SWOH has been ministering in Eastern Uganda for 40 years! SWOH Legacy is a multi year capital campaign to lay the groundwork for the next 40 years of ministry. We believe in continuing this initiative due to God’s provision and the initial success of the campaign in spite of global challenges. This capital campaign plans to invest almost $2,000,000 in the long term stability and effectiveness of Wings of Hope Christian Primary School and Hospice Tororo.

Phase 1 COMPLETED: Possess the Land 2020-2021. 

Achievements:

Raised an additional $40,000 to purchase the land

• Completed a successful missions project in 2021 and purchased the land

• Provided extra financial support for orphans and children at risk at WOHCPS. 

• Provided extra financial support for teachers who could not work during the 600+ day shutdown

• Completed largest pastoral and leadership training with over 230 participants

• Developed telehealth program to maintain vital hospice care to CANCER & HIV AIDS patients during pandemic.

  • Hospice program increased capacity to deliver care and added 30 more patients.

• Successfully launched the 2022 school year for 300 returning students and quickly increased to over 750 for the first quarter.

  • Added sanitation stations, extra school supplies

OVERCOMINGS

God has surely made the way to declare and demonstrate the love of Christ with us. As a movement we also recognize the major challenges that are on the horizon. Currently, the developing nation of Uganda has a significant rising inflation rate, only 17-24% vaccinated rate, and is experiencing financial fluxes due to the fluctuating European market. Due to these global challenges adjustments in scope, cost, and timeline have been made in our Legacy Campaign.

Will you join us in prayer as we believe God for the following: 

NEW PHASES

$250,000 GOAL Phase 2 : Dwell the Land 2022-2023. Begin building a permanent school facility on the school campus starting with half the classrooms for lower grades and purchasing a new vehicle for Hospice Tororo.

$750,000 GOAL Phase 3: Build the Temple 2023-2024. Build a chapel, conference center, clinic, and the second half of classrooms for the lower grades. Update the girls orphan dormitories.

$750,000 GOAL Phase 4: Extend God’s Love 2024-2025. Build classrooms for the upper grades. Build a dining hall, kitchen on the school, including science labs, on the school campus. Update the boys orphan dormitories. 

$1,250,000 Phase 5: Compassion Transforms Lives 2025. Finish up any remaining work on the school facilities. Invest in Hospice Tororo by creating the International Hospice Tororo Coalition to provide necessary long term financial support for the hospice care in eastern Uganda. Hire full time staff for Hospice Tororo.  

Dear friends of Uganda,

We want to first thank you again for praying for many of our partners and staff as we went through a winter storm here in Texas. It did create some delay for us, but we have continued to pray and serve as best we can.

Our hope is to encourage you with some great news about SWOH Legacy. SWOH legacy is our 5 year campaign to raise significant support to establish long term ministry in eastern Uganda. After 40 years of ministry, we could have never imagined that God would have so much in store for us and the work He wants to do in Uganda.

Our first phase, Possess the Land, focused on raising $40K by end of 2020 in hopes to purchase the land and buy a new vehicle for hospice. It was unfortunate that as the pandemic lingered, the cost of both fluctuated. After several weeks, recovering from the storm, we pressed on. Through the generous prayers and donors from across the nation, $40K was raised by Spring 2021 and all of our Legacy support will be focused on securing the land. Now, this summer one of our teams will return home to Uganda to close on the purchase. Praise God!

Our goal is to have our land purchased by the end of June, but there are several logistics that we would love to cover with your prayers. These factors include: 1) the ability to travel locally and internationally during the COVID restrictions and 2) organizing the current lease holders, our contacts in Uganda, and the school administration effectively through the close of sale. 3) Please also be in prayer for our safety and health, even with COVID on the decline in Uganda. We have spent several months putting the pieces in place, but we know that ultimately it is God who brings things together through prayer.

Our hospice ministry is an important part of our outreach and care in Uganda. Since all our 1st phase Legacy support is dedicated to the closing of the sale for land, we will be focusing on the purchase of a new hospice vehicle (approx. $25K) into our phase 2; Dwell in the Land which we hope to share more soon.

Thank you again for partnering with us in this most important journey of creating long lasting ministry for our 700 children and our 620 hospice patients. We believe our compassion has transformed so many lives.
To God be the glory.

We continue to pray and to hope all of you are safe during this unprecedented time of quarantine during a pandemic. Many of our jobs and lives have transitioned in unexpected ways, and there are still more unknowns than knowns. We have prayed for you all and for our nation.

We also want to say, “Thank you,” to our sustaining donors and prayer partners. Thank you for your committed, monthly support and one-time, significant gifts during this season. Your generosity assisted our transition to be “social-distance friendly” in the United States. Furthermore, we have been able to support several vulnerable populations in Uganda, including our orphans at the school and our teachers.

