Past and Present
(An update from Devon).
Hello Family and Friends,
It has been another month that has gone by since I have sent a update. I would first like to thank everybody for their continuing prayer and encouragement for us, which has brought multitudes of blessing into my life. While being in Uganda, Mbarara I participated in a program called Outlook. While being there God continued transforming my life and way of thinking. On and off I had spent time with different teams doing various activities. The first team Nielsen and I spent time with was a group of students from Sweden, who where part of Outlook program. We also spent time with a team of four from Texas, who came to do some teaching at the Bible school as well as some other ministry works. In less then a week, we are heading to Iris Ministries in Maputo Mozambique. During our second time back in Uganda, we spent with the team from Sweden where we did some adventurous activities. It was such a blessing to be able to travel around and explore different parts of Uganda with the team. We spent about a week traveling with them. During that time the Niel and the Swedish team went white water rafting. I didn’t not go because I felt as if the Lord told me not to, but I was able to go on a ATV ride to see the water falls along the Nile. (Not going end up being a good thing, considering some of the team got sick for a few days from in taking of the water from the Nile.) After that we went to a lake called Bunyonyi, where we got to relax and see the beautiful views of the mountains and lake. One of the days there we went to see a group of people called the Pigmies. These groups of people live a primitive life style. God had challenged me during are visit there. There was a little boy who was walking around naked, while most of the children there had some sort of half decent clothing. God began to speak to me very clearly telling me to give the boy my sweet shirt. I replied back saying, “What, my favorite sweet shirt? I am going to freeze!” (We where in the mountains where it got pretty cold at night,and it was the only one I had with me.) God spoke again, saying, “Give it to him.” Knowing it was what he wanted I gave it to him. The boy became so happy and was filled with joy, even though we could not even communicate, due to the language barrier. It wasn’t until after that I realized that even though I gave it to him, I gave it out of a cold heart and not a willing and loving heart. Later God began to work on this issue in my heart where I began to understand what he really wanted to do. I began see that when we give out our love its not our love but God’s love. We’re like a tree and as we grow in love and grow in understanding in love we produce fruit. That fruit some might take and think that they are stealing or hurting us but really they our actually tasting the love of God in us. (Psalms 1:1-6; James 3:13-18). After our time of being in the mountains we went to the school in Mbarara with the Swedish team. There we participated in a bible training class. We had a teacher teach that week about the Kingdom of God and how we need to renew are minds in Christ and stop making excuse because of our culture habits (Colossians 2:8). During the week I went to a local school called Adullam where I got to work on a building project. There I helped dig the foundation for a building which will be used for hosting the children that come from the streets. The following week we went back to the main city Kampala where we meant up with a team of four from Texas. With that team we went to visit 108 children which they sponsor through their church. To get to where the children were, it took us 12 hours on a bus ride to get there. It wasn’t exactly what you can call a smooth ride either. During the last 2 hours we went on what I think has been one of the bumpiest and most tiring rides yet. It makes me laugh, because back at home we complain about one pot hole, where here the whole road is a pot whole with lots of ditches. Once we arrived there we rested up. The following day we prepared something for the children. The Texas team did some teachings to the children on how to pray and gave them some gifts; Nielsen and I helped out in what ever way we could. The second day there we filled up 120 soccer balls for the children which when we started to hand them out the children were filled with SO much joy and were very eager to get their own. The smiles on there faces where so incredible to see. After spending the day with the children we went around to a few homes to visit some of the guardians of the children. The next day we visited a few more and then traveled back to Kampala for Sunday where the Texas leaders taught at church. Sunday I received my package from home, Praise the Lord. Thank you everybody who wrote notes and sent something along. That Sunday, the Texas team, I, and Nielsen all went to the school in Mbarara (Outlook), where Denise did teaching all week about The Issues of the Heart. The teaching was quite powerful and every impacting in my life. It brought out a lot of issues in my life I need to deal with and confront. This helped me to break of many bondages and strong holds which where holding me back from experiencing God in a deeper level. It has been very difficult to deal with some but God has given me grace and I have found my peace with in him which I was lacking so much of. (John 14:27; Romans 5:1-5). What she spoke of really helped to open my eyes to seeing the freedom we can find when we allow are emotions to be freed. I began to realize that when we hide things from people it doesn’t allow us to be loved fully by others but only let them love part of us which is not who we really are. Denise talked a lot about how culture has made are hearts cold and keeps us from being free as well. See gave us this quote which I feel really sums the gist of it all up. (“Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it in tact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket-safe, dark, motionless, airless-it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.” From The Four Loves by C.S. Lewis.) That very week we go to experience all the different culture groups which where at the school. (Sweden, Ethiopia, Kenya, Congo, America, and Tanzania.) Each group had to make a meal for all the other students. During my time here at Outlook I have been challenged to do some leading in worship. Which for the first time playing guitar and singing in front of people was quite nerve wrecking. My last week in Uganda has been a great time of fun and relaxing. Sunday the students and us split into groups where we went to different churches to minister to them. Once again I had play the guitar and lead worship, which is still very difficult. Early in the week we all went to a refugee camp with 50 thousand people from Congo and Rwanda, most of which are from Congo. They had fled there countries due to rebels attacking their homes. While being there we where able to hang out and a talked with different people where we got to ask questions to them and they to us. I also got to give out some apple snitch’s to the children, which they loved. Wednesday Nielsen and I headed off to Queen Elizabeth National Park. A little story about arriving there. Once arriving to the gate of the park we had to hire a taxi driver to take us into the park. There were three taxi drives, two where arguing over who was going to take us, while the other just stood there. While standing there and trying to figure out what we where going to do, because we where absolutely clueless about what to do and where we were actually going. I felt as if the Lord had spoke to me to make them each flip a coin and the one who wins will take us. It ends up that we got the guy who wasn’t arguing over who was going to take us. Me and Nielsen both felt as if that was the guy we should be going with. It ended up that he helped us save a lot of money and took us on a incredible safari tour of the park. Our first night there we saw Elephants, Water Buck, Fish Eagle, a Leopard, Lions, and many other animals. The Leopard we chased after in the car through the park, which was not allowed, but our driver wanted to. We ended up being only 15 feet away from the leopard as it climbed a tree. The Lions we did the same thing with and got to be 15 to 20 feet away from them in the park. It was quite an awesome experience being that close to such dangerous and wild animals. We left the next day while doing another game drive in the morning where we saw a lot of the same animals plus Hippos. God blessed us greatly during that time. Due to the limited access internet, I have not been able to send this news letter out yet. We have arrived safe and sound to Maputo, Mozambique. Please continue to keep us in your prayers as we travel and continue on are spiritual journey where God is continuing to equip us with his wisdom and love. Thanks you for all your support and prayers.
God bless, Devon Krasley
Nielsen speaking. Thanks to Devon for writing that so I didn’t have to this time ha. We’re currently at Iris Ministries in Maputo, Mozambique. By God’s grace we made it safe and sound after a 3 hour plane ride to Johannesburg, lots of waiting around, and then last minute night bus tickets (and we didn’t get left behind at the border!), but that’s a whole other story. We experienced God’s faithfulness once again. We’ve been here over a week already and it’s been fantastic! They house around 300 children of all ages, run schools, and many different outreach programs that visitors can participate in, such as garbage dump, hospital and street ministry. I don’t really have any more time so hopefully this will give you a brief picture of what we’re up to here.
Thanks for keeping up with us. Blessings.
