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Watchman Fellowship 2013 Mission Trip UGANDA, AFRICA by Tim Martin This is a picture of Tim with the staff of ACFAR (Africa Centre for Apologetic ...
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Watchman Fellowship

2013 Mission Trip

UGANDA, AFRICA by Tim Martin

This is a picture of Tim with the staff of ACFAR (Africa Centre for Apologetic Research) at the end of the trip. They were responsible for setting up the speaking engagements, arranging lunch and dinners at the conference and driving me around.

Deus,

Sarah,

Tim,

Nehemiah

Rodgers

Update #1: March 14, 2013 Well, today is the big day. I left the house this morning at 4:15am. I flew from Harrisburg to Washington CD (Dulles). I will board in one hour, then fly for 13.5 hours to Addis Ababa (in Ethiopia), then, a short flight to Uganda. The time zone is 7 hours ahead, which I am hoping will be much easier to adjust to compared to the two trips I took to the Philippines. That was a twelve hour time difference. Ugh! For those of you who don’t know what I am doing here, let me give you a quick rundown. As you probably know, I am in full time ministry with Watchman Fellowship. We study alternative religious systems (sometimes known as cults). From the results of our study, we write articles, teach in churches and colleges, and sometimes travel to where these cultists can be found in order to engage them with the truth of who Jesus really is. There is a similar ministry in California led by Paul Carden, “The Centers for Apologetics Research” (CFAR). I have the utmost respect for Paul and his tireless efforts in this unique filed. His special calling is to set up similar offices like mine all over the world. He contacted me late last year and asked if I would be open to go to Uganda. He had an established office there, and was looking for someone with my expertise to help train his people deeper than they are. Partly why I was asked to go was because of my extensive experience performing outreach to Mormons and my study of the Prosperity Gospel. (To those of you new to this type of information please know that the intent of my research and outreach is not to demonize these folks, but to love them and help them see the mistake they are making by following false teachers). Anyway, when Paul asked me if I would consider going, I was blown away. It was like Michael Jordon asking me to come shoot hoops with him. (Okay, I hate sports, and know that is an antiquated analogy, but that is the best you will get with me ). Now, I am boarding a plane in one hour to face the most challenging two weeks of my life. I will be teaching and preaching for over 20 hours. Very little of this teaching will be repeats over the two weeks. I am up to the challenge, God has blessed me, and I am ready to go. Thanks for listening, Tim

Update #2: March 15, 2013 I am now in my hotel room in Uganda. It is very green here, and very hot! The traveling went smooth…no problems, except I am obviously tired! For the bulk of the trip, I sat next to an elderly woman from Ethiopia. She was very nice, but we had a difficult time communicating. I think she stayed with her daughter in Ohio for 9 months. She was excited to tell me about the snow she saw for the first time. Very cool. I showed her pictures of my kids. My main contact here is Rodgers Atwebembeire, who is the staff person at the “Africa Centers for Apologetics Research.” I am left on my own to get my bearings, then he will come get me for dinner. Tomorrow we plan on visiting the Watchtower (Jehovah’s Witnesses) building in the morning, and then meet with the ACFAR staff. Below is the basic schedule I will be trying to keep up with!! Blessings, Tim

Sunday

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday 14

Friday 15

Depart USA 6:15 am

17

18 Outreach seminar 9-10am: Intr. & 9am-1pm Visit Orientation Mormon Church in 10-11am: Pres. 1 Kolo 11-12: Pres. 2 12-1:00pm—Lunch 5-7pm: Visit Miracle 1-2pm: Pres. 3 Centre Cathedral 2-3pm: Pres.4 3-4pm: Group disc. 4:00—Depart

24 New City Church Topic: Defending the faith 10:30 1 hr 40 min. Preaching time: 40-50 Minutes 5-7pm: Visit Winners Chapel St. Paul Church of Uganda

