I want you to meet a friend of mine. His name is Pastor Paul Ochaya, and he lives in Gulu, northern Uganda. He pastors a church with which we have been working, and also oversees six other churches which he has helped to start. Pastor Paul is a quiet man, with an inner strength of character, and a deep faith in the Lord, but it was not until my last trip to Uganda this past July that I learned about his background and the trials that have strengthened this remarkable man.

In 1997, much of northern Uganda was at war, attacked by the deadly rebel army called LRA. In response, the government sent soldiers to northern Uganda to stop the LRA, herding people into refugee camps. As Pastor Paul tells the story, in many ways the government soldiers were actually worse than the LRA rebels in how they treated people. The soldiers would do atrocious things to their fellow Ugandans, to the women and children, and no one could stop them. Gulu was one of the cities hit that hardest by the LRA and government soldiers. It was in 1997 that a soldier took Pastor Paul’s wife away from him, while their two children were very young, ages 2 and 4, and there was nothing he could do to stop the soldier. Since that time, Pastor Paul believes his wife is still alive, but he has never seen her again or heard from her again, and knows she is living as a wife of this soldier (multiple wives are common in northern Uganda). This sent him on a long journey of providing for his children through farming, as well as continuing his pastoral duties.

Today, if you ask Pastor Paul, he will tell you that he longs for the day he will be reunited with his wife, and is doing the best he can to take care of his children and shepherd the seven churches under his care. Please keep Pastor Paul in your prayers, that God will provide for his needs, give him strength in his work, and hope for a glorious future the Savior has waiting for him.

Pressing on, Eric