Training – The Rugumba's Updates

Strength in Trials

March 6, 2020March 6, 2020wilfredrugumba9 Comments

This week am attending the Shepherds’ conference (a pastor’s conference organized by John McArthur)

I have learned a lot about God’s love from different speakers, and He allows us to go through moments and trials because He loves us and He wants to grow our faith. In James 1:2, He tells us to count it all Joy when going through trials.

For the past 3.5 weeks, I have been visiting the United States. This time, I came with Vena and the boys; we have visited supporters and spoke at churches in Oregon and California, and I had the privilege of preaching at Corban University. We have had a wonderful visit; the kids went to the ocean and sea world which they have loved. One of our supporters booked us a hotel, and Vena and I went away last weekend to Santa Barbara.

On the other side, a day after I had arrived, I found out I had malaria. I went to hospitals here, but did doctors did not seem to know how to treat malaria, as they gave me Malarone which is a prevention medicine. My situation worsened; my doctor in Uganda mailed me medicine which took about a week to get here and when I took it I was better.

Vena has been having pain and we arranged to see a doctor while on this trip. They ran several tests, including a Pathology report that revealed she has stage 1 breast cancer. This has hit us as a family, but we know God is in control, and He loves us and will give us the strength to go through it. The doctor says she will have surgery scheduled on April 1st, and then 6 weeks of radiation. I am flying back with the boys today, but Vena will stay. CTL and the hospital have helped us apply for insurance to help with the bills, and we are waiting to hear back.

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In Uganda, by 2006, we had only one cancer radiation machine that broke down, and it took two years to get the two machines we have now. In a country of 40 million people, it is hard to use them and receive treatment. After seeing a local specialist, we have been informed that because of high numbers of patients waiting–it would take a patient at least 2 months for them to be able to start on radiations.

Here is how you can pray for us

Pray that Insurance to be approved.
Journey mercies as I travel with the boys today.
Comfort and strength especially for Vena as she won’t be with us for a while.
Vena is trying to find a local Christian school to volunteer at while she is waiting and is on treatment, so that she doesn’t get bored. But, also so she use her time here to learn new things that she can bring back to our school in Uganda.

Thank you for all your support and prayers.

Christmas Update

December 30, 2019wilfredrugumba1 Comment

In Uganda, a country with a fast growing population, most pastors do not have formal Bible training. Churches are growing, but at the same time, there is a rise in the amount of heretical teachings spreading throughout many Ugandan churches today.

It has been always my desire, that we get a way to help train pastors. So about 3 years ago, I contacted Corban University in Oregon to help train, but they had a lot going on then. However, God later opened a door, and they agreed to provide training to 50 pastors, free of charge. Corban University will be sending their ministry school professors for two weeks, twice a year, for 3 years.

At the beginning of this month, we had the opportunity to host 50 pastors from all over the country at Mercy Christian School. They came to learn about how to study and interpret the Bible. Mercy Church elders and pastors have been a part of this, and it has been such a joy to see how much they have learned.

Mercy Church, in two years, has planted two churches, and I see more church plants arising in future.

For Christmas, with the help of gifts from Children to Love, our kids gave out gifts to some staff and needy people around the community. It has been a joy seeing our kids give.

We have started working on construction at the school. We had to take off the roof on one of the original buildings since it was not up to code, and we are also remodeling the building by creating more windows and ventilation space. We are also in the process of building a house for long term interns.

For our school break, we sent out most of our kids to their extended families. However, for those who don’t have extended family, they have been sent to be with our staff and church members. I currently have a total of 12 kids at my house.

Ways You Can Be Praying:

Pray for safety of the kids this festive season.
Heavy rains have slowed down our building progress, please pray for good weather so that builders can build fast.
Pray for more finances to help finish upcoming building projects.
I am planning on taking a vacation with family to Jinja this Christmas season. Pray that we have a relaxing time.

Happy New Year!

January 10, 2019January 10, 2019wilfredrugumbaLeave a comment

Happy New year!!

The last few weeks have been the busiest weeks I have ever experienced. Our school is set to start at the beginning of February, and our HR was tasked to hire staff. The first set of interviews did not go well as we had many applicants, but few met our standards, and I began to panic as time was running out. Thank God, we were able to do massive advertisement again, and we had another set of interviews which helped us get the teachers we need.

