Mission to Kenya and Uganda November 2016
Janis and Laurie flew to Entebbe on November 2nd, were met by Pastors John and Jimmy and arrived in Masafu, Busia on November 3rd. We then travelled across the border into Western Kenya on November 4th. Over 19 days we ministered in 12 prisons, led seminars and services in various churches, taught at a Sunday School Teachers’ workshop and spoke at a women’s conference. We visited a site on a mountainside which has been given to Streams of Mercy. The pastors have a vision to use the site as a prayer centre, putting a building on the flatter area at the bottom of the hill and building prayer caves higher up as well as making some sites level enough for visitors to pitch tents
The team outside Busia Men’s Prison.
Pastor Charles speaking to the women and introducing us. After the ministry 10 women accepted Christ as Saviour.
Children stay with their mothers in the prison up to the age of 4.
There are very few facilities for them, which worries the governor of the prison. One idea is to have a nursery school running just outside the prison where children from the community can attend and those children in the prison can go out to the school., since they are innocents, not convicted prisoners. But until that can be put in place all they have is a few dolls. We gave gifts of soap and toiletries and provided milk for the children.
Kakamega women’s prison has similar problems with the children. One mother (pictured standing on the left) gave her testimony – she has come to know Christ in prison but at present is serving a life sentence and has a seven-month-old baby.boy. She accidentally caused her husband’s death during an argument after he brought another wife in the home who started to abuse her. The husband also lashed out at her even though she was pregnant at the time and in trying to protect herself she caused him to fall and he died as a result.
At first, she was given a death sentence but that has since been commuted to life, and an appeal in underway.
Streams of Mercy (Uganda/Kenya) has undertaken to be responsible for the care of the child in regard to nutrition and eventually schooling etc. 20 women gave their lives to Christ after the ministry.
Shikusa Borstal – young offenders 12-18 years old. !4 boys gave their lives to Christ – pictured on the right praying for salvation. We visited the borstal library and noted the absence of Christian books and Bibles, and the need for more scholastic text books, Streams of Mercy has now obtained a grant of Christian books from the charity 'Speaking Volumes'. These will be sent our later this year on our container and will be displayed as a Streams of Mercy section in the borstal library.
The boys receiv
ed
copies of ‘Upesi’ –
a Gospel paper
in Swahili as
well as a gift of soap.
Left - Giving the aid in Bungoma 11 men accepted Christ as Saviourt
Right- Kakamega men’s prison. We could only minister to a few in a small room as it rained when we arrived so we couldn’t meet with all the prisoners in the compound where there was no cover. 2 men accepted Christ here.
GLORY WORSHIP CENTRE
Sunday worship. Ministry to the children using our Sheep Puppet known as Basil to tell the story of the lost sheep. B
Congregation praising the Lord
Preaching the Word
We ran a Sunday School teacher's training workshop and and provided GO TEACH materials and New Testaments
The Big Celebration of 10 years of Streams of Mercy work in Uganda
The newest Tailoring Class celebrate Introducing the trainers
Presentation of the history of Streams of Mercy using Powerpoimt.
Some of the garments made by the students.
Clothes made while learning are taken to the refugee camp. The more perfect items made as the students become proficient are sold to generate income to help fund the classes.
Over 100 students have now been trained in tailoring – and some in carpentry and hairdressing. Over 70% have either started their own business or found work with someone else. The remainder need some means of funding to start up a business. Streams of Mercy wold like to be able to provide a micro finance fund to help with his.
Cutting the celebration cake
Final Sunday in Masafu
Before the church services Janis and Laurie with the translator and other team members went to Masafu prison and after they had spoken to the inmates and sung to them 50 accepted Christ as Saviour.
Laurie then went to preach at the Church of Uganda and Janis went to the Salvation Army, where earlier in the week Janis and Laurie led two days of seminars.
Worship
Eight babies were dedicated
The youth Gospel dance group ministered.
The home league singers contributed 
After giving the message Janis sang the solo ‘ Touch through me, Holy Spirit’. No invitation to come forward to the place of prayer (mercy seat) was given but people started to come forward and knelt there to pray for a fresh anointing with the Holy Spirit. 42 came – it was overwhelming.
Janis was later presented with a gift thanking her for the ministry.
The Officer will be moving on to a new appointment - he has been promoted to district Officer and will be in the Mount Elgon region of north east Uganda where there are 3 small SA churches in the villages, and the officer’s brief is to do evangelism and plant more churches in the area. He has requested that when we are back in Uganda in February 2017 we join him for a few days to help with that outreach.
Finally, we travelled to Kampala and spent two days working with the choir of a relatively new church planted in a developing area.
They were quick learners and felt they had gained a lot from the experience of learning some of our English songs in four-part harmony.
They worked very hard at the songs. On the final day, they came dressed in traditional dress and presented some of their own songs to us. This is one of the best choirs I have heard in Africa.
We felt this had been a successful mission – about 275 prison inmates came to the Lord and many in the churches were blessed.
In one area of Kenya we were asked to pray for people to receive the fullness of the Holy Spirit. It was an area where there was a lot of occult and witch doctor influence and as people started to pray to be filled there were demonic manifestations which we bound and cast out in the Name of Jesus.
We were asked to listen to a choir in an Anglican Church in Kenya – they apologised for having no keyboard but they sang so beautifully in four-part harmony unaccompanied that we told them they had np need to apologise – their singing was beautiful Choral music.
In the UK we have been collecting aid to send to Uganda and have enough for a 40-foot container. All we need now is to hear that the SoM charity registration in Uganda has gone through and that customs will be waived as a result. We also need the funding to ship it !
Please pray that we may be guided aright in all future plans and that we , have the necessary health and financial resources to meet the mission expenses and the many needs that are there. We want to progress with the completion of the Streams of Mercy centres in Uganda and in Dr Congo. We praise God for the way He has led and provided over the last 10 years and trust Him for future days.
Thank you for your continued prayerful support.
May God, bless you
Janis and Laurie Homewood.
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