Today is Palm Sunday.  As we passed several other churches on the way to District Conference, the streets were lined with people selling palm leaves to worshipers going inside to worship.  The thought came to me of the people selling outside the temple when Christ came to the temple.  There he found people more concerned with the selling than with the attitude of worshiping. I will admit I loved the idea of the palms to wave.  It gave me food for thought.  Would I have chosen to be one waving those palms when the Savior entered into the gates of the city?  Do I now wave palms of consecration in my personal life?  

As I get to know the members here in Rwanda I am amazed at their level of commitment.  We have a branch president who joined the church 5 years ago.  His wife is not a member.  He does not have a job.  He comes every day to the chapel to assist in pathway, seminary, cleaning, or to help his members through interviews of encouragement.  Many of his branch members are also unemployed.  Last week he baptized his oldest son who is 18.  He has such a positive attitude and with optimism says God is preparing a good job for him.  

I am sitting here in-between conference sessions.  We are listening to the meetings in the language of Kinyrwanda. A translator then speaks in English for those few that need translation.  Our visiting area Authorith, Elder Ndinga, from Nairobi speaks French.  So when he speaks his words are translated from French to Kinyrwanda and then into English.  We wonder how accurate his message is when we finally get it but always the message is inspiring.  They teach from the scriptures and the handbook.  We had about 300 attend today including 21 investigators.  

Speaking of investigators, two weeks ago we had 2 investigators come.  Last week those two returned again to sacrament meeting and between those two they brought 15 more with them.  The Missionaries can hardly keep up with their teaching load.  President told us last night he has  expected to receive an additional 18 missionaries assigned to Rwanda in preparation of the new mission but has been given none.  Rwanda is a young adult district.  There is only one high priest in the entire country.  The church is young and rapidly growing.  

We are struggling with government leaders in Uganda wanting bribes to get our projects moving.  We are doing what we can where we can but this week we did get exciting news - clearance for our Grace School Project.  We can only do half what they need but we think we have a partner who is interested in completing the remainder of the school classes we can not build.  This will give that school 7 classrooms.  We are now looking for a sponsor for a borehole to give them water and to pay for a kitchen.

This week we had a power week.  On top of the news for Grace school, the Lord Mayor of Kigali City requested a meeting with us.  We went fasting not sure the purpose of the meeting but needing support in city sectors and other districts /sectors beyond.  Rwanda has recently changed their requirements to do humanitarian projects.  Each sector or district is now requiring an organization to register and join a form which gives permission to do work and tracks where and what the projects are.  Until now many organizations were just doing work and asking the districts to maintain projects but the districts can’t keep up with the maintenance load.  In addition they found some organizations doing the same work in the same areas when other equally needy areas went without help. This decision to get organized is amazing idea but it has slowed us down in receiving permissions. 

Back to our city meeting.  To our relief, they were very warm and welcoming.  They asked for our help.  They are very concerned with their youth getting into drugs, alcohol, immorality, and stealing.  In our first meeting last December the city asked for the help of the church in three project focuses.  One was a business mentoring program which is out side the parameters of humanitarian so we could not embrace it.  The other two we are slowly embracing, one school at a time.  Where we failed is that we have not informed the city of our projects, just the sectors.  That kind of information is cultural so thay forgave us and smiled as we told them of our projects. So now, we will write a letter to inform them on a monthly basis.  Secondly we gave a copy of the non denominational My Standards Booklet which the area presidency has recently published.  This is a booklet much like the Strength of Youth booklet but is not church oriented.  The area presidency has asked us to get permission to distribute it as we meet with the ministry of education in both countries.  The Lord Mayor and the entire committee loved the booklet idea to give their 6th to 12th grade students.  They asked if it could be translated into Kinyrwanda for them.  They want to roll it out as quickly as possible and he will present it to the government at large. 

To top off a good week, we were told we have a water specialist coming from Lehi, UT to train us in water wells and spring captures.  We are so needful of his help and we get him for a whole week.  3 days in each country.  We are very excited.  Elder and Sister Mallor are serving a 15 year mission in water.  They consult all over the world so we feel very blessed to get a chance for training.  

The only disappointment is that our new CES couple arrive in Uganda the same day as the Mallors arrive in Rwanda so we can’t be here in Rwanda to properly welcome them.  It will be so nice to not be the lone couple serving in Rwanda.  

Happy Easter to all and to all a good night as it is now 11:30 pm.

