Count it All Loss

Christmas 2011

aelambourne — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 02:54:57 +0000

“The blind will see.
The deaf will hear.
The dead will live again.
The lame will leap.
The dumb will speak
The praises of The Lamb.
Mary, did you know that your Baby Boy is Lord of all creation?
Mary, did you know that your Baby Boy would one day rule the nations?
Did you know that your Baby Boy is heaven’s perfect Lamb?
The sleeping Child you’re holding is the Great, I Am.”
-Mary Did You Know

Simply amazing: Emmanuel, God with us.

For when nothing else makes sense

aelambourne — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 21:34:48 +0000

“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: “I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God.” That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic—on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg—or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”

-C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

Summer 2011

aelambourne — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 21:47:59 +0000

Uganda Team at Pastor's House

The girls Jinja's Source of the Nile

View of Kigali, Rwanda

motorcycle taxis in Kigali

Millennium Bridge London

St. Paul's Cathedral London

Sanders Bible Church, Sanders, AZ: High School Mission Trip

Canyon De Chelley

Hoops Camp

San Diego, College Retreat

Lake Powell

Powell Summer Camp

Minnesota

Pfeifle Cousins Water Ski Team

I guess there is a reason this summer feel like it flew by!!

Quick London Love

aelambourne — Wed, 01 Jun 2011 23:21:00 +0000

Cassidy and I have had a great past 8 hours in London. Two at the airport, four around downtown, and the rest on the underground! Love it!

Up till now

aelambourne — Mon, 30 May 2011 13:38:18 +0000

Here is a highlight list from this adventure, going back all the way to the beginning:

May 9: depart Phoenix

May 11: arrive Entebbe, Uganda after about 27 hours of travel

May 12: fight jetlag; visit University Community Fellowship for the first time

May 13: 4 girls (including me) stayed home sick, while the rest of the group did clean-up projects around church with local students; dinner party at church for the students graduating university

May 14: Leadership Summit at UCF – a few members of our team got to share and teach. An amazing moment of seeing Yahweh’s power through broken and powerless people.

May 15: First Sunday service at UCF. Great time of interacting with our brothers and sisters

May 16: Day trip to Jinja, Uganda. Saw “the source of the Nile” (but not really). Beautiful nonetheless. And some amazingly beautiful rapids.

May 17: Kids Fun Day at UCF: about 450 kids from various local churches and leaders to match. Pure craziness and joy. An amazing reminder of the potential and value of each tiny, individual life with his or her flickering image of the Creator.

May 18: Went to dorms around campus to follow up with students. Went in mixed small groups of RMCC/UCF, simply to go talk and pray with students. What a beautiful picture of lives opening up to each other.

May 19: Lunch at Cafe Javas (a very nice place), then souvenir shopping. Then hung out at UCF.

May 20: Decorated UCF for Passion Nite, a huge worship night at UCF. Tons of people and energy and music and love and passion in the air for four straight hours of worship and teaching.

May 21: Rested and helped prepare for the Sunday Service.

May 22: Huge Sunday Celebration, UCF’s 10th anniversary. Lots of testimonies from members, looking back on Yahweh’s faithful guiding of UCF, and looking forward to His faithfulness in the future. Very exciting time.

May 23: Sad day, as the rest of the RMCC began their journey back to Mesa. Cassidy and I (from then on) rested, until moving houses to stay with a friend of mine. Then dinner out at an Ethiopian restaurant. Also rode my first boda-boda this time in Kampala (motorcycle taxis that are PLENTIFUL and go EVERYWHERE around the city!). From then on, basically our main mode of transportation.

May 24: Walked around downtown Kampala and bought bus tickets for the following day’s journey. Great to travel around and see different areas of Kampala.

May 25: 10 hour bus journey from Kampala, Uganda across the border into Kigali, Rwanda. Amazingly beautiful drive, through rolling green hills. The journey was surprisingly comfortable and quick. Arrived in Kigali and were met by a family there we were to stay with. Greeted at their home with homemade pizza – a very welcome surprise.

May 26: spent the day riding around (on motorcycle taxis, of course) Kigali and walking around downtown. Great to get a feel for another East African city, similar and yet different from Kampala. The overall feeling of the landscape is a bit like Southern California (the hills, trees, and weather). Also an unexpected surprise from Kampala’s more tropical feeling. That night we went out with our host family to a Rwandan restaurant. Definitely my first time of going out for local food. Great experience.

