March Additional Update.

Greetings to all our friends/co-workers. As you will be aware, Uganda like many other countries is on the lockdown therefore very few essential activities can take place nationwide.

We too, as the CMM team to a big extent spend most of our time at home. In this report, we are letting you know how things are going on with some of our individual CMM families during the lockdown season.

Kato Edward’s Family.

Our family is comprised of 5 members; Kato Edward, Nambatya Diana Kato, Namata Abigail Earon, Muwanguzi Hansen Ssenyondo, Nabirye Janipher.

The Katos.

Since March, we are at home since its lockdown all over the country. We use most of this time to bond with the children since we were a bit busy before the lockdown. We get time to pray, play, and do different things together.

At first, Diana was too much scared about this COVID-19 until we heard a message from the pastor at Watoto that “Jesus Christ is above all thing and will surely take us through so be strong”.

In order to keep ourselves safe, we pray for our health, we boost our vitamin B by drinking lemon juice and eating fruits. We always sanitize, wash our hands, and stay at home.

What we have been doing is praying for others and helping some people financially with the little that we have.

Our prayer request is that God continues to provide for our family through this trying moment.

Byamugisha Richard’s Family.

Thank God the lockdown announcement found us all home as a family otherwise it’s been complicated for those that traveled since they’ve had to stay where they are until circumstances change.

Much of the time has been for personal reflection and family ministry. Since the Lockdown crisis, we laid a program for a family alter, personal prayer time, bible study, playtime, home chores, and online ministry.

Family time.

Since my family is very young, we start our day with the family alter at 7am. Each adult member has a day to share the word from the bible, that’s Mary, Isaac, my wife Molly, and myself. We then share prayer requests and end the prayer time.

Prayer time.

We then embark on Breakfast which is normally at 8:30am. Mary and Isaac go for home classes which are supervised by either me or my wife. The class usually takes 2hrs and they join their friends to play. Our vicinity is comprised of staff members, where my wife Molly teaches, with their families. So we have a total of 12 children in one location. Luckily we all agreed on the health standards for that crisis. We usually have a clear program of lunch and supper till evening where we converge at 8pm and wrap up with prayer.

Meal time

It’s been a hard moment of no movement but it’s been a great time for bonding. We have learned much about being together for the last month on a daily basis. We also get simple exercises since we are prohibited from moving far from homes.

Staring at nature.

We have also mobilized foodstuffs for 3 vulnerable families in our community and 2 distant families. The distant families are the triplets and the Oldman George from Mitooma in Western Uganda. Since we don’t know when the lockdown is ending, we request friends to pray for us not to lack. Our children in Karamoja are in a dare situation, so they need prayer for God’s intervention so that we may lose them due to hunger.

Mugabi Isaac’s Family.

We have a young family of 2 boys, Sharma, 4 and Timothy, 2 with Sharma doing his first year in nursery school, and Mercy my wife doing her first year at University.

Our day starts as early as 7am but in intervals, with Mercy and I getting up first and plan and prepare for the day, while the boys join us at about 8am for breakfast.

I am usually quite engaged for most of the day in research and planning for my new business setup and some software development work as the boys do what they do best, video games, while Mercy does the cooking (for most of the days) and some reading after.

The Mugabis

The evening time has always been meet-up time to pray as a family and share on a number of things including the word of God.

We continue praying to God for provision in these trying times.

Dan Muwanguzi’s Family.

The ideal day for the Muwanguzi family during these days. I usually wake up around 6am, go to my home office and usually start my quiet time (bible study, meditation/prayer until 8am.

Princess and the boys join me at 8am and we spend an hour in the bible study, prayer for our selves and friends, and then discuss any other educative/discipline stuff. Afterward, we share a cup of tea/coffee as Miriam and Timothy also join us a bit later to continue starting off the day together.

(L-R) David, Jonathan, Mike and Princess for the Morning devotion.

At 10am, I communicate with about 7 of my student pastors plus 3 co-CTBS teachers to work on the C-TBS assignments for those 7, at times sharing about the COVID-19 challenges in different communities, receive prayer requests from various churches/individuals which are mostly around food/provision and health of any family.

In the afternoons, the kids are doing their schoolwork/personal studies, Miriam joins the kitchen crew and by 2pm I get back into my personal studies, communication, and any other CMM related work.

At around 5, we as a family get back again together chatting/informal discussions. The evening is TV/News plus good nights.

Prayer requests.

We are currently faced with a challenge of many of our friends, neighbors, co-workers, relatives, single mothers, the elderly, etc who stopped earning weeks back because of the lockdown yet Ugandan families are big.

Every day, we are receiving either phone-calls, visits, or text messages needing help along food/medicine lines, genuine yet many. We usually respond to the best that we can and will appreciate prayers along those lines for us and Uganda at large.

The muwanguzis.

We thank you all for your continuous prayers and support to us. We too are praying for you more especially during this COVID-19 season.