Consider this question: How is a long-lasting, discipleship community created? If you have had the privilege to be a part of such a community, what did that look like for you?  If you haven’t had a chance to check out the vlog below of Colleen and Stella’s chat, please do before reading on.  It’s fantastic perspective of what community typically looks like here in Uganda.

Those of you who are reading this are most likely coming from different nations, backgrounds and cultures.  Our own cultures deeply affect our perspective of community, what it looks like, and how it flourishes.  However, thinking about community and discipleship, perhaps we can also be challenged by looking at what makes other communities flourish, and how we can carry those into our own?

One of the best pieces of advice we received from another missionary living here Arua when we arrived was, “Embrace the interruptions.”   Coming from a western culture in the US but now living in Uganda, it was a challenge for us to step into a culture with more of a “door is always open” perspective.  We wanted to guard our time, having only scheduled visits.  However, the longer we lived and invested in our community, the beauty that occurred as we embraced these interruptions. When we left our door open, we found that people were feeling more relaxed as they came to visit.   As a result, we are making room for deepened relationships and greater discipleship opportunities.   

In our community in Arua, we are always welcomed on our way somewhere to a handshake, invitation to a cup of tea, or even a meal.  Relationship and time together is highly valued.   Fellowship often happens sitting together at home, with limited to no time restraints.  How contradictory, especially to those from cultures that have a more “on-the-go” mentality.  While there are times and places for this, if the goal is to build a community of discipleship, we must look at what others around us value and what will create community spaces.  

Stella said, “Preaching the gospel starts in community.” Of course, we know that the Word of God is what transforms hearts and lives.  But it most cases, it can’t come in isolation.   When a person is sharing their life’s highs and lows with someone else, and walking the day-to-day together, it creates depth and richness.   They are not walking something alone anymore.  They are walking with a brother or sister who cares about their heart and can encourage them in the journey.  Then, when the Word of God is part of this relationship, it’s grounded in Him, not people.   There’s an amazing opportunity to witness the Holy Spirit at work, doing what only He can do.   Within our community, we can rest in His goodness in hard times, seek Him together, and celebrate when He moves.   This is where discipleship enters community. 

So, what does that look like for you? Does this type of community described seem familiar to you?  Or, as you read this, did you long for this same type of community?  If it’s not something present in your life, what is one small step you could take in that direction to create it?  Maybe it’s inviting someone over for a cup of coffee and a chat.  Maybe it’s intentionally stopping and talking to people in your neighborhood when you go out on a walk.   Maybe it’s bigger, like perhaps attempting to start a fellowship in your workplace or with your neighbors. 

How can you preach the gospel through your community?

We are not meant to be alone! God has created you to need other people to build you up and support you! AND you are called to support and encourage those around you. Instead of a traditional blog, we decided to make a video blog discussion among our House to House Team. We hope you find this discussion encouraging to to reach out to someone in your community today!

“Some Christians try to go to heaven alone, in solitude. But believers are not compared to bears or lions or other animals that wander alone. Those who belong to Christ are sheep in this respect, that they love to get together. Sheep go in flocks, and so do God's people.”

Charles Spurgeon

The purpose of fellowship is to gather together for a common purpose.  Discipleship is coming together for the purpose of growing together in God’s word.  Sounds like a pretty common purpose, right?  Looking at these definitions, it is clear that fellowship and discipleship easily go hand in hand. 

Recently we had a Christmas party for our staff that work on our compound, which consists of three watchmen and one house helper.  We’ve been working with these individuals for the last three or so years, but have never had the opportunity to put together a party for them.  Our helper put together their meal of choice: beef, rice, cassava, greens, and some sodas to drink.  Our kids helped us prepare some of our favorite Christmas cookies to share a little taste of our culture in the states.  We welcomed our staff into our home, where they sat in our living room surrounded by Christmas decorations and music.

