Hello Beloved,
Glad tidings in the mighty name of Jesus; I am privileged to once again reach out and connect with you at this awesome moment. I am truly excited because such opportunities have not ceased to come our way as the Lord enables us take over new territories.
The Almighty God has enabled us engage and expands our ministry activities to diverse communities of the different regions of Uganda. We pray that in sharing this report, you will like we do be encouraged.
CHILDREN MINISTRY
Raising Hope Leaders Trainings
We have had three major Children’s leaders training this month in the districts of Kampala, Kamyenge and Hoima. Two of these trainings were undertaken in the Refugee camps of Rwamwanja and Kyangwali in Kamwenge and Hoima respectively. A total of 83 children leaders and workers were trained and equipped with skills on how to connect with children and how to connect them to God. The skills training included how to lead a child to Christ, how to lead a children’s bible study, storytelling techniques, how to teach a memory verse, who a child and teacher are. Through the training, the relevance of children ministry and how it leads to church growth was highlighted through the training.
“I have always found easier to share the gospel with an adult than with a child the reason being that I didn’t know how to and also because I thought the children did not understand the gospel. I am challenged to now go and reach children especially after learning how to do so through this training.” Remarked Sheila during the training.
Rising Hope Graduation
We just concluded the first ever Raising Hope National Children ministry training with a total of 43 children workers across the country graduating in the discipline of nurturing children for Personal relationship with God, Growing with healthy character and Advancing the kingdom of God through Children.
Of the 43 graduates, 5 graduates were advanced as Master trainers due to their excellence and exception in executing their responsibilities and meeting the requirements of a master trainer. To excel in this discipline, one ought to have replicated this program by training other leaders or starting the program in their communities or districts, established at least one community bible club and conducted a vision casting training program with at least five other churches in his or her community.
“I am grateful for being considered a master trainer. My labour in ministry has not been in vain” said Mr. Amolo Peter in his short speech at the graduation. “I have crafted a vision, mission and core values for the children ministry which knowledge I obtained from the training” he adds.
At least five community clubs have been established by the master trainers.
The Community Bible club program
Community Bible clubs are the life blood of the children ministry. They are an effective tool through which unreached children have been reached. To many of both the unchurched and churched children, the clubs have become the “church outside church”.
To this effect, 53 new children joined 8 of the established community bible clubs with 23 salvations recorded. This is a great achievement especially taking into consideration that without the bible clubs, these children would not have had an opportunity to know Christ at this stage. Our mandate is to establish bible clubs in at least every community through the local church.
THE CHURCH PLANTERS PROGRAM
The Church Planting Vision is to plant a Living Church in every community, Planted by ordinary believers”.
This month through we undertook the second module training with 26 church planters in the district of Ibanda. The training brought together over 12 churches from the South Western districts of Uganda along the Uganda Congo Border. Half of the participating churches were from the refugee camps.
“I have made a covenant to serve God for the rest of my life. With the skills I am obtaining from the church planters training, I hope to work towards evangelizing and discipling the masses.” Said Muhumuza Godfrey after the Training.
Muhumuza was an ordinary believer at Kiburara Gospel Church before being identified and sent for the training early this year. Through the training, he has been elevated into a potential church planter currently leading a home cell.
The church planters program, at least 43 new believers have been baptised, 522 reached, with 103 surrendering their lives to Christ. At least one church was planter in the refugee camp in August. A baptism program is underway for the new converts in the few coming weeks. We bless the Lord for this impact story and your generous contribution to the program.
DAY STAR PRIMARY SCHOOL
Water is critical; for most area school children the school dinner made with the water collected is their largest and most nutritious meal of the day. In many schools especially in the rural communities, water continues to be a great problem alongside sanitation and hygiene.
Because of the challenge of water leave alone its safety, the education of many Ugandan children has been greatly affected in terms of time spent by the students to collect water from wells and swamps and open sources, many of which are polluted to water borne diseases as a result of drinking Contaminated water
It’s estimated that by eliminating the need to travel to collect water, it frees up an estimated 165 hours annually which can be used for children to focus on their education & ensures that students are provided with water which is safe to drink.
In August 2016, Day Star nursery school secured a safe water drinking project with Solarwave Uganda to provide a sola driven water purification systems and desalination systems. To help improvise purified and distilled water for the children. Anytime – Anywhere.
“It has been challenging to boil water for over 500 children at the school and besides we have been under pressure from school inspectors to improvise safe water to the children” says Rose the headmistress of the school. “Before this establishment, the children drunk water directly from the taps and nearby stream which brought about waterborne diseases causing the children miss school” she adds
With this project, this problem will be rectified and this challenge solved once and for all. However the milestone to cover is the payment for the system which the school is meant to cover quarterly for the next two years.
The Community Bible club program
Community Bible clubs are the life blood of the children ministry. They are an effective tool through which unreached children have been reached. To many of both the unchurched and churched children, the clubs have become the “church outside church”.
To this effect, 53 new children joined 8 of the established community bible clubs this month with 23 surrendering their lives to Christ. This is a great achievement especially taking into consideration that without the bible clubs, these children would not have had an opportunity to know Christ at this stage.
We continue to pursue the mandate to establish these clubs in at least every community through the local church.
Please pray with us for
- SUPPORT FOR THE WATER PROJECT at DAY STAR PRIMARY SCHOOL
- The church planters training program and graduation slated for the first week of October 2016.
- For Ruth, Juliet and mark, three pupils at Day Star primary school who lost their father later this month. Pray especially for provision for their education.
- Lift our church planters and children workers unto the Lord praying for protection, guidance and provision.
- For the New doors opening in Congo specifically in Goma and Eastern Congo.
We are grateful for the awesome and great things the Lord is doing in our midst and all this is possible because of you prayers and support that has enabled us to reach and touch these communities. We can’t explain how much this means to us but one thing we know for sure is that the Good Lord is surely proud of you. We pray that even as he has been good to us through you, his goodness will never cease to manifest in your life as it has been in ours.
DO NOT hesitate to check out how you can support these program by visiting this link https://mercylinkfoundationafrica.org/index.php/funding to see how you can support any of the program
Blessings
May the almighty God bless you abundantly?
Robert Sebunya
DIRECTOR