Prayer Requests From Nate Jores

What a wonderful Christmas season we have had here in Uganda. It wasn't exactly a white Christmas, but my zucchini plants are looking very nice. We are transitioning from the rainy to the hotter, dry season right now.

It was a great blessing to have Ben (my brother) and Jesse Long with us for Christmas. They have been teaching at Waama Bible School in Tanzania and came up by bus from Arusha, Tanzania, through Nairobi, Kenya, to our place here in Jinja. We had a good blend of leisure, work, and ministry while they were here. They helped plant five banana trees, two orange trees, a mango, and a tangerine. We (Ben, Jesse, and I) also went white water rafting (grade 5) on the Nile river. On Christmas day we split up each of us going to three different village churches. Rhoda found great joy in cooking and baking, trying to fatten the bachelors up a bit.

Thank you all so much for your continued prayer support. The Lord is so good. Our transition is going very well. The boys have adapted very well and each day that goes by feels like we are more at home. It is true that the Christmas season did bring back some homesick feelings, especially for Rhoda who longed to wear a sweater and sit by the fireplace with her Mom. We know we are meant to be here and the Lord has given us great joy in this calling.

We would ask for your prayers as we will be beginning language study this month. Our hope is to find a good tutor who will come to our home and work with us three days a week. We have been getting by very well in English, but it is very evident that we would be able to reach many more people if we could speak the local language.

Please continue to pray for our Saturday meetings with the pastors. They have been very encouraging and productive so far.

Please pray for Rhoda's and my personal spiritual walks. We have both seen our need to wake up earlier and spend the first minutes of the day with the Lord. As the psalmist says, "My voice shalt thou hear in the morning, O Lord, in the morning will I direct my prayer to you, and will look up" (Psalm 5:3).

One last one… Would you pray for patience and consistency as we seek to train up our boys? Elijah especially seems to be at a stage where he needs a lot of love in the form of the rod of discipline. We are so grateful for all of you and your love for our family.

May the Almighty God richly bless you all,

Nate (for Rhoda, Elijah & Judah too)