I made a new friend recently as the result of reading about his faithfulness through a trial. I found myself praising the Lord so much while reading his letter that I wanted to share it with you. My wife and I signed up to begin supporting this mission monthly, and I want to invite you to do the same for this dear family.

From Nathaniel and Jen Jolly

Firstly, we feel our trip was a great success. We were able to meet with a local pastor who is connected with HeartCry Missionary Society, an extremely reliable ministry, known for very sound theology and very concerned with the truth of Scripture being lived out in the local church. To find a church in Uganda connected to this ministry was unbelievable, as many Africa pastors are not sound in doctrine at all. This pastor, Bill Issa, was able to attend the pastors’ conference I was the main speaker for and subsequently kicked out of (more on that later) and spent a great deal of time with us. God’s providence was made so evident through this entire trip that we are still in awe of the goodness of God. From meeting Bill beforehand to the specific message I prepared for the conference, to my mother joining us for this trip. Everything came together so beautifully. Only God could orchestrate us meeting someone in Africa with such similarities, from our training and love for music to our church backgrounds to our doctrine and theological positions. Things just lined up so well. God even provided a way for us to test each other’s character in the short time we were together.

On Thursday, I preached what was to be my first two of four sermons at the pastors’ conference. My topics on Thursday were “Sola Scriptura: What the Bible claims of itself” and the qualifications of a pastor. Moments before I began to preach we learned that this ministry, Makenke Redeemed Church, had around 20 female pastors and was planning to ordain about six more the following day after I preached. My text for the second talk, qualifications for an elder from Titus 1:5-9, obviously opposed their system, but faithful to the text I preached the word of God as written. Afterward, the pastor very deceitfully attempted to undo the preaching I had just done and even told the interpreter to stop interpreting for a moment. Luckily the other pastor with us understood the language and we discovered that the pastor for that church was telling the people to disregard the clear scripture taught on “the husband of one wife.”

The following day before I was to preach, the pastor pulled me aside to tell me that the book of Titus was nothing more than the Apostle Paul’s opinion and communicated that they didn’t believe such doctrines. He then offered to let me continue preaching if I would change my doctrinal position and move to something else. The ending result was that we were asked to leave.

We opted to include this story because it is essential to understanding the condition of the church in Uganda. We were lied to, several times during the encounter, and the manipulation and deceit were unlike anything we’ve personally experienced in the U.S. Unfortunately, we learned that this Pentecostal/charismatic church is the typical church in Uganda. In fact, even the media believes that this is the normal evangelical church. As they said in one national newspaper: “Ugandan pastors and scandals go hand in hand. They make news read more interesting whenever they are a subject of talk in the media.” After talking to many people, we discovered that this ignorance and lack of care for the truth of Scripture is the most common view of the church here.

I was glad to be counted worthy of testing, but more importantly, Pastor Bill Issa, who was with us, was able to see first hand our love for Scripture and unwillingness to compromise. The condition of the church was truly both saddening and enlightening. God clearly orchestrated this so that the church we want to serve with would know we are faithful to God’s Word. This also served to strengthen the bond Bill and I had already begun, and leaving the conference early gave us an extra day together to discuss doctrines and talk about working together. It also served as a reminder to Jen and me how dangerous a “church” can become should they stray from the truth of Scripture. The American charismatic church has done so much damage that it is unbelievable. Ugandan pastors are divorcing their wives for younger women in the church, making their congregation eat “holy” grass and drink bleach to “cast out demons”. One pastor killed 28 members and injured 18 more from this, and all because he claimed the “Holy Spirit” told him to.

The prosperity/word of faith Gospel is stronger here than I’ve ever seen it and unlike in the U.S. where people have been led astray, in Uganda it kills people, literally. In speaking to many believers/leaders, we saw that they knew very little of the Bible, and much of what they said was just made up. All of this to say that Biblical training is desperately needed in Uganda. Bill also informed us that western missionaries had done more harm in Uganda than help from his perspective. He told us of westerners moving there to build churches and to get money from the west and the locals, allowing them to live extravagant, Joel Osteen-type lives. He also mentioned how westerners come and do their own thing rather than coming under the local church and how many never do gospel work at all, just simply humanitarian work. So, we have a huge negative stigma to overcome, but Lord willing we can show the Ugandan people that we are there to serve them through training and equipping, rather than taking advantage of them.

After all of this happened, we had the chance to visit Bill’s church in the capital city of Kampala and meet one of his elders, Dave. They were such kind and hospitable people. The love and consideration they showed us is almost unfathomable. We were able to spend the evening in Bill’s home and with his beautiful family. At the end of our time we concluded that, not only would we be able to be of great help in serving the pastors and churches in Uganda, but that we would do so with Bill and the local church he pastors in Kampala. Our hearts were truly knitted together in a way only God could do and we are excited to work together with them to teach/preach and share the truth of Scripture in Uganda.

While our lifestyle will be harder than what we enjoy here in the US and there will be many changes, we are ready to give up our ease of life here and serve where we know we can be useful and are needed. This work will be hard. The animism and poverty of the culture mix easily with the false prosperity gospel. We must overcome the bad reputation that previous missionaries have left the country with, as well as learn new customs and ways of communicating. English is an official language, but education is so low that it is still difficult to communicate with ease in much of the area in which we will be. We will need to learn to speak Luganda, as well as Swahili.

All of that being said, this is the ministry we feel God has called us to and made a path for us to pursue. We are excited about our move and the preparation period. We are hoping to move in August of 2020, Lord willing, and as He provides. However, we weren’t called to do this alone. We need the help of the body of Christ, both financially and prayerfully. Our living expenses look to be about $2500 monthly (as far as we can tell at this time) and we will need to raise a large amount before moving to cover some large expenses such as a vehicle and appliances for where we will live. We also need people who will be faithful in prayer for us. We realize that we live in a busy society here in the U.S., but we desperately need prayer partners. Together we can faithfully have an impact on Uganda, even if only in a small way, for our Lord Jesus. Together we can plant and water, and watch what God grows. After all, it’s His work, and we are called to be obedient and to serve faithfully.

Please let us know if you’ll be willing to regularly pray for us. Also, let us know how we can be in prayer for you.

If you’d like to financially partner in this mission:

Patreon: Patreon.com/jollymissionaries
Covenant Baptist Church: https://covbap.org/giving/
PayPal: jollynathaniel@gmail.com

The email for contact or newsletter is: Jollymissionaries@gmail.com

Twitter and Facebook name: Nathaniel Jolly

Feel free to let us know if you have any questions. We look forward to partnering with you as we make the transition to being full-time missionaries in Uganda.

Blessings,

Nathaniel and Jen Jolly

Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/jollymissionaries/

 

–Michael: Thanks for reading this. I hope you were as encouraged as I was that there are Christians who want to serve in this way. Please stop and pray now and consider helping them financially.