“You’re lookin’ good, just like a snake in the grass” -ELO

Hi All,

We hope you are enjoying the warmer weather back in the States as you near Summer! We are enjoying the cooler temperatures the rain brings, but it is still warm and even hot most days! April and May have been full, and as we look ahead, the next two months will be even more so! So, if our updates are more spaced out, you know why.

We celebrated Jackson’s third birthday this past weekend. He requested “pancakes with my friends.” So, we had brunch with our team! It was a sweet time celebrating our precious boy! The children wanted to make sure we keep you up-to-date on SOME of the animals we have gotten to see. So, here it goes! We have seen eland, monkeys, baboons, ostriches, yellow-billed kites (lots of other birds too!), plenty of spiders, ants in abundance and of varying size, GIRAFFES, chameleons, and some snakes …. Like the boomslang snake which is highly venomous (look it up – it is pretty too!). We have heard and seen the tracks of hyenas but have not yet seen one. Travis got to see a warthog and her babies while travelling to pick up visitors. Clayton would like you to know we have NOT seen zebras yet – 0. Though, they are here, and we are hoping to see some!

LANGUAGE LEARNING

April brought an end to our language learning class that the team prepared for us! We still have a great deal to learn, but now we continue learning alongside our language helpers. It is great to have a foundation to build off, but it remains a daunting task to be fluent in Ngakarimojong and to be responsible for the studying of that with all the other responsibilities that demand our time. Please pray that the Lord would bless our study of the language and that we would be quick learners and use it well!

BURIAL / LABOR DAY

Several months ago we heard rumors that Nakaale was chosen as the location to celebrate Labor Day this year, and that even the president of Uganda would be there! We weren’t sure if anything would materialize, but slowly it became apparent that the rumors were true. As the event got closer, things really began to get busy around here. The neighbors and our land were utilized to make a parade ground of sorts. Prisoners were brought in to clear the land and then several days before the military started to move in.

One morning during morning devotions with the day workers, I (Travis) noticed some tents right outside our main compound gate. After going out and introducing myself to one of the soldiers, I found out that they were camping all over the property and around the parade ground in the days leading up to the event. You could tell the locals were a bit uneasy as there is a long history between them and the army. The rest of the ordeal, of which we will spare you many details, turned out to be an ironically exact lesson on Matthew 5:41, “if he makes you go one mile with you, go with them two miles…” you get the idea.

The Sunday before the event hundreds of soldiers had arrived and started doing drill routines with their marching band- it was hard for everyone to focus during the service with all of that in the background! Our sleepy little “intersection” where you normally are lucky to see goats and cows and a few people milling about was transformed by hundreds of military and police members and onlookers.

The day before the event, I (Travis) found myself soberly and quietly making my way through all the hullabaloo. The purpose for my excursion outside the comfort of our compound was to help dig a grave for one of our day worker’s wives who had passed away. I could take pages to tell this part of the story, and maybe I’ll write about it separately elsewhere, but I’ll try and summarize. We had found out that day that the body had been transported back to the area and help was needed to dig the grave (not uncommon for people to not want to help as they are very superstitious about death here). Unfortunately, we were short on day workers and our ministry guys were out of town- so I stepped in to try and help fill the need. I took a crash course on cultural do’s and don’ts, grabbed a shovel and pickaxe, and headed off (having a general location to go to but not knowing exactly where to find the grave). The whole walk I was brainstorming since I had been warned that there was a good chance that I would be asked to officiate or speak at the burial. I picked up a “guide” at the clinic along the way and we eventually found the place. When I got there, they had finished the grave early as they had hit bedrock about 3-4ft down. The family was anxious to start the ceremony as she had been dead since Sunday evening and it was getting close to noon (They don’t bury people between 12-2pm here [again, superstitious]). Though both brothers of the deceased said they were pastors (turns out they were catholic priests of sorts), they insisted a pastor from the mission do the ceremony. I sent to fetch Pastor Julius (NPC Pastor and clinic chaplain) but said that if he was unavailable, I would be willing to step in. Long story short, Pastor Julius did come and was able to lead a brief, Gospel-centered service. I helped transport the body to the grave and then helped with the burial process – learning more cultural practices along the way. As the family broke out into their weeping for the dead, the marching band played in the background and 500+ soldiers shouted in unison, a strange combination of sounds to be sure. Then it was all over. I said my condolences again, and made my way back down the road through the community, almost unaware of the stares of the neighbors of the deceased who had refused to help, being content instead to continue sitting around drinking their booze; then back through the crowded intersection filled with soldiers, VIPS, and locals; back into the safe confines of our compound; and finally back to work in the shop. Another strange day in the life of a missionary where one asks themselves, “How in the world did I end up in this situation?”

The next day we briefly went out to enjoy the festivities and witness thousands of people also attend the event. We heard the President speak while we sat at our picnic table, and then by the time we left for our trip at dawn the next day, it was all over and back to our quiet little area in the middle of nowhere Africa.