It has been stressful and sometimes I felt lonely, but I got encouraged each time I prayed and let God take charge.

My parents and sisters came to my home, and we celebrated Christmas together. We shared the day with our staff that was working such as our medical staff, Baby Home Mothers, and Security Guards, and we also shared it with our patients that were admitted to the Medical Center.

I took a few days and vacationed with my family after Christmas and that was energizing. In times when I am done, I just imagine the thousands of kids that will walk through this school, know Christ and be nurtured to become Godly leaders that will impact our country, and I am so humbled that God has called me to be a part of it.

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whatsapp image 2019-01-09 at 11.06.54 pm

A few weeks ago, nothing was up at our school, but I am thankful to God that we have built six classrooms, and they are now on the roofing stage. It is not just about the buildings, each day over 20 men come and work on our site, and I see 20 families that are cared for because of this building project. We have bought bricks from local villagers, and they are thankful to earn money so that they can feed and educate their families; our local businesses have also been boosted because of the cement and supplies we continue buying from them. Thank you for your prayers and support. Our goal is that the school will be done in 3 weeks pray for me.

Our annual camp starts today; we invited all the kids that we sponsor to come to the Village for 3 nights. We will be sharing with them from Romans 12. We are blessed to host a team from Chicago that will be helping us in the camp, and will also be doing a medical outreach as the team has two nurses and a doctor.

We continue welcoming in new babies at the village, and each day we receive referrals for babies that need to be rescued. This breaks my heart knowing what these kids go through, but I am thankful we have a safe place where they can be. Our last set of kids that we rescued are twins, Kato and Wasswa. They are currently at the national referral hospital to receive treatment for malnourishment.

Please Pray:

Pray for Kato and Wasswa that they will be fine soon.
Pray for good weather that our builders are not delayed.
Pray for me and my fellow staff that God will give us strength in this time.
Pray for the Camp that our kids will be transformed by the power of the gospel.

whatsapp image 2019-01-09 at 11.06.53 pm(1) — The Rugumba Family on Family Vacation!

What Happened This November

December 3, 2018December 3, 2018wilfredrugumba1 Comment

It has been a while since I last posted.

Lots of things have been going on, and I would love to keep you posted. My trip to the USA went well; Vena and I got to meet friends and supporters.

On my visits, I share about what we do and why we do what we do. I get to step out of the leadership of Mercy, and as I am away, my senior managers lead. I am always encouraged and energized seeing what God is doing and has done at Mercy in just a short time. Can you imagine that 7 years ago that was just a bush and we were caring for only 30 kids? Today, we have grown to over 200 kids, a Microfinance serving over 500 people, a medical center that saw 6,000 patients last year, and a church of close to 500 members growing in Christ. Only God can do such a thing. Thank you for all your support and prayers.

We had a tragedy here in Uganda when a fishing boat, turned into a boat cruise, capsized. Over 120 people were on board, but only 27 have were reported to have been rescued. Most lost their lives because they had no life jackets and did not know how to swim. Our nation is mourning over the loss of these young middle class business men and women that passed on. One of our church members lost a sister and her Fiancée in this incidence. As I have been thinking and mourning over that, I am so thankful that on my trip to the USA, through Market of Hope, an event organized by LBC church, we were able to raise enough money to give our kids swimming lessons through out the year as a life skill.

We also raised enough money to start on the remodeling of our school and building more classrooms.

This past Friday was Worship Night; this is an annual event we organize, where we invite the nation for a night of prayer and worship. Normally, we do it in a stadium, but this time we organized it at the Worship House, our main campus. We had a very big turn out, close to 20,000 people attended and our overflow section was filled, so many people stood around.

Friday was declared a national mourning day for families of those that died in the boat tragedy; we spent time praying for them at our worship night. We had special musicians, from all over the world that performed. Jack Cassidy, from the United States, who was on the Voice TV show last year came and performed. He is staying with my family for the next two weeks.

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WhatsApp Image 2018-12-01 at 11.42.24 PM

On Saturday, we had our staff, Isaac and Tracy’s wedding. Isaac works as our accountant and Tracy is a physician assistant at our medical center. I had the honor of doing their wedding, and the reception was held at Mercy Church.