19 Outreach seminar 9-10: Pres. 5 10-11: Pres. 6 11:-11:20—Break 11:20-12:20: Pres. 7 12:20-1:00—Q&A 1:00-2:00pm— Lunch 2-3pm: Pres. 8 4pm: join Rodgers at UCU campus

25

26 10:00-12:00pm 9:00am—3:00pm West Minister Visit Theological UCKG/Synagogue of seminary all Nations Chapel 5:00pm—7:00pm St. Paul’s Church, Mulago

10:30-11am. 30 min. How to do apologetics in church. 2-4pm meet with ACFAR staff

20 Outreach seminar 9am-3pm finish seminar 3-4pm: Outreach at Taxi Park

21 9am-3 pm: Visit cultic sites Conference 4-6pm: Participants arrive 6-7pm: Dinner Between 6-7pm 7:30-8pm: St. Francis chapel introductions & “Understanding the Orientation Prosperity Gospel: A 8-10pm: Patterns in biblical response” the cults

27 Personal time in the morning

Depart Uganda 5:25pm

28 Arrive PA, USA 12:46 pm

Arrive Uganda 1:05pm

22 Conference 8-9: Breakfast 9-10am: WoF 1 10-11: WoF 2 11-11:30: Break 11:30-12:30: WoF 3 12:30-2:00pm— Lunch 2-4: workshop 4-5pm: Workshop Results 5-6pm: personal time 6-7:30: Dinner 7:30-9 SDA 9-10PM video

Saturday 16 9am-1pm: Visit Watch Tower Headquarters 2-5pm Meeting with ACFAR staff 23 Conference 8-9: Breakfast 9-10am: JW 10-11: LDS 1 11-11:30: Break 11:30-12:30: LDS 2 12:30-2:00pm: Lunch

Update #3: March 16, 2013 I had a very interesting day. My schedule will not ramp up until Monday, so I had today and tomorrow to go at a slower pace. The picture below is what I see outside my hotel widow. There are often kids playing soccer at the park, and the street is often noisy with traffic. It took me awhile to realize that this was a street, not an ally. Parts of it are dirt, and many parts have very deep holes. Hence, I was told that people who fix car shock absorbers are in demand constantly. In the center of the picture is a new Mormon Church that is being built. It looks like it is getting close to being finished.

I slept 11 hours last night, which has me most of the way caught up from jet lag. Our first agenda was to visit the Jehovah’s Witness compound.

As you can see the sign did not say, ‘Jehovah’s Witnesses,” but “International Bible Students Association.” This was one of the original names of the Jehovah’s Witnesses. They told me that they still use this in Uganda because this was the original name that was incorporated into Uganda. I guess it would take too much work to change it.

The picture to the right are the gentlemen who took us on the tour (the shorter Ugandan is Nehemiah, the Christian who drove me there). These people were very friendly and answered many questions. The purpose of this center is to take the English Watchtower magazines and translate them into 9 different languages that are used in Uganda and surrounding countries. Then, they send them out to be printed and distributed.

For the remaining of the day, I met with Rodgers and his staff at his office. We had a great time talking about our interest in this unique work that God has called us to. They also gave me a lot of perspective of what I am going to face when teaching on the Word Faith movement on Friday. There are a lot of obstacles I was not prepared for. I sure hope God is ready to speak through me because I am almost at a loss for words! (Something that rarely happens ).

On the way back and forth to the Watchtower headquarters, many of these huge mounds of dirt could be seen. Of course, this is not just dirt….they are termite mounds. I think Rodgers thought it very odd that I wanted to get a picture next to a termite mound, but hey, I knew my kids would be fascinated! (FYI: I am not standing on the ground. I am actually 1.5-2 feet up onto the termite mound. It was probably 8 feet tall total!)

