Ministry of Margaret Nelson
Uganda, Africa


May 28, 2008

Moving on...

After a wonderful, restful and refreshing 7 weeks in southern California, I am now moving on with my travel and ministry schedule. I am now in the Pacific Northwest with my children and grandchildren, looking at a time of family fun of musicals, baseball games, and birthday parties (we have 4 adult birthdays within 2 weeks!).

Then it will be on to visiting and speaking engagements throughout Washington and Oregon and a few other places, before returning to southern California in approximately 2 months. Again, if you care to contact me for visits or ministry, please contact me at amawulira@hotmail.com so we can get something on my schedule.

As for updates on the Ugandan ministries, please continue to uphold the 2 prayers requests I gave you last newsletter. Those are for the New Life Center Church/Academy land sale to the Ministry of Defense to be completed. The process is very complex, and Pastor David Kasule needs personal prayer on all fronts, for legal dealings, for safety, for wisdom. And Hannington Sseruga, SEVO director, continues to be in hiding from the police until the legal issues can be worked out with our lawyer regarding the attempted overtaking of SEVO by opponents, who’ve sought to have Hannington arrested for false crimes. Things move slowly in Uganda for many reasons, so ongoing prayer is needed to cause resolution in both cases.

For further information on these 2 prayer request, please refer to my most recent newsletter. And let me hear from you when I’m in your area!

Thanks for praying.

Margaret Nelson


May 1, 2008

Updates

I have been in sunny southern California for 3 weeks now, and have seen the temperature in the 40s, skyrocketing to 100° for the weekend (nice!), then plunging back to anywhere between 40s and 60s. Then when it gets warm enough for me to be comfortable (I’m used to the 90s year round in Uganda), everyone turns on the air conditioning. Brrrrr!

Aside from the erratic temperatures, there’s food. Oh my! People always worry about getting sick from eating African food when they come to visit me in Uganda. And certainly some do. But all of us who’ve lived in Africa for any length of time have the opposite problem! I guess we just get used to the bacteria that is resident wherever we happen to live. But in addition to bacterial changes are the types of food. I can get confused what to order in a restaurant because of the huge variety of food available! In Uganda everything I eat was either picked or killed that morning. No chemicals, no preservatives, no refrigeration. Everything is fresh, tough, and full of roughage. This is no joke -- my jaws used to get tired of chewing the rough food when I first moved to Uganda. By contrast, much food here (even meat) is like mush. All these things require change and adaptation, along with the 11 time zone difference.

All that aside, there are several situations in Uganda that are in need of ongoing prayer.

  1. The founder and director of our SEVO program (Samaritan Emergency Volunteer Organization), Hannington Sseruga, has had to flee his home and go into hiding. The group of ex-SEVO members who wrecked our ambulance last summer continue to cause trouble for us. Because Hannington had the ambulance towed from Luweero into Kampala for repairs, these guys went to the police to press charges of theft against Hannington for “stealing” the ambulance, which they claim as theirs. Hannington will be consulting our SEVO lawyer, so pray that this matter, and other related ones, can be settled legally once and for all, that local authorities will be convinced of SEVO’s rightful ownership, and that Hannington and his family will be kept safe.

  2. As work progresses to sell the 4 acres of land owned by New Life Centre Church and Academy to the Ministry of Defence for the new Army barracks, we are finding that there are certain government authorities who are hindering the land owners in their attempts to meet sale requirements. Please pray for Pastor David Kasule and Pastor Stephen Ejaba as they continue to work on these matters, that God will protect them as the forces of corruption come against them, and that God will provide the needed finances for lawyers, paperwork, etc, and most of all, that the sale will be quickly and properly consummated.

Back to issues in the USA, I will be leaving California for the Pacific Northwest on May 28th. I will be spending about 2 months in Washington and Oregon, before going on to other areas of visiting and ministry.

If you would like to contact me for ministry, visiting, or any other reason, please email me at amawulira@hotmail.com and I can send you my local or cell phone number. I hope to see many of you while I’m in the area!

Thanks for praying!

Margaret Nelson