Good morning,
As I'm writing this, the rain is falling outside. I love the rain, it reminds me of growing up in Chilliwack, where about 6 months of the year I would wake up to this same sound. Right now I am preparing a message on John 6:1-14 to give to a high school this afternoon. It's amazing how much the Bible comes alive when you take the time to study it. That's one of the reasons why I love giving these messages. The Feeding of the 5,000 ties so closely to Jesus' message on being the Bread of Life (the discourse He gives from verse 22 to the end of the same chapter).

Anyways, a little update over here. I'm over malaria thankfully. I got my blood checked on Tuesday and there was no more malaria. Immaculate's little sister, however, wasn't so fortunate. She contacted malaria at school and was recovering from it at the same time I was. Her medication didn't help so she was admitted into the hospital and put on I.V. She's better now and was taken to her home yesterday afternoon. Besides that, things are going great. Tomorrow I teach at the Bible College for the first time ever. I'm really nervous so please pray for me. It's more of a Bible study though, so it's short and relatively easy compared to lecturing. Thanks for all your prayers.
God bless

Hello and greetings from Uganda,

Things here are going swell...except this malaria thing I have. I was feeling a little weak and tired with headaches for the past few weeks so finally Immaculate got me to see a doctor. Turns out I have malaria so now I'm taking medication. The medication is worse than the malaria. It totally makes me feel like I got hit by a truck or something and right now it feels like my head is going to explode. Anyways, it makes life slow down a bit and now I have time to read and stuff. Right now I'm reading Studies on the Sermon on the Mount by D. Martin Lloyd Jones and let me tell you, it's a wonderful book. I just read the chapter on meekness and it was quite convicting. Well, that's my update for today. Tomorrow I won't be going to church so I'm dissapointed about that but I can always read. God bless

Greetings once again everyone.
Things here in Uganda are going great. This week is kind of a week for the Bible college so a bunch of us at church did some renovations. First we sorted out the storage room, which although it is about the size of a small closet, fit a huge amount of things. Then we knocked a wall down and made a room bigger for people to sit around and talk between sunday morning services. Anyways, the rest of this week is filled with wedding plans and such things. Things are really rolling along now and it sure is getting exciting. 85 more days until the big day finally arrives. Immaculate has now fully recovered from her weekend bout with malaria, I'm happy to report.

Last night we had a nice evening service at church. Pastor Brian spoke about 2 Kings 8 and he stressed the absolute wickedness of the heart of man. He used Hazeal as an example of how wicked our hearts by nature are. This man assassinated the king of Syria, and then had a brutal and a terror filled reign as king. Pastor Brian stressed that apart from the saving grace of God, we would have sinned filled lives all the time and we would never choose to do good.

Yesterday I also went to the Remand Centre and spoke about John 1:35-51 about Jesus calling His disciples. I explained how different each call from Jesus was but how each disciple responded in the same way, by following Jesus. Then explained how we can follow Jesus today, by listening to His word and obeying it and by repenting of our sins and seeking forgiveness from God because of Jesus's sacrifice. This led a long discussion (in Luganda) about how to repent and when to repent. John, my translator, began to talk about repentance and how there isn't a set time to pray like the Muslims have (and believe me, that 5 o'clock call to prayer is quite annoying) which sparked a debate and some people leaving because it offended them. But John said that he couldn't go out of his way to make the Bible more appealing to people. The Bible says there isn't a set time to pray so that's what John was telling them. It was quite the scene but it reminded me of how man by nature doesn't want to hear truth. Instead we want to follow our own rituals and traditions. Without God there to change us, we would all be offended by the gosple message.
God bless,

Hello again,
Well, it looks like updating this blog is a little harder than I thought. Between the power being off, Bible College, wedding plans, taking care of my sick fiancee, there isn't a lot of time to update this. I know, you're all thinking "all tight smooshes" which, being loosly interpreted from the "framers" dialect of Dutch, means always excuses or something. Guilty as charged, although if I was in the US, I would plead the 5th. Things are going great. First of all, this week started with a national holiday. It was independace day on Monday. Yeah, I celebrated that with a nice visit with Immaculate. Then on Tuesday we visited the Canadian Consulate, which couldn't help us until Wednesday. The Canadian Consulate office in Uganda is pretty intersting. It's Canada's official visa application centre and offers support to Canadians inside Uganda. Well, the office is about the size of my bedroom and it's as hard to find as my cooking skills, but that's another story. So on Wednesday we (Immaculate and I) went back to talk to them whether I needed to tell them anything about us getting married and what visa to apply for when coming to North America to visit. Well, as it turns out, there aren't any Canadians working there. Yup, that's right, only Ugandans. Immaculate found this quite funny, seeing as it's Ugandans giving other Ugandans visas to visit or study in Canada. Anyways, it turns out we will apply for a temporary resident visa, which they will give us about a month before our trip. So that's pretty cool. Anyways, the last part of the week consisted of Immaculate finding out she has malaria and some other infection so I got to take care of her. It's pretty cool, that taking care part...not the Immaculate being sick part. This morning we went to the early service because Immaculate was on for Children's Ministry. We went to the 10 O clock service and we left almost right away because she was pretty sick. So right now, she is taking a nap and I just woke up from mine. Well, have yourselves a great Sunday,
God bless

Hello everyone,
Sorry for not updating sooning. Anyways, things here in Uganda are going great. I really enjoy visiting the Remand Centre on Wednesdays and Fridays. It's mostly boys that are in the home, although there are a few girls. Peter, a guy from church, does most of the talking...in Luganda. So it's pretty difficult to be able to understand exactly what's going on. He finds who is new to the home and gets their contact information. Later he phones the kids relatives so that they know where their child is. One child had ran away from home and his parents thought he had died. Needless to say, they were a bit overjoyed to find that their son was alive. We also give a short Bible study for about 20 minutes. I get to lead it and it's a little different having to be translated after every sentance. So far I have managed not to lose my train of thought. Right now we are going through the gosple of John.

Last week, after I was finished, I had some kids come up to me. They wanted to know how to defend their faith. Some Muslims had talked to them and told them that based on 1 Corinthians 15:15, Christ didn't rise from the dead. Also, they wanted to know why, since Jesus was circumcised, Christians aren't. So I helped them by explaining 1 Corinthians 15:15 in its context. Also, I went through Galatians with them, showing how the Galation believers were wondering the same thing and what Paul told them. It was a great experience. Back in North America I never had any Muslims trying to talk to me about Christianity. It's a whole new experience. Anyways, I should get going. I have to prepare a Bible study for a secondary school today. Thanks for all your prayers. Feel free to email me at: mejneels@yahoo.ca
God bless