Lastly, my jet lag is obviously not over. I ordered a sandwich for dinner, which took a long time to come. I think I fell asleep 3-4 times. One of the times, my head bobbed down so violently that my glasses flew off my head and hit the ground! Hence, I better close this and go to bed! Blessings, Tim

Update #4: March 17, 2013, I was originally supposed to preach at a rather large church today. They had four services! But, they were installing a new bishop today, so my speaking was cancelled. It would have been a very interesting opportunity. The largest cult murder/suicide happened in Uganda 12 years ago today. Yes, more people were killed that compared to the Jonestown murder/suicides from the 1970’s. If you are interested in learning about it, go to: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Movement_for_the_Restoration_of_the_Ten_Commandments_of_God. So, instead of preaching, I went to the Mormon Church. One of the reasons Paul Carden (CFAR) wanted me to come on this trip is because of my extensive experience talking to Mormons. He was hoping to have his people see how I handle myself in dialogue with them. It is one thing to read about them, but something entirely different to know how to effectively talk to them. The results? WOW! After church service, Elder Brown (a missionary from California) invited us into the bishop’s office to answer our questions. The two Ugandans from ACFAR (Nehemiah and Christian) were with me, praying and listening to our conversation. I could not have hoped for a better interaction. Nobody felt attacked, we understood each other, and in the end, I believe elder Brown experienced some heavy conviction. I left him realizing that he has no hope of eternal life based on what his religion has taught him. Just before I closed with the gospel, someone knocked on the door and said they needed the room. This was fine, because I know the conversation is not over. Nehemiah exchanged phone numbers with him and will be able to keep the communication going. In the evening, Rodgers and I attended the prominent prosperity gospel church in Uganda. It reminded me of my former days going to bars and dancing. Of course, nobody was drinking or pairing up, but the music was ear splitting loud, nobody knew what the words were and everyone was dancing in the aisles or at their seats. The auditorium acoustics were horrible. The preaching was so full of echoes that I could not figure out what he was talking about. He started by quoting some verse from Colossians, but never explained how it impacted anything else he said. Well, tomorrow is another day. I have to be to the Calvary Chapel at 9am to start evangelism training. There should be about 30 people, and I will speak for 4-5 hours. I think it will be a lot of fun. Ugandans seems to really like to interact with the material, so it takes the pressure off me to talk for a solid 300 minutes! God bless, Tim _____________________________________________________________________________________

Update #5: March 18, 2013, Today was the most exhausting yet. Rodgers picked me up at 8am, we arrived at Calvary Chapel around 9am, and I probably started teaching around 9:30. I am not sure, it was all a blur. We took a few breaks along the way, but there was no rest for me. There was always someone waiting in line to ask questions. We took a lunch break, which was my first chance to sit, but I had to eat fast so I could go check to make sure my PowerPoint was at the right place. After lunch, I continued to teach until 3pm. I was originally going to join Rodgers on some adventure; I don’t even remember what it was. But, he saw how wiped out I was, and asked if I would rather go back to the hotel. Of course, I agreed. He had to stop for a moment to run an errand, and I fell asleep in the car. If you know me at all, you know it takes a lot of exhaustion for me to fall asleep anywhere, let alone in a car!

So with all that to say, I sure need your prayers for tomorrow. We have the same schedule up until 3pm. But, after that, I am going to speak at a chapel service in the evening. I may need to see if there is any spare wood I can use to prop myself up! Right now, I am trying to figure out what I will say at the chapel. After speaking 4-5 hours today and tomorrow, I am guessing that the 30 minute chapel should go quite well. After reading all that above, my fear is that you might think I am living on the edge here. Nothing could be further from the truth. I am having the time of my life. God is so good, and is moving me through this trying time like a champ. The only truly difficult part for me is that my family is so far away. Thankfully, I get to chat on Skype with them once in a while. Blessings, Tim ____________________________________________________________________________________

