Last day of LOVE with the children of God!

We have all heard the saying "love is all around" but we our team has lived this saying the last 3 -1-2 weeks. There has truly been love everywhere we have been. We visited several ministries that we have worked with the last two days here: Amani Baby Cottage, Serving His Children, Canaan Children's Home and Ekisa. We have grown to love deeply in a short time and that can only be from God. We love so deeply that it hurts to leave but are encouraged that we will see our friends again: even if it is not this side of Heaven for some, we will talk with all of them again. We look forward to the day that we can have conversations with the ones that cannot communicate. We have loved meeting the children of God everywhere.

One of my favorite quotes from Mother Teresa is: "I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts, there can no no more hurt, only love."

We leave Uganda with only LOVE in our hearts. Love that comes from our heavenly Father. We have seen His love shine down on every ministry that we have partnered with and we have seen tremendous JOY everywhere. His JOY. We witnessed the miraculous change in a little boy yesterday at Serving His Children: he could not walk because of pain 10 days ago and yesterday he was smiling and laughing. There are many stories like Emma's. He is being shown God's love and is healing. We were able to assists with Amani's rearranging and place beanie babies in every bed (because of a generous donor) and see the joy that the children felt when receiving them. We have witnessed love through the eyes of everyone we have worked with and met Jesus there.

We are going to post reflections and stories for those that care to read them in the next couple of days. For now, we leave Uganda remembering a favorite quote about love and we pray for all of our friends here always.

"What does love look like? It has the hands to help others. It has the feet to hasten to the poor and needy. It has eyes to see misery and want. It has the ears to hear the sighs and sorrows of men. That is what love looks like." Saint Augustine

1 John 3: 1 - "How great is the love the Father has has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!"

Building In Every Way..........

As I have watched our team and the children interacting with each other I realize that we have been constantly building the last 3 weeks. Building shelves for Canaan Children's Home, building a pantry for the kitchen at Amani Baby Cottage, building puppets with the children, building pictures with paint on the walls, building relationships with all the ministries that we have partnered with, building relationships with the children and the staff at each orphanage, building new friendships, and building God's kingdom. We realize that we are not "needed" to do any of these things that God has led us to do. And, we realize that we are much more blessed than those we have blessed.

So what is the purpose of these HEAL mission teams? To build love. To build a bridge that truly bonds all people in all nations for God's purpose. To look after orphans and widows in their distress. To continue relationships year after year with those we are constantly building things with. To realize God's plans sometimes change and these "short term" mission trips most often lead to long term plans that God has had in mind since the beginning of time.

We played with the babies at Amani the last couple of days and they enjoyed eating animal fruit snacks that we brought while making their tiger puppets. We enjoyed watching the "mammas" interact with the children. The males on our team worked the last two days building a promised kitchen pantry for "momma cook" at Amani and we are going to stain it and place it tomorrow. She is so proud of her new pantry. There are doors with locks and shelves at different heights to fit the different size pots for cooking.

Our last time to visit Canaan Children's Home during this trip was tonight. It was a bitter-sweet visit. We are sad to say good-bye but look forward to saying hello again in the future. Some of us will see the children again on this earth. All of us will see them again in Heaven. And that is the real beauty of this mission team that has been building.