As I sat and observed the staff during the party, I was overwhelmed with the pure joy I sensed from them.  I’ve never seen them so happy, almost giddy like children.  They laughed and joked in both English and Lugbara, ate multiple plates of food, drank several sodas (one staff member had five!), and just enjoyed one another.  We sat together for almost 4 hours, sharing stories and laughing until we cried.  A couple of our staff said multiple times, “We will never EVER forget this day.”  There was deep satisfaction in each of their spirits, as well as their bellies!

After that party, I noticed a slight shift in their relationships with one another. It changed how they worked with one another, how they spoke to each other, and they just flat out laughed together more!  Not that it was negative before, but it was apparent that our time of fellowship built more unity and togetherness.

I don’t share this story to toot our own horns by any means, in fact the opposite.  I share this story because the Lord taught me so much about His gift of fellowship.  We were so humbled and thankful for the experience that day. To us, it wasn’t that hard to provide the food for the meal or the space to gather.  It was intentional, purposeful fellowship. We wanted to bless our staff to show our gratitude for all the things they do for us every day.  We wanted to enjoy them, and allow them to enjoy one another, to celebrate all they’ve achieved together the last year.  But as a result, there was a change in their hearts, and definitely ours as well. To me, it was a small taste of “every tribe, nation, in tongue,” as it states in Revelation.

 I love the focus of House to House, and that its vision is deep, purposeful fellowship with one another, plus rich discipleship. The goal is to grow together with one another, no matter where you are in your journey, towards being more and more like Jesus.  It’s a loving, supportive, community that goes deep in the Word, and deep with one another.  Praises are rejoiced, needs are shared and sometimes met by the group members, and insight into God’s Word is discussed.  Friends leave blessed by what they’ve learned and how they’ve encouraged one another.  It’s both fellowship and discipleship, which God has given us through the body of Christ as His Word. And His desire is for us to be impacted by it!

“And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.”  Hebrews 10:24-25

At House to House, we have long ago given up counting “salvations” in our ministry as our definition of success. Don’t get me wrong, we love it when people decide to make a step toward following Christ, but we know that growing with God never stops! Accepting Jesus as your Savior is just the beginning of the never ending discovery with God.

We have decided instead to define success as people who are in community with one another seeking God together, and inevitably growing in their faith. Sometimes, the people who attend our bible sharing groups have not made a commitment to follow Jesus. Sometimes they come with resentment from former religious experiences. Sometimes they come with simple curiosity knowing nothing about following Jesus. Sometimes they have been “saved” for years, but they don’t know how to live out their faith in a community.  But in any case they are welcome just as they are.

We are constantly working out our salvation throughout our lives. Cultivating it and maturing in our faith through our experiences with God and with our community as it says in Philippians 2:12. 

So then, my dear ones, just as you have always obeyed [my instructions with enthusiasm], not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence, continue to work out your salvation [that is, cultivate it, bring it to full effect, actively pursue spiritual maturity] with awe-inspired fear and trembling [using serious caution and critical self-evaluation to avoid anything that might offend God or discredit the name of Christ].- Philippians 2:12 AMP

If we were to make the mistake of making the goal of our ministry "salvations”, then we would miss all the opportunities for discipleship, growth and change that must follow after (and before) that commitment to Christ. If salvation were the goal, what would happen if someone attended a bible sharing group for months or years and did not commit themselves to Christ? Would we have failed in our mission? If salvation is the goal, then yes, we would have failed. But success at House to House is not counted in salvations, it’s counted in relational commitment to the community and to God. So, if we see the commitment of someone to engage with a community of believers, we define that as success because that person is growing in their community of faith. Maybe that person goes from hating Christians, to hating them less, to even liking some of them. Maybe one day that person will make a commitment to follow Jesus, but that decision is between them and Jesus and not for any of us to define. 

We are all on this journey of faith. Sometimes our faith journey is filled with deep growth and other times our faith can feel stagnant. But in any way, we are working out our salvation in our relationship with Jesus. We cannot rest our faith on a single moment of commitment to God. Much like the intimate relationships in our life, our salvation takes work, conversation (with God in prayer in this case), time and vulnerability. Let us surrender any pride or guardedness over to God and seek Him together and trust that we will grow in our faith. 