KAMPALA TRIP

At the beginning of May, we took a trip to Kampala. Travis attended presbytery and I (Bonnie) was able to attend a day-long women’s conference while the children played close by with Beatrix and other children/childcare helpers. The Lord also worked it out that two different family friends from the States were in/around Kampala that same weekend! It was so fun to connect with friends new and old. We are thankful that we made it there and back safely (Though getting into the city turned a 7 hr trip into over 12 hrs!) and that we stayed healthy the whole time!! It was an encouraging time to connect with other churches in the Reformed Church of East Africa (RCEA) and other missionaries! Please continue to pray for faithful churches here in Africa as they seek to bring the Gospel to their communities! They face many trials in doing so.

BACK AT IT / SNAKES

Travis remains busy with lots of different maintenance projects around the mission compound, clinic compound, and so on. He also is still helping with the church plant here in Nakaale and Mbale, KST, and missionary homes down there. Our new team members come in just a couple of weeks! We are excited to have them! Pray for them as they say goodbyes in the states and settle in Mbale.

We have not had many good snake stories…… until now. Buckle up! We were out playing with the kiddos and puppies before lunch one Saturday. We had just picked some avocados off of our tree and had stopped by the mango trees by our house. I (Bonnie) noticed something moving a little strange in the grass a few yards away moving in our direction. All of a sudden, Travis and I realized it was a snake. We told the kiddos to get inside, Travis somehow managed to get them inside, get the puppies inside, and grab his snake killing stick (A “modified” hockey stick…yes it’s as cool as it sounds- at least Travis thinks so) while I kept an eye on it (if you lose a snake from sight, you might not be able to find it again..). When Travis returned, I checked on the kiddos in the house and went to get a guard. Travis and he were able to kill the snake. Lodeem, the guard, said it looked to be a black mamba. The following day, the guards killed a boomslang and said they saw another mamba by our house but were unable to kill it. On Monday, I was washing some dishes in the sink, when I heard commotion coming from our living room. Addy runs out and says “MAMA! THERE’S A SNAKE!” I run into the living room where Clayton is pointing to our window. I scooped up Dawson, told Jackson to go to the other room, and told the twins to get Daddy (Who was taking a shower, haha). A Boomslang was in our window and I was not sure which side it was on (it ended up being in between the ratwire and the mosquito nettings but could have easily gotten on our side). After a challenging and ultimately unsuccessful attempt to kill the snake, it ended up sliding outside the window and we were unable to find it…but hopefully it was injured enough that it didn’t survive. And just Thursday, Clayton was playing outside around our house and saw a snake and the guards and Travis came running. We couldn’t find the one he saw, but the guards found and killed another boomslang in our hedges that border our front walkway that the children often play by. So if you’re counting that is at least 5 venomous snakes in less than a week! All I can say is praise the Lord for His watchcare over us!

VISITORS

We are looking forward to many visitors in the upcoming weeks/months. We have several visitors next week for Knox School of Theology as they will be celebrating their first official graduating class! We look forward to seeing some of them in Mbale and hosting a couple of them who will be visiting Karamoja! In June, our Pastor and his wife will be here which is so exciting! We have been missing them and our home church so much! And as Travis drops them off in Entebbe for their return flight, he and Chris will be picking up a short-term missions team that will be here for a few weeks into mid-July! What an exciting couple of months! Please pray for stamina and health and safety for all involved!

In Christ,

The Emmett’s


Praises

We have so many things to be thankful for in this newsletter. The Lord is good!

  • Safety: especially with the uptick in snake appearances & lots of travel
  • Jackson also has continued to eat well and has not had an unexplained fever since February! (I am not sure if this is just a reprieve or if they are totally gone, but we are so thankful for this time that his body (and we!) has had to rest from the cyclical fevers.
  • Health: No one was sick for our trip to Kampala and we have been relatively healthy for 2 weeks!!
  • We completed our 9 week language course
  • The relationships we are building with our team, locals, and other church members/missionaries
  • The encouraging time we had at Presbytery and the Women’s Conference along with an overall good trip with new friends and fun memories!
  • Getting to see friends from Pennsylvania in Uganda during our Kampala trip!
  • KST’s upcoming Graduation!

  • Jackson turned THREE this month! We are so grateful for him!!

Prayers

As we praise the Lord for what He is doing here, we also are praying for many heavy requests.

  • Pray for one of the mission’s workers who lost his wife this past month.

  • Pray for Bonnie’s language helper who’s mother is ill and who’s sister-in-law recently died after childbirth leaving behind a husband and 8 children
  • Pray for the church’s members as they seek to care for their families and live faithfully to the Lord in a culture that does not encourage it.
  • Pray for the fields to grow and there to be a good harvest so when hunger season comes, they can feed their families
  • Pray for the Karimojong people and those that the mission and church have contact with to come to saving faith. That this area would be known not for it’s wickedness but for it’s love and service to God and others.
  • Death, sin, and brokenness are all around and it can feel quite heavy at times, pray for us to be a light and an encouragement to those around us. Pray that the Lord would be our refuge and that we would hope in Him!
  • Pray for opportunities to grow our relationships and to share the Gospel with others.