Quarantine life in Uganda has similarities to life in the United States. Shut down schools, bare highways, and shut down entertainment venues characterize life in Uganda. Unfortunately, Uganda, as a developing nation, and Sovereign Wings of Hope, as a ministry in rural Uganda, experienced new challenges due to lack of infrastructure. 

Many businesses came to a complete halt because of strict social distancing regulations. Little or no funding went to Ugandans who were unable to work or who lost their jobs due to social distancing measures. Country border guidelines necessitated that we postpone our summer missions project. Due to shutdown of local transport, many of our hospice patients could not meet us in our hospice for outpatient care. Our students missed valuable time in the classroom, and there was no online option available to remedy it. In most cases, parents pay school tuition directly to the schools in Uganda, so school teachers were furloughed for months. 

And yet in the midst of the very little, God continues to do so much. Similar to the widow woman who supported her child and the prophet Elijah during the three year drought, we saw God use SWOH to deliver food to our orphans at our school. We want to thank Pastor John, and our principal, Simon, who worked faithfully to serve our 20+ teachers and 700 students. They have been encouraged by our gifts and prayers. We were able to pay a partial teacher’s salary to sustain our teachers and their families. We invested in PPE so that we could continue to serve the hospice patients that we could reach. 

Our vision this fall and the rest of the year is to “Retool to Regrow.” Our COVID-19 response includes working with our local partners in Uganda to assess current and future needs, to develop realistic projects, and to continue essential hospice ministry and school ministry work. We hope to continue our missions ministry as soon as possible, and we are exploring virtual methods to continue training pastors and teachers. We are excited about starting school in the fall and about building up an infrastructure that will handle local quarantines should they arise. 

- President Jeremiah Situka

We hope all of you are safe during this COVID-19 pandemic season. Many of our jobs and lives have transitioned in unexpected ways. Here at SWOH, know you all are in our hearts and prayers.

During this season, we have had time to reflect on what our approach should be this summer. Many of you are aware that our world is in a global pandemic. At the same time East Africa, including our Ugandan brothers and sisters, faces an unprecedented locust swarm in the billions, which will create food shortages for millions.

One cannot imagine what Pastor John, our colleague in Uganda, might be having to bear. A family man, he pastors Grace Community Church, the host church where we conduct conferences and outreaches with our missions program. He‘s a teacher at Wings of Hope Christian Primary School, with an average class size of around 100 students. He has already had to guide these communities through a significant drought and low resources last year. In spite of these challenges, he is committed to keep his faith, be with those in need, and provide hope through any efforts he can.

Pastor John’s approach is similar to that story of Jesus at the well with the Samaritan woman. Jesus and his disciples take a mission trip to Samaria. Even though Jesus is physically exhausted from the journey, he still takes time to care for a Samaritan woman he meets randomly. Jesus cared for the people in front of Him.

With all these factors in mind, it reminds me that Sovereign Wings of Hope is in a unique position to do the same with our Ugandan brothers and sisters. By doing missions, we encourage others to keep up their faith in trying times. By working with the terminally ill, we are with families in the most critical time of life, when someone passes away. By maintaining a school for at-risk children and orphans, we provide meals and education to over 700 kids. 

Therefore our plan this summer is to “keep on keeping on” as we prayerfully monitor what COVID-19 response will allow us to accomplish. We hope to continue our missions ministry this summer, continue to grow our school ministry and invest in our hospice ministry. We believe partnering with Ugandans in these ministries will empower Pastor John and others to keep their faith, be with the people, and provide hope.

We’re home. Transitions are hard! All the excitement and exhaustion and blessing of our time in Uganda are about to be left behind. All the adjustments to our “normal lives” and application of all we’ve learned - about God and about ourselves - lie ahead of us.

In Uganda, it is customary to wish travelers “safe journey.” It’s the equivalent of “have a nice trip” or “have a safe trip home.” We pray that the journey home will be safe and the lessons and blessings we bring home from Uganda will have eternal impact at home and with the friends we left behind in Uganda.

by Sara Call

This week I met a little boy named Jared. He was playing with my girls, running around and around on the packed, red dirt next to fields of sugarcane and sweet potatoes and drying stalks of corn. They were playing just yards away from the red, clay building where the pastor’s conference was going on. As my girls and Jared ran back and forth, up and down, around and around, a woman walked up. It was Jared’s mother. We had one of those mom talks. We chatted about our children’s names and ages. I learned that Jared was 2 years and 3 days old. He had been a sickly baby, so his second birthday was cause for celebration. Now he was a healthy 2 year and 3 day old running around with new friends!

I asked the instinctive, American question in response to hearing that a child has just had a birthday - tempered, I thought, for cultural differences, “How did you celebrate?”

“We had no money to celebrate, but I prayed for him,” was his mother’s answer.

Her answer shook me. She gave him the best gift - prayer, because she had no other gift to give him.

This family could not afford to celebrate their treasured child’s birthday, and yet they found a way to come to the conference. What sacrifices they must have made to come to the Pastor Training Conference.

by Sara Call