Northwest School of Missions

This furlough I have had the opportunity to be a part of the Northwest School of Missions. It is a program where a few missionaries (this year there were four) are selected to travel around the northwest and speak at various Christian churches that choose to participate. It involved about a month of traveling and speaking. I had the opportunity to share at 20 different churches across the northwest. Michelle and the boys did not travel with me, so they could do homeschool. While it was a long and tiring month, it did allow me to meet a lot of very nice people. While I did share about our work in Uganda, my main focus was on the events of our last year and the lessons God has taught us, especially about God’s desire for us to learn to walk with Him and put our trust in Him. The message looked at the 23rd Psalm and its teaching on what it means to follow God. This was the message God had put upon my heart to share. After giving this message a number of times, I was glad Michelle and the kids did not have to travel with me and hear me give the same message over and over. I was even becoming tired of hearing myself give the message. I tried not doing the message part a couple of times. At one church I felt short on time so I decided to just talk about our work, but a fellow kept interrupting me to ask why we were working in Africa. I realized that God was not allowing me to skip the message He had given me, so I went ahead and shared the message part about following God. Another time I asked God in my devotion time to give me a different message to give. I then went to the next passage of scripture I was to read and found it to be the 23rd Psalm. It was clear I was to stay with the message He had given me. The message part made my presentation a little long, but I think it was more beneficial to those hearing than just hearing about us. God seemed to speak through the stories of our struggles to many people who were dealing with difficulties of their own. At one location before my presentation I overheard a phone conversation in which a man was saying he was not going to come to hear me speak as he was too tired. This did not overly bother me as I did not assume that everyone needed to come hear me. I always figured God could motivate the people who needed to hear. But in this case, I felt God prompt me to pray for this man to come as he needed to be there. I gave the presentation and afterwards a man came up and told me the message had especially touched him as he had been going through some very difficult times lately and had been discouraged. He said he had not planned to come as he had been very tired, but then had felt powerfully moved that he needed to be there. He was the very man I had prayed for. It was not easy being away from the family for so long to do the School of Missions, but I thank God for the opportunity, and pray for His blessings on the people I have met.