Last week, we had a national MTN marathon, I missed running it because I was preaching. After my birthday, some of our staff that participated discovered that they could run, and three of our staff participated. Mujuni, our security guard, placed seventh in the half marathon race, out of the thousands of people that participated, including professional runners from Kenya. This was his first time to participate. We plan to start a running team at Mercy as running has become a part of our lives.

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WhatsApp Image 2018-12-01 at 11.43.42 PM

We held our first set of staff interviews for Mercy School. We want to employ 10 teachers, and we have already hired 7 out of close to 100 applicants. We are advertising again and have interviews scheduled for the end of the week, where we hope to get the remaining 3 and a head teacher. At the end of December and January, we shall start having teacher training.

Prayer requests:

Pray that we get the right teachers to be selected on our team.
Building has started, so pray that our builders get work done fast and nice before February when our school year begins.
Pray for more money to come in to enable us finish building and furnish the school.

Our new school’s blueprint

Answering the Need with the Church

September 28, 2018September 28, 2018wilfredrugumbaLeave a comment

There is always a need. A need for Christ and a need for hope and love. A need for emotion, spiritual and physical healing, and the truth is, there will always be a need. We saw this need in our community, and we decided to do something about it.

About three years ago, we started our medical center to help prevent people from dying, but we saw the need was greater than just physical healing. We saw people needed spiritual healing as well; they needed prayer, and they needed hope, so we decided to plant a church.

Mercy Church 4

On March 5th, 2017, we had our very first church service, and today, almost a year and a half later, we are reaching almost four hundred people and one hundred kids every Sunday.

Before we even had our first service, the witch doctors in our area heard we were planting a church and came and cursed our land and us, but the Lord is the Victorious King and their curses held no power against the King of Kings.

Through Mercy Church, we have seen how the Lord has worked and moved in people’s hearts. We have seen healing, we have seen growth, and we have seen at least 400 people give their lives to Christ. To God be the Glory!! No curse can withstand what the Lord can do!

Mercy Church 2

Our vision for the church doesn’t just stop with this church plant, we have plans to grow bigger and to plant more churches throughout Uganda for the Kingdom of God. There is much darkness throughout the surrounding areas near Mercy Child Care Ministry, and our goal is to bring light to such darkness through the church. We want to see people healed physically, emotionally and spiritually, and so our goal is to continue answering the need in the communities by planting more churches and medical centers.

Right now, with our goal to plant more churches, our plan is to raise up spiritual leaders. We currently have several different ministries that are dedicated to discipling people. We currently have a children’s ministry, youth ministry, Evangelism, women’s ministry, music ministry, an usher’s ministry, the marrieds ministry and life groups. Along with the several different ministries within the church, we also have classes where we are teaching people business, sewing and English. We have plans for a parent class and an elderly group.

Our intention with these ministries and classes is to raise up leaders and to give them more opportunities to serve God; not only that, but with these ministries, people are building life-long relationships and growing together and that is our hope through them.

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Every day our church grows more and more, but there is still so much darkness in our area. We want to see even more people surrender their lives to Christ. Through our different classes and our bank, we are reaching people who are unsaved by allowing them to join and to receive help.

We also are doing many outreaches throughout the community. This week we had a Hernia Camp at our Medical Center; we hosted 3 retired surgeons from UK who joined 20 Surgeons from Uganda, Kenya, Rwanda and Burundi. They taught them modern techniques of Hernia operation, and we were able to offer over 80 patients free Hernia surgery. Most of them were dying from pain and were not able to afford surgery.

Hernia Surgeon Pic

We also held outdoor gospel meetings in the surrounding villages and over 200 people gave their lives to Christ. We baptized around 50 people last Sunday. One of the kids we baptized was Hawali, a little Muslim boy we found abandoned, and we rescued and brought to Mercy. He came to me and asked me to baptize him, that he had decided to follow Jesus for the rest of his life.

People need Christ, they need love, and they need hope, and we believe we are answering their need through Mercy Church. God has moved in so many lives, and it is so incredible to watch these lives be forever altered. We pray that Mercy Church continues to share the Light, to share hope, to share love, and to share Christ with the people of Uganda.