Our house in Arua is located on the edge of the city, feeling much more rural than city-like.  Outside our gate there are plots of land growing various vegetables, ground nuts, and sorghum.  Ladies pass by carrying basins of produce and charcoal on their head, walking to town to attempt to sell all they are carrying.  Others stop and knock on our gate, selling liquid soap they made or small bundles of ginger and garlic. 

Our neighbor, Gabriel, has an abundance of mango and avocado trees on his property that provide food for his family throughout the year.  He also owns a small plot where he grows coffee.  The coffee grows year-round, where it is then harvested in October, roasted, ground, and sold in the market.   For the year, with their coffee lot, they make just over 100 USD. This could cover several months of rent or a portion of school fees for one of their children.

Shortly after we moved to our house in June of 2020, there was a knock at the gate.  We had never met Gabriel before, but he entered with a warm smile and two avocados in his hand.   He extended them to us with joy and welcomed us to the community.  His family has deep roots in the neighborhood, so he shared a bit of the history with us.   He told us if we needed anything, to please reach out.  He wanted us to feel at home.   This was the beginning of a sweet friendship, not only with Gabriel, but with his whole family.  The gift of two avocados later grew into a large box of full of the round, delicious fruit at Christmas time.  They were joyfully delivered, with nothing expected in return.  They just said, “We give all the glory to God for what we have, and we share it with you.  Be blessed.”

Then, in early April of this year, shortly before we left Uganda for our first return to America since moving overseas, Gabriel stopped by with his wife.  They came carrying a large pot full of fresh ground coffee they had recently prepared from their coffee harvest.  We were stunned, knowing the value of the coffee and what it provided for their family.  We initially argued, but he insisted.  We persuaded them to sit with us so we could prepare some and enjoy a cup together.   I was brought to tears by their love, humility, and generosity to us.  The next week I returned the pot with pumpkin muffins inside as a heartfelt thank-you.  Gabriel smiled and said, “We give to you with nothing expected in return. You are with us, and we are happy to have you in our community.”  They prayed blessing over us and our family, and we parted ways. 

What does it mean to love your neighbor?

For our family, these stories I share are just a small taste of the love we have felt during our time in Arua.   Gabriel and his family exude love, kindness, and servitude. In their words and actions, it’s clear that they love the Lord with all their being.

Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’   This is the first and greatest commandment.  And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.” – Matthew 22:37-39

There are so many ways you can love a neighbor.   Simple gestures of service, giving, and words can be a huge blessing.  But I love how the commandment Jesus gave first focused on loving God.  In loving God, that also means we know how much we are loved and openly receive God’s love in our hearts.  When we understand how deeply loved we are by God, how much would that impact how we love others around us? 

Our heart at House to House is that, as we spend time in the Word with those around us, they understand that deep, vast love the Father has for them.   Our heart is that any burdens or shames they are carrying would be lifted through God’s Truth and love in Kingdom community.  We pray they will carry each other’s burdens, lifting each other up and encouraging one another, and serve each other in joy and gladness.  In doing this, light breaks through the darkness, and communities are transformed.    

May we each discover the depth of God’s love for us, and may our love for Him grow so vastly that we pour it out to those in our lives, just as Gabriel did. 

It’s June in Uganda, which means that it’s short term team season. There are a lot of visitors in Uganda, especially into northern Uganda coming into northern cities to evangelize and preach the gospel. As someone who participated in several short term teams in my life, I understand the compassion, motivation and excitement for sharing the gospel in a new place. However, Uganda does not need more evangelists. 

Uganda needs disciples and disciple makers. In order to be a disciple maker you need to be committed to the person that you are discipling and be a support on their faith journey as they continue to grow with God. Unfortunately, a two week visit into Northern Uganda with brief encounters with people will not make true disciples of Jesus.

In an effort to become more like Jesus we need to constantly be connecting with Him and to be in a community who asks about our connection with Him and cares about our relationship with Jesus. 

