A mixture

Pictures:

- apparently stickers and paper airplanes are universally enjoyed

-Donna hanging out with some of the kids

- me with Jacinda, a precious girl who suffers from eye pain of unknown origin. After praying for her, she's experienced relief of the pain in her right eye, so we are continuing to pray for full healing of the left eye too!

- "dress rehearsal" dance

- Abbie and Hannah painting the name of this newest house ... "Victory"!

Our last day at the Village!

Hard to believe the time with the children is coming to an end so quickly again. The last two days since I've blogged last have been full of fun and laughter. The children have a dance, song, and music competition next Saturday for which they have been practicing hard every day. On Saturday evening, they gave us a "sneak peak" dress rehearsal of their program and it was great! I preferred their singing the best- no music, no instruments, just a wonderful blend of voices. I wished they would have performed their whole song but they said they needed to practice more. After the dress rehearsal in which the dancing was east African type of dancing, they "kicked back" and started their Acholi dancing with which I'm familiar by now (and is by far better than the east African dancing!). I of course, showed off my rhythm-absent dancing skills to which the children laughed quite hysterically. Hannah caught a little on film- I do believe the word "blackmail" might be apt in the not too distant future :)

Yesterday (Sunday) we have church (or "prayer" as the children called it) and again, it was wonderful. The songs of the children were beautiful and the presence of the Holy Spirit was tangible. Our team led a short drama in which we used some of the children as characters in the story of Samuel hearing from God, but first mistaking God's voice with Eli callling him. I then gave a brief message on hearing from God, reminding these children that God has something to say to them every day, and that His voice is always kind and gentle and loving, never scary or unkind (as many of them have experienced fearful voices and visions from the enemy). I do believe that God's heart just delights in revealing Himself to these children and it was a blessing to lead the children in a time of listening.

After church, we rested and relaxed, and then played some more with the children- relay races, several rounds of London Bridge, and a time of guitar playing and teaching the kids some new songs (courtesy of Abbie who can actually play the guitar whereas I just pretend).

Today I'm working a lot in the medical clinic, trying to gain understanding of how things are done, why they are done that way, and attempting to help in some organization aspects- quite a large task to try and tackle in a day for sure!

Today is a mixture of emotions for me- part of me is ready to come home (what is up with the homesickness this year? Apparently many of you are swell enough to miss after being away for 2 weeks :) ) and part of me longs to stay longer in order to build more of a foundation of trust in the relationships with the children and to remind them of the great love the Father has for them, to encourage them in who they are as children of the Most High King, and to watch as they bring His Kingdom here. But this time has all been entrusted to the Lord and we are blessed to be a part of this piece of His plan here at the Village for this short time, knowing that we see only a fraction of what He is doing at this time.

Tomorrow we head to the safari park for a boat ride on the Nile and a drive through the safari park. Looking forward to seeing the majesty of the great animals again this year! And let's not forget actual showers...

Love you all and so grateful for all who have been praying and interceding for us. Will be excited to share more with you all when we return..but first we must get through this whole leaving thing tomorrow. Pretty sure tissues (or a t-shirt sleeve) will be needed upon our departure.