LOOKS LIKE WE MADE IT!!!!

Saturday has been a bit of an eventful day.....in a very good way!!  We woke up earlier than we had anticipated in order to make it to the airfield on time.  This meant that we only got about 4 hours of sleep.  AND, this 4 hours was cut short by a horrible thunderstorm in the middle of the night that woke everyone up thinking, "what was that?"......especially in light of the previous days' news.  It was by no means a peaceful storm that someone could just sleep through (except for Daniel.....he knew nothing about it when we talked at breakfast this morning).  We made the drive to the MAF air field and so many things remind me of northern India in the foothills of the Himalayan Mountains.  The roads, the houses, the people, the poverty.  It just overwhelms me.  We were able to get our bags checked in (somewhat half-heartedly) and weighed (we were good with the weight, so nothing had to stay in Uganda).

Our plane that will take us into South Sudan!

     We found out this morning (or maybe late yesterday) that now all people entering the country of South Sudan have to go first to Juba in order to receive the passport stamps and visa, then we are directed onward to our destination.  We boarded our plane with Simon Elliott (one is his real name and other is not, but I can't remember which) to take us to Mundri.  The flight was very smooth and just such a wonderful time with the LORD.  Some things that God always teaches me when I fly, but even more so in the charter plane, is how big He is.  He is absolutely incomprehensible!!  He created this whole earth by simply speaking it into being, so why do I ever question His ability to provide for my needs?  I know that He is sovereign and loving and caring and compassionate, but also just and righteous and full of wrath and anger due sinners.  I don't pretend to know how these work together, but when flying over southern Uganda and into southern South Sudan, I simply can't fathom it.  The land is so green and lush - much more than I was expecting (probably not as much as some may think, but much more than I had expected).  We flew over the Nile River and on my side of the plane seemed like a simple stream, but on the left side of the plane was an overwhelming body of water.  Again, God did that.  He gave us a beautiful day with little turbulence to fly in and blessed us with views of such a wonderful country that not so very long ago was torn by civil war where all of the people that we will meet were affected.

We stopped in Arua to register with Uganda that we were no longer going to be in their country, then we headed to Juba.  When we landed, there were many UN planes and helicopters at the airport as well as a paved runway!!  NOT what we were expecting, but a blessed surprise.  One of the memorable moments for all of us was that this is the first stamp any of us have in our passports from the "Republic of South Sudan" - now it's own independent country.  What a blessing to be in such a new country and to be able to take part in what the LORD is doing here.  While in line to get our entry stamp in our passports, I overheard 1 lady ask her pilot if she was in Africa.  He replied, "yes, we are in South Sudan."  Ummmm, it's a pretty difficult place to get to, so I can't imagine someone just coming by accident!  How could you not know where you are?  Or, at least that you're on the continent of Africa??  But, I digress......we were able to obtain our stamps in our passports and we were freed to fly to Mundri.

       After 1 somewhat interesting attempt to land on the airstrip (there were cows on the runway), we were able to land safely and we were greeted by Jeffries, Coffee and Repent.  Such beautiful brothers in the faith in South Sudan and it was such a blessing for them to come and greet us and make sure that we were taken care of.  We traveled from the air strip to the "BrookHills Compound" in Mundri, South Sudan which is where we'll be staying for the week.  It's much hotter here than it was in Uganda, but I know that the LORD will provide for us while He is allowing us to do His work here.  What a blessing and an honor to be part of building the kingdom of God.  We visited under the Mango tree and had our orientation with Jeffries and Repent and discussed the events of the coming week.

My bed at the MAF guest house

The afternoon was filled with activities too, after we arrived in Mundri, but Bethany and I were TIRED!  We laid down to take a 30-minute nap.  Well, 1.5 hours later, we woke up and realized that we were missing out on some time with the children who are sponsored through 4 Corners.  What a disappointment to have missed the first part of this, but we caught up quickly by playing with and taking pictures of the kids who had already finished with the afternoon's activities.

BrookHills Compound

Also, this afternoon, we met Paul, the "Archbishop of the world" (I will refer to him as Archbishop mostly from now on).  He is such a delightful man who longs to teach other God's grace and salvation in Christ alone.  He leads Sunday School classes and also serves in his church whenever he is needed.  Such an amazing blessing to meet him.  I asked him how he got his name and his reply was, "I call myself that because I want to be a bishop, but there are already so many.  I want to be the bishop of other denominations, but there are so many....there are no vacancies.  So, the vacancy is Archbishop of the world, so I will take that one."  ALRIGHTY!  You got it was my thought and I will call him Archbishop from now on.  He has thought that "Louanne" is too hard to pronounce, so he has renamed me "Lois."  I can handle that....

In the evening, after we all got cleaned up, we were served a delicious dinner and had our evening devotion where Jeffries shared a history of the church in South Sudan and also shared a lot of the struggles that they currently face.  One of the main ones that he mentioned was that the people struggle with trusting in the faith of God to produce works, but have gone to more of a "works based" type of thinking overall as justification for their sins.  He mentioned that this type of thinking is much more reminiscent of the Roman Catholic Church than that of the evangelical church.

Overall, it's been a FANTASTIC day where God has shown each of us so many different attributes of His character.  Just as a reminder of the ones that are so evident today: He is sovereign, loving, caring, righteous, full of anger, forgiving, limitless, independent of space and matter and He created this world and these people.  He has a great plan to make His name known among them and we are all grateful that He has chosen to allow us to participate in bringing His great name great glory which we rejoice in!