Elder and Sister Bird

 

 

Hi everyone,                                                                            March 8, 2022

Time for an update on our work.  We are in Uganda right now and dying in 98 degrees and no air conditioning.  Can't wait to go back to Rwanda in two weeks.  It is 10 degrees cooler there.  Each Country and home have their advantages and disadvantages.  That is good because it gives us something to look forward to when we need to return to either country.  Tomorrow we are receiving a shipment of 10,000 PPE kits for Covid.  Aren't we about through with this Covid stuff?  Rwanda is still masking but Uganda is beginning to shed them.  We are still required to wear them as missionaries.  We hear you are back to normal in Utah church meetings.  Can't wait for that decision here.  Receiving a huge wheel chair shipment as this week.  That program has a lot of hic-ups in it.  It's taken about 4 months to get them across the border from Kenya and even though the chairs are donated by the church and are supposed to be free, they often charge the patrons for them.  Somehow that money slips into someone's pocket but no one knows who's pocket that is. 

We have at least three emails per week asking for us to support someone's NGO which usually is paying someone a wage.  Good thing we have guidelines so we can say sorry - that isn't within our guidelines.  Uganda is so full of NGOs it's become a joke among all the senior missionaries.  The white skin and tags seem to attract the requests.  We all joke that when we go shopping there are always two prices, the black man's and then the white man's.  One couple even pays a ward member to do their produce shopping for them because it is cheaper and they get quality produce.  Wish I had that option.  We are in cities.  They are VERY rural.  (Wouldn't trade jobs with them.  They are real sports.) 

Held a bid opening for a medical center last Friday.  We will build a new critical care maternity unit for mothers and a neo-natal baby unit.  Ladies were laying on the ground under a tree waiting to deliver. One delivery bed only to service about 20 babies a day.  All 6 recovery beds in one room were full.  Attending mothers, sisters, aunts, or friends bring them meals until they go home which is usually within eight hours and on a motorcycle holding the new baby. 

We are hoping to start two similar projects at other medical centers. We have several school projects adding new classrooms, squat latrines and water tanks to public schools.   Schools are the bulk of our work.  We are hoping to diversify a little by doing a hillside flooding retention project with the city and a pig farm project with the Episcopal Methodist church.  Both the latter projects are in planning stages.  Funding still needs to be approved.  I can't believe how much work it takes to get a project completed.  It has taken us until this month to even get one started.  That has been three months of identifying, planning, estimating, clearing funding and now bidding.  The construction work now begins. Hand over in four to six months if all goes as planned. 

Our biggest frustrations have been – poor or no internet service, power outages, a landlord who is awful to deal with, and no church credit card to charge office expenses and gas to.  The internet service issue we will live with because there is no fix.  We bought our own toilet seat and tools to repair a few things in this new apartment.  We learned that we pay for power ahead of time each month, not just when the meter runs out and our mission credit card finally arrived today.  We are doing fabulous!!!!! 

We had two prayers answered this week.  In fact, both within the last two days.  We arrived back in Uganda last week.  Thursday was the health center bidding with contractors.  On Friday we had a long list of things we really needed to get accomplished while in Uganda but we needed to have contacts in the government to assist in the goals.  The Area Presidency have published a non-denominational My Standards book that is much like our church Strength of Youth booklets.  They asked us to present it to the schools as we meet with them when doing projects and to also ask for permission to hold Seminary for the teen age students who are members as well as any other students who wish to attend.  We included our needs in our prayers and then moved forward patiently as we waited for Heavenly Father’s help. Within two days both needs were met.  At Christmas I baked cookies and took them to each neighbor and wished them a Merry Christmas.  The lady across the hall from us stopped us as we were returning from our morning walk.  She welcomed us back and thanked us for being so kind.  She asked about our church tags so we invited her in.  Rita visited with us for an hour asking about our beliefs.  We found out she works for the Kampala Board of Education. She knew the name of the person we needed to talk to in education and has made the appointment for us.  The very next day a member of Parliament who attended the kick off to the Health Center addition asked if he could meet with us.  He wants a project in a neighboring district to be considered because their health center needs a full maternity center.  They have nothing and the mothers are delivering in their one and only exam room. We were shocked he wasn’t asking for more in his own district area.  Good man.  And we found out he is a less active member.  He was very interested in our education project and wants to embrace it.  He asked if he could arrange a dinner meeting with 5 to 10 other members of parliament for us to present our program to.  Oh how the Lord does work in little ways to accomplish great things.  We are simply his tools. 

I have sincerely been reminded how many blessing come when we try to live the gospel.  Just try.  No one is perfect at living all the commandments or putting forth effort to be good every day, but the Lord forgives our mistakes as long as we just try our best.  The blessing just pour into our lives when we put our heart into good works.   

Have a great week.  Try to stay focused on goodness this week.  Read at least three verses of scripture every day. Find gratitude in something every day.  Pray to be a tool to do something good for someone and then watch for the miracle.  It will come.  Don’t forget to record your miracle. 

Sister Bird