Please continue you praying for the new believers to grow in their faith.

Birthday Run Update

August 2, 2018wilfredrugumbaLeave a comment

Last week on Tuesday, I went with my whole family to meet Jajja Rille and the team visiting from Laurenglen Bible Church in Bukwo, Eastern Uganda. We drove for 8 hours to Kapchorwa where we had to leave the car and take a motor cycle(boda boda.) We took it for 4 hours climbing Mount Elgon on the worst roads I have ever experienced.

I sat on a boda with baby Rille and Graham, and it fell on our way back. Thankfully, no one was hurt because it was riding very slow on the bad roads. The ride was worth it, meeting jaja Rille and the LBC team, and the kids thought the boda ride was adventurous. Bukwo is where our gold medal runners come from, and it is 6,000 feet above sea level on the slopes of mount Elgon. I trained on the same road they did and kids kept calling me Kipsiro (one of our goal medalists.) The amazing views are spectacular there.

On the way home, we passed by Palisa which is a little town . Last year, we spent a month teaching Evangelism, and one of our church members went back to his village and shared the gospel; around 20 people came to know the Lord. In his village, there wasn’t a church nearby, so they started a Mercy Church plant praying under a tree. I was able to see them and talk with them, they had over 50 people there. They made up a structure out of corn husks and they were excited for it. I shared the story to Mercy Church on Sunday, and they are excited about going there and encouraging our brothers and sisters.

This past Wednesday, was my birthday and my run. That morning I started out scared, I had never run 33 kilometers and friends were waiting and some sponsored me to run. I feared disappointing them, but I was confident in the fact that I had trained enough. I was joined with over 50 friends, and we started off by praying. Some of those who attended were non believers but they just loved running. Most of my friends ran 10k, and 20k with me. The speaker of our sub-county joined the run, along with Pastor Wilson, Vena and even my boys who joined in the last 5 kilometers. We had a dance work out class for about a hour and a half hours after running. I ran through a 10 k loop 3 times and on the first time we had to take a different root to make up for the 3 extra kilometers. My biggest encouragement was meeting my friends walking and running along side the while share funny stories with them.

I am thankful to God I finally made it to the finished line.

We have so far raised about $2,5

00 in pledges and cash, and I am asking you to give towards this cause. Our goal is $20,000 to buy an X-ray and build a room on code that will keep radiations in. To give, you can use the link below.

https://www.childrentolove.org/give

Please feel free to share this blog to friends and encourage them to give.

Thank you for your support.

My Birthday Wish: Part 2

July 11, 2018wilfredrugumbaLeave a comment

Saturday morning, I started serious training for my birthday run on August 1st. It will be my first time to run 33 kilometers, and I am doing it so we can get an X-ray Machine at Mercy Medical Center. This X-ray would be the only one in our sub-county of 26,000 people.

I ran 24 kilometers through Mende sub-county and through the more rural places where we stay. It’s a great run through some nice forests and I get to see monkeys. As I run, in my heart, I pray for the community, and I meet good people and kids who cheer me up and run with me some miles.

Mende has only one public secondary school which means if you lived where I stay, and your parents can’t afford private school, you will have to walk 7 kilometers to the school and 7 back every day. Some of these kids join me in my run. While on my run, I come across many mosques and witch doctor shrines, and sometimes I find witchcraft stuff laid on the roads. This breaks me and I pray for the light of the gospel to continue to shine in this community and for more Mercy Church plants in these areas.

This past Sunday, was Mercy Sunday. Our sponsored kids and I shared about the work at Mercy, and we showed videos with the goal of challenging the church members to serve the least of these. It was a joy seeing these kids up on the stage serving God, and at the end, many people’s lives were blessed.

I am raising $20,000 to buy an X-ray machine and build an X-ray room at our medical center by running on my Birthday. For each kilometer, you can sponsor me by giving $10. You are also welcome to join me on my run. I will be setting off from Mercy Medical Center at 6:00 am on my birthday August 1.

There are two ways you can give:

1.) You can write a check to Children to Love, and in the memo write Mercy X-Ray.

Children to Love International

P.O. Box 9575

Bakersfield, CA 93389

2.) You can give online at this link: https://childrentolove.givingfuel.com/give-now