were there.  He lived with his sister, Sarah, and her husband, Tonny.

One day, just as many others, he came to our door, and talked to Dave.  He had purchased a battery radio in Kampala at a side-shop.  It looked nice.  Wasn't expensive, but wasn't overly cheap.  When he got home and started to use it, it didn't work.  When he opened it, as I recall, there were basic parts that were missing.  So, he had been cheated.  He asked Dave is he could fix it.

Dave did.  He gave it to Simon a day or so later.

A day or so later, on a Saturday morning, Simon showed up our door, dressed in work-out clothes, and asked us what he could do for us, how he could work in our yard.  It was because he appreciated what Dave had done and wanted to repay Dave.  Other than Sam, our Ugandan son who had been dropped into our lives in a very special way about a year earlier, Simon was the only one who had ever offered help in a sense of appreciation.  We were both very astonished and greatly appreciated him.  I definitely was able to show him a couple places in our yard near the banana trees and pineapples where we could use some help.  He did it all.

We were friends from then on.  One funny thing.  I was teaching French to some of the adults/teachers [didn't SPEAK it very well, but was good at teaching the translations, etc.].  We were meeting at a library, and someone had forgotten the key.  This person went to get the key, and the rest of us were hanging out.  I glanced at the side of the library, where there was a pile of dirt surrounded part of the building.  Simon was kneeling there, his back to me, and I couldn't figure out what he was doing.  THEN I saw that he was digging in the dirt and grabbing the insects that the Ugandans, from various locations, would eat.  Can't remember if it was some kind of ant or grasshopper.  I was horrified!!!  Being from the States, that was definitely not something I had seen or thought was OK.  [I could well be wrong, considering protein, etc., but still don't want to do it.]  Anyhow, that is one of my favorite chuckles about Simon.

When we returned there for our son, Sam's, wedding, in September, 1999, we had dinner with Simon when he was one of the "parents" at a home with a number of kids.  While talking with him, he indicated he wanted to be married and he asked us to pray for him.  We held his hands and prayed very sincerely.  Hugged him much.  We truly loved him much.

 It wasn't long before he was married. 

I met his wife and saw children when I was there in late '03, early '04.  Haven't seen him since, personally, but have seen him online, fb, email, etc.  And continue to love him dearly.

He has become quite a worker at the orphanage.  And a dear friend with my dear friends, such as Sam and his wife, Adhe.  So, again, Dave and I are not "Aunt and Uncle" which is the common description of respect in Uganda, but now we are "Mum and Dad".   What a treat!

He was on my heart today, so thought I'd put him on yours, too.