The point in which somebody receives salvation or a “soul is saved” is simply a starting point of a, hopefully, lifelong journey of continuously growing with God. If we stopped growing here we would miss out on all that God has for us. As disciples, we are ever changing to become more like Jesus and aligning ourselves with Him and the things that He believes and the way that He thinks. This takes time and community support.

I recently read ‘Renovated: God, Dallas Willard, and the Church That Transforms’ by Dr. Jim Wilder and he called this type of thinking, “Thinking  with God” instead of just thinking about God. It’s a subtle but profound shift away from trying to obey God’s rules, to thinking the way God thinks. They both have the same initial appearance, but aligning our mind with God’s has transformational impact. When our attention shifts to some other aspect of spiritual life, those learned behaviors won’t stick  unless we’ve learned to think God’s thoughts and been changed on the inside.

Thinking with God is difficult, and not commonly taught, but it is an important to do so that we can move forward in our relationship with Him. We need to understand HOW He thinks and HOW He operates. Then once we have aligned our thought’s with God we have become His mature disciples and we can say, “Imitate me as I imitate Christ.” like Paul did in 1 Corinthians 11:1. 

Also on this journey to become mature disciples of Christ, we need to have the support of a community with other like-minded people who are also trying to align themselves and their relationship with God. This group helps reinforce the things God is speaking to us. By being in this community, we are encouraged to press into Christ more and more. Our community can also call us back to Him when it’s difficult for us to remember why we even started this journey in the first place. 

Uganda needs more disciples, not more evangelists. More people committed to walking day in and day out with those around them furthering them in their faith. Myself and our team have seen it time and time again, that people are evangelized to, make a decision to follow Christ and are left to fend for themselves. 

Evangelism without discipleship is making spiritual orphans. 

It is our belief at House To House, that the best people to both share and walk alongside Ugandans who want to align themselves with Jesus are other Uganda’s who are already doing the same thing. Ugandan believers who have experienced the same culture, the same setbacks, AND have also chosen to follow God and to continuously ask for Him in their lives. 

If you are Ugandan reading this, then I hope that you will be inspired to gather your friends or family together to begin to align your thoughts with His thoughts and deepening your relationship with a God who loves you. 

And if you’re a foreigner who is planning your trip to Uganda, I ask that you would pray about using your time to support the ministry work that is happening here through the Ugandan disciple makers that live in and love this country and it’s people. You may not be the one to save souls here, but your encouragement of and solidarity with other believers here is like a cup of cold water on a hot day. (Also, you should totally go on a safari. It’s worth it)

But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me.  John 15:26

Living in this day and age, we have resources at our fingertips.  In-person trainings, Zoom trainings, books, podcasts, online materials, etc.  While those things are wonderful and can be very useful, it can often lead one to prioritize those things over God himself.  It can lead people to think that those things must be the first go-to, and the end result is less time in God’s Truth and more time spent in man-made materials.  People are missing the most important and source of Truth that we need that is a direct link to the Father – the Holy Spirit.  In John 14, Jesus promises his disciples the Spirit of Truth, but he says, “….the world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him or knows him (vs. 17).”

When discipling friends here in Uganda, talking with them about the Holy Spirit is probably one of the things I get the most excited about.  What a true gift that our Heavenly Father desires to be constantly present with us, to lead us, and to guide us!  And what a GIFT that is that we get to share the Holy Spirit with others.  The lie many people believe is that, in order to disciple someone, they must attend trainings at a church (preferably with a certificate in the end to prove it).  Then just maybe they’ll start thinking about discipling others, but their confidence level is low because it’s within themselves.  And their mission circle may be very small, maybe only sticking within their comfortable church or community setting.   

When equipping local partners to disciple, House to House prioritizes the value that the groups should give space for the Holy Spirit to lead the group.   The structure of the discipleship groups is to teach each member that they can lead a group, because they have the Holy Spirit at work, the Helper, and that qualifies them to be a laborer for Christ.  No formal training or certificate is needed if the Holy Spirit is allowed to lead.   

