April News

Dear Friends and Family,

God has truly blessed us these past few months. We have continued to feel His leading as the details of our departure are being finalized. God has given us peace, direction , and growing anticipation as we get closer to being on the field.
It is exciting to be part of the team that will be developing a camp on the 715 acres recently purchased by NHUM. This beautiful site is located on Lake Victoria in the southern part of Uganda. We believe that God will greatly use this camp to impact the lives of the youth of Uganda for Christ. The new youth camp and training center will play a vital role in bringing the Fatherhood of God to the fatherless children with whom we have been entrusted.
Our goal is to establish a camp that will work with our current children’s centers, other children’s centers in Uganda, as well as other Christian ministries working to further the gospel of Christ. The camp will provide opportunities for people to come to know Christ, grow in their relationship with Him, and grow in their understanding of what it means to be God-honoring men and woman in their culture.
We are excited to see the truth of God’s Word transform their lives and compel them to live for Christ. There is much work ahead of us and we cherish your prayer support. We trust that God will work all things together for His glory.

Blessings,
Caleb and Alair

Prayer Request
A strong financial and prayer support base as we continue to seek new partners in ministry
For wisdom as we make decisions and raise funds for the land.
That we will continue to clearly share the vision of what God has called us to.

Updates
Our plane tickets have been purchased!
Our departure date is June 25th.
Thanks to ministry partners, New Hope Uganda has signed a purchase agreement for 715 acres of the 1,100 acres of land on Lake Victoria for the camp!
Prayer Support- We are very thankful for those of you who have committed to pray for us and this ministry either daily or weekly!
We are grateful for those who have given financially to this ministry.

Monthly Support Covers
Personal expenses such as:
food
house maintenance
insurance
fuel
Ministry expenses such as:
air travel
savings for furloughs
correspondence
NHU admin. expenses
hosting groups
community needs

Start Up Expenses
initial airfare to Uganda
work permits
visas
shots
printing and mailings
camp housing to be built
vehicle in Uganda
emergency fund
phone
language school
NHICF training

Support and Donations
New Hope Uganda Ministries
PO Box 154
Belle Fourche, SD 57717
1-800-611-6486

Land for Camp Site

Dear Family and Friends,

Thank you very much for your prayers! God has heard us and acted in a very strong way! We have a signed purchase agreement for the land and money to back it!

A couple days ago we sent out an email requesting prayer for the negotiations we were going to be in the very next day for the purchase of 1100 beautiful acres of land on the shore of Lake Victoria for our Manhood/Womanhood/Youth Camp. I have felt strongly that we need that land but we didn't have any money with which to negotiate. God has provided! The night before we went for the meeting, I received a call from a dear friend wanting to invest in this venture. Because of circumstances he isn't able to donate the money but he is loaning/investing the money needed for the down payment. We also got another significant donation from another dear friend. So as we went into the meeting we were able to talk with confidence.

Negotiations went well! We have now signed for 715 acres of the land. As I understand it, because of the pressure the cooperative is under, they have offered the second plot that would have made the offer 1100 acres, to someone else and said they thought we weren't interested. I assured them we are interested, so they are promising to bring that title to the negotiating table soon.

We have put a small down payment down and promised the rest after the two weeks it will take them to have the boundaries verified and an amicable agreement made with the squatters.

Thank you so very much for your prayers! Please keep this in prayer. We still need to raise approximately $120,000 to complete the purchase of the 715 acres. We also need approximately $150,000 more for the remaining pieces of land It is a lot of money for an organization our size.

Some of you may be wondering if the equatorial heat has been affecting my brains in trying to get such a large piece of land. Others have wondered about the size of the land and if this is in line with our mission of "bringing the Fatherhood of God to the fatherless. These are very valid questions. Below are my copied and pasted answers to those questions.

It is obviously a very large piece of land and is much bigger than we would be able to use in the near future. However, there are several reasons why I hope we will be able to buy all of it:
· Land prices are going up continuously in Uganda. Foreign investors from Arab Muslim nations, China, and other Asian countries are buying up land. The land is far enough away from Kampala that the price is still not very high but the land grab is spreading. Getting land of this quality and size in the future will be difficult.
· This is an investment in the future of ministry and the Kingdom of God here in Uganda.
· Ugandan culture is very different from US culture. Here there is only one volume on any radio or PA system and that is maximum. It is not uncommon for us to have our sleep disturbed by blaring music from “discos” that are several kilometers away from us. If I buy a relatively small piece of land it is likely that in the future someone will put in a disco on the beach near by and keep our campers awake through the nights to all kinds of bad music. It would be very difficult for us to do anything about it. If we own this whole piece, the nearest neighbor would with two possible exceptions, would be on the other side of a hill or quite distant. Without this whole piece of land, we could end up with a piece of property that was unusable for our purposes because of the neighbors.
· There is a fairly large piece of forest on the land. It is being encroached on by sawyers and charcoal makers. It would be wonderful to be able to preserve the beauty of the site.
· There would be much land available for hiking and nature trails.
· The population of Uganda is growing very fast and the market for the kinds of facilities we would provide would continue to grow. We would be looking at increasing the types of services we provide to include things like a retreat center and could have camps for different ages or groups.
· When we talked to the leadership of Hume Lake, one of the foremost Christian Camps on the west coast of the US, they told us to buy as much land as we could get a hold of. Hume Lake is what it is today because many years ago some young men with forethought made a big investment in a large piece of land in the mountains of California.

Our purpose is to bring the Fatherhood of God to the fatherless. We have been very aware of the need for a Manhood/Womanhood/Youth CampTraining Site and have been planning that direction. We saw that if we don't strategically train boys and young men to be true, godly men, many of them will grow up to produce children that are in effect fatherless if not in actual fact. Now we see even more that we need to make bold steps into this area if we are going to play the role we believe God has given us in reaching the fatherless, being a part of transforming Ugandan society, and reducing fatherlessness.

We are learning to look way into the future in our planning and are that much more aware of how strategic we need to be in preparing for the future. This isn't just about now or the next few years; it is about 20 and more years from now. The site is very strategically located to serve children's centers, churches, schools and needy children - often fatherless, from Kampala, Mukono, Lugazi, and Jinja and beyond. A significant portion of the population of Uganda comes from those areas. Those towns and the surrounding areas would likely include as many as a million fatherless children not to mention the many thousands of other children who could benefit from the programs we could offer.

Thanks again for your prayers. Goodbye for now.

In Christ,

Jay
Director
New Hope Uganda

California

We had a great time visiting family in California during Alair's Spring Break. We were able to see Alair's dad (James) and sitster (Janea) as well as Caleb's brother (Josh) and sister in law (Vanessa) and nephew (Cy). We spent one day at the Santa Barbara Zoo. We had a great time seeing everyone as we know this will be the last visit before we head off to Uganda for two years.