Follow-up

Dear Friends,

Thank you for your many prayers in response to my last communication regarding witchcraft in Karamoja. I owe you an update.

Thank the Lord that Cosmas and the rest of the family of Kodet Martina, the woman who died, seem to be doing well though they continue to mourn. We continue to pray that, through the faithful testimony of Christians like Cosmas, God might use their sorrow to turn their hurts unto Christ and the great comfort that he alone can bring.

I also asked for prayer for Loumo Gabriel. Sadly, his condition seems to slowly worsen. When I visited him on Thursday he was basically catatonic. An interesting development regarding his situation is what we have learned of the circumstances which the community believes to have brought about his illness.  Apparently, he and his brother-in-law, Ngiro Albino, were in Adumani, Northwest Uganda, where they had managed to find some work. Well, they were involved in a fight there. They badly beat and injured another man. They quickly fled the scene and managed to travel home to Karamoja. The mother of the injured man is a witch doctor. They believe that she cast the spell which has brought these afflictions. (Ngiro Albino has also been suffering from illness, albeit less severe, in which his stomach area has been swelling at times.) So, the families believe that the solution will be to travel back to Adumani to apologize to the witch doctor and her family and to convince her to remove the spell. From their perspective, the only great burden is the transport money since it is a long distance. They would also likely be required to pay money to the offended family.

These events bring great opportunities for interacting with our Karimojong friends, believers as well as unbelievers. I appreciate your continuing to pray.  I shared with my friends – “Yes, it is good to apologize for beating up that man etc. However, your greatest need is not to be at peace with the witch doctor but to find true peace with God, through Christ. Think about how such fighting is offensive to the Lord and how he might be the one allowing your present suffering. Perhaps he is at work through all of this to bring you to himself.”  

Please continue to pray for these ones. And pray that in such situations I will have the wisdom of Christ as to know how best to speak his truth in love.

In Christ,

Dave