I love reading the scriptures on when the Holy Spirit came and filled a room of believers, and He equipped them to go out.  The Spirit gave them power to go out.  You can’t rest in that guarantee from a podcast or book.  Allowing the Holy Spirit to come and lead the discipleship groups makes space for the amazing things God can do. It’s been beautiful to witness our local friends reach out to their neighbors and co-workers, and also share vision for new people and new places that God has placed on their hearts. 

May we all walk with the Spirit of Truth today, allowing Him to connect us to the Father, His heart for those around us, and to lead us in our days. 

I grew up in a time when a common training in the church was to learn how give your salvation testimony. In these trainings, the framework often prescribed was to share how you once were bad and then Jesus came into your life and finally, how everything was better. Though my own personal testimony fit this mold in many ways, I often shy away from these salvation testimony formulas. I would cringe as I watched many of my Christian friends, who had been raised by loving parents in a Christian environment, struggle with how to package their conversion moment as a 4 year old child. In reality their childhood conversion moment was not the end of their journey of faith, merely the beginning. But we were told to share that we were saved; that was the end of our salvation testimony, lets put a nice little bow around it. 

This, however, is not the real life of a believer.

I feel that we are setting up new believers for failure with these types of testimonies. These salvation stories do not embody the ups, downs, doubts and faith filled moments of a life lived with Jesus. Those of us who believe that Jesus is our savior are still in a process of maturity of faith every day. He paid for our sins so that we could live our whole life with God. Believers still have struggles; they still have doubts and fears but the difference is that God is present with us and we go through it with Him. 

If we can share with non-believers our honest life as followers of Jesus, then we can show them a life in relationship with an active, loving God. We can show them how God works through us in hard times. We can show what it’s like to live faithfully, trusting God.  Even when the circumstances are stacked against us. When we are vulnerable enough to share with non-believers all of the ups and downs, then we can show them the realities of a life lived in a relationship with Jesus. Then whenever they choose to engage with Jesus they will not be disillusioned by a “fix-everything”, “there are no problems” God.  They will experience what you’ve shown, God’s ever loving presence that is with them in all the hardships of life. 

God calls us to make disciples and one of the most important ways to draw people to God's amazing love is sharing our own story. Not the fairytale where it all ends up magically ok, but our REAL story, our PERSONAL journey of faith. About our difficulties, our struggles, our realities and the ever present love of God through it all. That's how we make disciples... so go and share your story.

Baiti

Throughout 2021, our team was able to meet weekly with Baiti for discipleship and study of scripture. Through the encouragement of our team and his growing understanding of God’s love for him, Baiti has begun to grow in his faith and walking in obedience to Christ and in loving others. Baiti is a humble individual that runs a health clinic in the Arua area. Stirred by his growing relationship with God, Baiti has begun regularly reaching out to neighbor kids, signing worship songs and sharing stories from the Bible. Additionally, in the midst of many challenges, Baiti has also shown great grace, patience and endurance as his relationship with God has grown. Baiti is a blessing to those around him and it is exciting to see what the Lord continues to do through him in the future.

2021 was an encouraging year for House to House as we have seen the spread of the gospel despite lockdowns and uncertainty brought by the continued pandemic. We were able to have several trainings of new leaders in House to House methods as well as continuing our neighborhood bible sharing groups. We have seen 124 people discipled this year by our leadership team and several people empowered to begin bible sharing groups in Northern Uganda. 

We have also seen the fruits of our Arua team with new leaders emerging within the Arua community. The exponential growth of House to House brought the empowerment of new team members who are critical for the continued growth of the ministry. Our new team members are well versed in House to House methods, most of them being former trainees, and are now becoming trainers for our many partnership opportunities. Over the last year, word has spread of House to House partnering to bring the gospel into other NGOs and we are excited for the potential partnerships arising as word has spread. 

We are grateful for all of the opportunities God has brought us and we pray that we will continue to steward them well. I would like to thank all of you who support us, donate to us and pray for us as we continue to share God’s love in Uganda. Thank you for all that you do for our ministry.