follow up from the last desserthouse!

hey friends! our total raised last desserthouse came to $510! schweeeeet! below is the update from Jason, our Micah Challenge contact. the things theyre doing are aweseome! we'll be coming in with some updates bout next desserthouse shortly!

Thank you for organizing the dessert house, and thank you for making Micah Challenge the beneficiary of your work. We are SO grateful! I am in Kampala Uganda right now. I’ve had the privilege of visiting with different Micah Challenge coordinators while I’m here, and also visiting various projects of the church to change the world. Its been really inspiring, and extremely hopeful amidst the troubles. Your gift helps us support and engage deeper with Africans doing this kind of work. I want to share a quick narrative of a group I met with yesterday in Kaber Maido District in Uganda.

I met with a group called the arrow boys. They are men who formed a group to defend their villages against the Lord’s Resistance Army (a rebel group that was terrorizing northern Uganda for quite some time). In around 2003 or 2004 their entire community was moved to IDP camps in Uganda because people were being terrorized and children abducted, etc. In 2006 and the beginning of 2007 they all returned to their homes. The Arrow boys formed an association of veterans from that conflict to try and support each other, and help each other out upon returning to their homes. I went there with a group that is giving them agricultural supplies and training to begin a small agricultural project—6 acres and about 10 different crops. When they returned home in 2006 they had to start from scratch. They had no possessions, no land, and no crops, all they had was hope. They did not give up, and they’ve been trying to survive since then. I happened to be there the day they signed the agreement on the agricultural project with the group Micah Challenge works with. It was such a tremendous and joyous occasion. Of course they asked me to speak even though I really didn’t do any work other than pray for them and visit—I told them that in the United States there is a new generation that is passionate about the kingdom of God and the livelihoods and security of people like them. Their faces lighted up—they are so excited to know that their story is being told, and that there are young Christians in the states who care for them. Thank you for who you are, and for your commitments because your passion and prayers give hope to people like the arrow boys. It’s a new day for the arrow boys of Kaber Maido, and just by having the event that you did you are a part of it! I hope and pray that in five years we see their crops flourishing, and their livelihoods restored.

I just wanted to share that with you to encourage you, and to thank you. God bless, and keep in touch!
-jason

PS put Oct 18 on your calendar—its Micah Sunday—a day where literally millions of Christians around the world will be praying and focusing on the MDGs. Perhaps you would want to get your church(es) involved, or have your own kind of meeting on that day to show solidarity? We’ll talk about it.