Update #6: March 19, 2013 Yesterday and today, I taught the evangelism training seminar. I will finish it up today around noon. Below you can see some of the pictures from yesterday’s training. The people are very grateful for the lessons and show their appreciation often. One of the biggest challenges teaching these folks is that many of them are Biblically illiterate. They are Christians, and understand salvation through Christ alone, but are unaware or confused about many other topics. For instance, when I was teaching them about the Mormon view of repentance, I had to stop and teach for 1520 minutes on the biblical view of repentance. That was a first! Or, sometimes I will get questions that are totally unrelated to anything I am talking about. Yesterday, I was in the middle of one of my points when a man raised his hand. He asked me what I thought about Christians getting tattoos. Sometimes it is hard for me to understand their accents (actually, I guess I am the goofball with the accent, but you get the point). But, when their question seems to have no context to anything I am talking about, they need to ask it 3-4 times until I can finally figure out what they want to know. Sometimes the other Ugandans don’t seem to understand what the questioner wants to know. At any rate, these “out of context” questions would normally annoy me. I have an agenda to teach a certain topic, and don’t like to get derailed every 10 minutes by random questions. But, this is different. These dear people have very little access to someone who can answer questions that might plague them, and they see me as someone who can help them figure out how to live the Christian life. I am totally blessed by being here and teaching. I feel so humbled and blessed to be their servant. God bless, Tim

Update #7: March 20, 2013 Today was the last day of the outreach seminar. This teaching was enjoyable because it was a smaller group (30ish). Hence, I could be more personable and connect with those in attendance better. After the seminar was over, we went into the streets of Kampala with tracts informing people Mormonism’s true nature. As many of you know, the Mormons claim to be Christians, but are far from it. I was able to pass out tracts 4-5 times faster than those with me. I assume it was because I was the only white person on the sidewalk. As a novelty, they wanted to see what I was passing out. At least that was my interpretation. The companion I was with said that it was because I was anointed. In the evening, I had the privilege of speaking at the chapel service at St. Francis Chapel. This chapel is on the larges college campus in Uganda. There were 800-900 students attending my talk. I spoke for 45ish minutes on the prosperity gospel. I think it was well received very well. Below are a couple of pictures from the event:

This might be the last update for a few days. Tomorrow the conference starts, and goes till 10pm. I will stay 2 nights at the college where the conference is, and might not have access to e-mail. Even if I do, I will probably be too exhausted to write. On Friday, my day starts at 9am, and ends at 10pm.

God bless, Tim

Update 8: March 23, 2013 I am back in the hotel room. I had no internet access since Thursday. I spoke at a conference Thursday night, all day Friday and this morning. The conference was video recorded, and I was told that they have 12 hours footage of me teaching. Hmm. No wonder I am tired! Well, actually, I am surprised that I have as much energy as I do. I know many people have been praying for me, and I am sure my current energy level is due to God responding to His people. I will have some pictures of the conference later. I was too busy to take any, so I will have to get some from the ACFAR folks who were organizing the event. I was told that there were 130 people registered, which I think was a great turnout. Pastors from all over Uganda and some from other African countries came to hear me speak. It was such an honor, and very humbling. The most difficult part for me in these settings are the “question and answer” portions. Like I said in my previous e-mail, questions will come at me from every direction imaginable. People here have burning spiritual questions on their minds and they don’t realize that we are looking for questions related to the topic I am speaking on. One woman’s question broke my heart. She asked: “at what point is it okay to stop asking God to heal someone and leave it to His will.” I could tell this was a very emotional question with great context. I don’t remember exactly what I said, but I tried to help her know that she is not giving up on God if she does not pray every moment possible for this unknown person. I think sometimes we can become too consumed or obsessed in our prayers. Sometimes God says no, and that is not easy to take. But we don’t want to give up, but instead, concede to His authority. Even as I type this, I am reading this and hoping my answer came out better that what I sound like right now. Tears welled up in her eyes as she listened to me explain the confidence we can have in God while still not needing to pray continually for a situation. After the Q&A session was over, I went directly to her to offer more comfort. The person she had been referring to is a little girl with tuberculosis. The disease has almost taken her life. So very, very sad. Part of the blessing in this ministry is that some people will see me as a pastor type of person to whom they can reveal their sole to. But, the bad part of this blessing is that I am not a pastor, and feel very inadequate to give comfort to someone in such grief. I pray that God used my words to bring some comfort to this dear woman. The rest of my schedule here will be very easy compared to the rest of my time here. I only have a couple of things to do each day. Still, I didn’t mind the busyness at all. I came to work, and work hard. God has blessed my effort, and has sustained me through it. Now I can relax, make sure I am ready for the next few churches/chapels/or whatever is on my schedule, and then look forward to seeing my family again. I can’t wait.

