Uganda 2008-2009
Wow, what a trip!!
 Hugh Osgood and Trevor Howard travelled to Uganda ready for the Namboole, National Stadium Passover Festival on New Year’s Eve. We were hosted by our good friends Pastors Joseph and Freda Serwadda of Victory Christian Centre and Impact FM radio. The New Year’s eve event saw Dr Hugh preach to the crowd of about 100,000 (depending on whose figures you rely on).
Pastor Joseph had then arranged for us to speak at the CiC Uganda National Pastors’ Conference on 2nd & 3rd Jan. About 2000 pastors from across Uganda came to hear Hugh, in his role as International President and Founder of CiC International, as well as Trevor and a couple of other international speakers address issues of ministerial conduct, how God fights for us, and responses to questions from the delegates. It was a great event concluded by Pastor Joseph in his role as CiC Uganda National Patron.
On Sunday 4th Jan Dr Hugh preached at Victory Christian Centre’s main service, while Trevor preached at Kampala Evangelical Free Church in Muyenga (a former slum suburb of Kampala which Hugh and Trevor, and teams from Cornerstone Christian Centre have been reaching out to for many years).
Monday & Tuesday 5th – 6th Jan saw Dr Hugh & Trevor lead two staff development days for the Country Director and local staff of Tigers’ Club-re:trak Uganda, a street boys’ football club which helps with the health, education, repatriation and micro-enterprise sponsoring for boys who find themselves living rough in Kampala. This was yet again a well-received and extremely beneficial couple of days, including encouragement and equipping of the staff as well as analysis of personnel and management issues. Thank you for having us again!
 Wednesday started with a truly amazing meeting. Dr Hugh spoke at the early morning business leaders meeting... It starts at 5.30am and by 6.30am nearly 5,000 people were present. There is need for a 10,000 seater auditorium for this meeting alone at Victory Christian Church, Ndeeba. What was brilliant was to witness the team preaching of Dr Hugh with Pastor Joseph interpreting – always a major memory.
After the Business leaders meeting on Wednesday Dr Hugh and Trevor visited education projects linked with Muyenga High School and Christian Family Helpers, a group of schools and orphanage projects linked with Cornerstone Christian Centre in London, where Dr Hugh is the Senior Minister and Trevor is the Overseas Projects Co-ordinator. We visited Muyenga High School, St. Barnabas Primary School, Triumphant School and Kampala Pupils’ School.
Trevor was able, through some gifts from Raglan Primary School in Bromley, to pay for two extra classrooms and some new desks and benches in these latter two. St. Barnabas has an on-going pupil correspondence scheme with Raglan School.
 On Thursday, after visiting some new land on the Masaka Road which the project is acquiring to develop a new school and boarding facilities at the Uganda government’s request, we were able to visit the tourist trap which is also known as ‘the Equator’ and enjoyed the marvel of water going opposite ways down the plug hole!
Friday was set aside for Dr Hugh and Trevor to meet with various ministers and young people who they have been mentoring over the years. This was very exciting and several young people would be interested in working with UK churches to develop a long-term relationship to see educational needs met in some of the the poorest slums of the city. Do contact us if you are interested.
Friday evening was a great opportunity for Dr Hugh and Trevor to continue the link of Cornerstone Christian Centre with Kampala Evangelical Free Church (so named after Bromley North Free Church – the first church Dr Hugh planted in Bromley back in the 1970s). Dr Hugh preached at the evening prayer meeting.
Saturday we had to maximise our resources, Hugh started writing reports and set time aside to prepare for what would become a full day of preaching on Sunday; while Trevor travelled with one of the Directors of Christian Family Helpers, Vivienne Wamala, the project Social Worker Paul and the Administrator Ignatius to Kakumiru, where they had established St James’ Charity School & College in what is a remote rural area.
It was exciting to get pictures and see electricity on the site (an answer to the prayers of many years), as well as to hear of all the plans of the schools there being run from 2009 as government aided schools – a real testimony to the excellence of the project as it will now become a model site for the new Univeral Secondary Education programme being rolled out nationally. Efforts will now concentrate from our point of view on developing the virgin site on the Masaka Road into a model schooling, boarding and farming training centre. Again, if you are interested in helping this work please contact us to discuss possibilities.
Sunday was a busy day (as if the others weren’t!). It started with the English Language service at Victory Church for Dr Hugh, with Trevor preaching at the English service for Pastor Steven Sebyala at Calvary Temple Worship Centre, Kitintale. Dr Hugh joined Trevor and then preached at their main service. After lunch at Fang Fang’s Chinese restaurant, we went to Miracle Centre, where Dr Hugh had a great time fellowshipping with Pastor Robert Kayanja before being invited to minister at the Sunday evening prayer meeting. It was great to have the opportunity to continue to build the relationships across several of Kamapala’s key churches and leaders.
We left Kampala on Monday evening and arrived safely home on Tuesday morning.
A big thank you to all of you, our partners, for your prayers and support for this trip.
Special thanks are due to Cornerstone Christian Centre, Bromley and Victory Christian Centre, Kampala for their help with the costs of our travel, accommodation and sustenance whilst out of the country.
Our thanks also to re:trak Uganda for their hospitality and for the UK office and Director for their help in setting the days up.
The trip wouldn’t have been the same without the warm family welcome and increasingly professional attitude of Mummy Helen and her team in Muyenga, thank you.
If you are interested in supporting, sponsoring the work or inviting the expertise of Dr Hugh Osgood and Trevor Howard into countries like Uganda, please contact us and we will be very glad to help you as you seek to be a part of God’s plan for the nations supporting Kingdom growth.
During 2009 we hope to visit such countries as Nigeria (both Central and Southern), Ghana, Tanzania, Pakistan and South Africa.
All of these trips will require prayer and finance, as well as the good will of those receiving us.
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