Friday, May 27: Visited the Bible school that our host family serves at. A very cool ministry training local pastors to better lead their people and impact their communities. We then went to the Kigali Genocide Memorial. It featured a very informative overview of the intricate conflicts of the past century (dating only back to colonization times) and of the unimaginable events of 1994. It also highlighted other worldwide genocides in recent history. The main thing I walked away with was the renewed importance of appreciating the image of our Divine Creator in ourselves and in others. When we miss that, we mess up everything.

Saturday, May 28: One last early morning boda ride through the crisp Kigali air and hills. Such an amazing feeling. Then on to our again 10 hour journey back to Kampala. This journey was not so comfortable as the first, with a very rattly bus and a route that took us on a dirt rode for about a third of the journey. Bumpy and hot but more beautiful and special to see the villages and people.

Sunday, May 29: Special breakfast of crepes, complete with Nutella and Ugandan sweet bananas. Very international. Third and final Sunday service at UCF. A very bittersweet moment of enjoying the service and the people, not knowing when, if ever, I will be back here again. Crazy but special. Then lunch and the afternoon with various friends (meeting most for the first time), both Americans and Ugandans. Walking back the last bit to our house, just trying to take in all the sights and sounds and feelings, enjoying the cool, still air of Kampala and its beauty.

Monday, May 30: Can’t believe it’s now been three weeks since we left Phoenix! Very packed and enjoyable. Today we visited the office of International Justice Mission and joined their morning devotions and prayer (my friend we are staying with is an intern with IJM). Such a great organization, bringing justice and order to little corners of this world of surrounding chaos. Then traveling around town to a special coffee shop and one last souvenir stop. The plan for tonight is Indian food out and then dessert at a rotating restaurant with a great view of Kampala! Trying to live up our last two days here!

Whew! So, I’m all caught up then. That’s my adventure so far. It’s coming to a close, but still have a lot packed into the last day in Kampala, a quick night in London, and lots of plane time!

Here in Kigali!

aelambourne — Thu, 26 May 2011 12:59:55 +0000

After a glorious ten hour bus journey from Kampala yesterday – which actually was not bad at all – we arrived here in beautiful Kigali, Rwanda.

A quick two days here, then back to Uganda on Saturday. Such an amazingly beautiful place and city.

Part 2

aelambourne — Tue, 24 May 2011 07:24:42 +0000

Another quick update from Kampala:

The RMCC group left Uganda yesterday morning and Cassidy and I miss them very much. But we are excited for this next part.

We have been hanging out in Kampala yesterday and today. We will take the bus (minimum 9 hours!) to Kigali, Rwanda tomorrow.

Loving this crazy new adventure!

Back again

aelambourne — Wed, 18 May 2011 12:29:11 +0000

Quick update from Kampala:

Our team is doing great and loving being here! Spending tons of time at UCF, the church we are serving at. Meeting tons of new people and just enjoying our brothers and sisters in Christ. Had a crazy kids day yesterday, about 440 kids total. Tons of fun. And a leadership training day last Saturday, where we got to spend lots of quality time with the UCF leaders and members.

Kampala has actually been fairly quiet and we haven’t had any problems at all. Thankfully.

Very weird and great feeling of being back here again, this time with people from home. Blows my mind!

A few more updates here, if you’re interested!

On the road again

aelambourne — Mon, 09 May 2011 21:53:18 +0000

Heaven and earth are made for each other, and at certain points they intersect and interlock. Jesus is the ultimate such point. We as Christians are meant to be such points, derived from him.

-NT Wright’s “Surprised by Hope”

As a group, the 16 of us get a chance to do that in a different corner of the kingdom for two weeks.

Kampala, Uganda…here we come!

4 weeks…. again

aelambourne — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 04:15:12 +0000

A year and one week ago, I started this blog to chronicle my upcoming world travels.

28 weeks and 9 countries later, I arrived back in the US. Now, 17 weeks later, I am back in a very similar spot. A very quick semester interlude now brings me extremely close to departing for Uganda.

I will have been to Uganda twice within a 5 month period. Pretty crazy. And yet very exciting. This time, I will be doing it in community with people I already know and love (from both places). I am so excited to continually see the kingdom in action here in Mesa and Tempe, and all the way to Kampala, Uganda.