God bless, Tim

Update 9: March 26, 2013 You might think that I have not sent an e-mail for a bit because there is nothing to report. Nope. There still has been a lot going on. But, as of 2.5 hours ago, all my speaking engagements are over. I think the last two went very well, and were well received. I thought I only had one chapel to speak in today. But when Rodgers picked me up yesterday, he told me that he was contacted by another school to find out what time I would arrive. Somehow, someone forgot to call him earlier to schedule my time. Thanks to God, it barely worked out. I finished speaking at one chapel, then we drove away quickly, and arrived at the other chapel as the service was beginning! I told you before that I would give you some pictures of the conference. Someone caught me going over my presentation in the one photo, and the other was taken after the final session on Saturday. I was told that there were 130 people registered. I can’t tell you how strange, humbling and overwhelming it was to see so many people come from so far away to hear me teach. I am so grateful for the tremendous amount of work that Rodgers and his team had to put into in order to set this up.

So now, my speaking is all over. I will be meeting with reporters this afternoon about an article I wrote concerning the Mormon view of black skin. Besides that, I get to relax, have fellowship with the ACFAR team, and prepare to go home. Oh yea, I will also be going to some meeting to see a self proclaimed prophet. Instead of speaking, I actually get to sit down and shut up for awhile…not too big of a challenge!

I have tried to add up all the speaking that I have done during the last 11 days, but it has been a blur, so I might have missed (or added) a few things: 1. 2. 3. 4.

4 chapel services (2 hours total?) 2 Church services (1 hour total?) 12 hours teaching at an outreach seminar 10 hours teaching at the conference.

25 hours of teaching in eleven days. The only way I was able to accomplish this was through the prayers of God’s people. Even on my busiest days, I can’t say that I felt exhausted and ready to drop. God is good, all the time. God bless, Tim ____________________________________________________________________________________

Update 10: March 28, 2013 I wrote the e-mail below in the DC airport, but was unable to send it. I have been home now for 3 hours, and am loving hanging out with the kids. --------------------------------------------------------Well, the end is near. I have been traveling for almost 24 hours. I am now sitting in Washington DC waiting for the last flight. I am so tired I can barely see straight, so this will be a short, short update. But, I at least have to tell you about the first leg of my flight from Uganda to Ethiopia. I was very upset with the airlines, which I won’t go into, but it was one of those moments that you feel so justified in being mad that you decide to stay mad no matter what. Just to make sure someone wasn’t going to start a friendly chat with me, I made sure I had a sneer on my face. When it was time to board the plane, I grumbled all the way up the stairs, and made my way to my seat, 26A. Several rows before getting to my seat, I saw what awaited me, and realized I better get over myself, because my mission trip was not over yet. Sitting in 26B was a Mormon missionary. Elder Raymond is a Mormon missionary in Ethiopia, but was in Uganda for a meeting. His companion was somewhere else on the plane. We had a great conversation about forgiveness of sin. I made sure, over and over that he understood that his book of Mormon required complete obedience to all the commandments. Though he recognized it, he was not shaken in the least. So, I made sure he realized that he needed to teach the Ethiopian converts this important doctrine. How sad would it be for them to learn about all the great things the LDS church has for them in this life, but miss out on eternity because the missionaries failed to impart this important teaching to them. He took my challenge well, and might just follow through. And yes, I got over myself, forgave the airline, and enjoyed my time with him. God sure had a sense of humor in how he showed me my arrogance and bad attitude! For now, I need to find a way to rest without missing my next flight! God bless, Tim © 2013 Watchman Fellowship, Inc. ● All Rights Reserved

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