Uganda
East Africa

As I was out walking on the far side of my garden, a neighbor lady and some children saw me and called to me. She invited to me to join her in munching on some freshly roasted peanuts and corn nuts, and as we chatted in Luganda over the fence, another neighbor approached us. This man has frequently criticized me for not being a good neighbor, and he brought that up immediately, and implied that I needed to spend more time conversing over the fence with my neighbors. In my busy life, that is no doubt true. But in the years I’ve known this man, his concept of being neighborly is actually different. As we visited, he informed me he is a leader in the community and therefore he needs me to work with him. I challenged him by asking him if he’s a leader, why he would need me? Well, he needs a sponsor. I asked him why? His answer was essentially that it takes money to accomplish anything.
Our conversation soon focused on building latrines, since he’d just been to a conference where the appalling lack of pit latrines in Uganda was discussed as a major health concern. So his conclusion was that he needs money, mine of course (government money is “too slow”), so that they can dig the pits, buy bricks and cement, buy nails, buy the corrugated metal roofing, and of course, pay all the workers for building pit latrines in our village.

I told him that I believe education is the critical issue, not money. Build latrines and people still don’t use them. You must persuade them why it’s beneficial to them to use the latrines. Many men may go so far as to walk to the latrine and they urinate on the outside of the walls rather than walk a few more steps to go inside. So the latrines, even expensive, well made ones, are abused, not cleaned inside or outside, and then they’re used even less over time. Who wants to use a latrine that reeks from all the muddy urine, or dodge the filth inside to be able to use them?

So you educate the people to see the benefits of proper hygiene and sanitation, then teach them to build their own latrines if and when they want them. If there’s no money, a shovel can always be found and the pit dug for the cost of sweat. Bricks are made from earth, or mud walls can be erected. Poles can be cut from trees for supports or roofing support, and if there’s no roofing, grass can be cut for thatch. And the people are more likely to use it because they built it for themselves.

He was not convinced and I didn’t expect him to be after similar conversations for 11 years. I told him the most difficult thing to change is human behavior, and truly Jesus Christ coming into one’s heart and life is the only way it’s likely to happen. He abruptly ended our lively conversation shortly thereafter, and went back to his house…

Not two hours later, another conversation took place with another village man. This man has taken our Business Without Regrets course, a simple Bible-based economics course written by a Kampala pastor. In this course one of the most striking statements is where the poverty mentality is compared with a wholesome mentality. The poverty mentality says: I’m so poor; I can’t do anything until someone comes along and helps me. The healthy mentality says: I’m so poor… but what I have, I will use to do what I can do.

This man has a large family and he struggles like everyone in rural Uganda. But in mid-July he saw a man selling pineapples near a new truck weigh station on the highway at his village, and thought, “Hey, I can do that!” With the little money he had in his pocket, he bought some fresh pineapples, and sold them over the next couple of days, tripling his money! He saw the obvious business opportunities of opening a small shop where there were going to be 60 government employees at the weigh station and probably hundreds of truck drivers, along with the ever-present men and women digging in a rock and sand quarry behind the weigh station. He has managed to come up with the needed rent money to secure the room. With the money from the pineapples, he bought paint, hired a painter, and bought a lock for the door – and he was in business!

His resources? He kept selling pineapples, then managed to come up with an old refrigerator, a water filter, some shelves, a couch, easy access to fresh tropical fruits and he has a wife who can cook delicious foods, – and his faith in God to provide. God took his vision to sell cold drinks and snacks and immediately turned it into a small restaurant!

So all in one day, I had two living examples of what I have been teaching when I use the Business Without Regrets curriculum, a simple Bible-based economics class. This second man admitted to me that without the training he’s obtained, and plenty of modeling and advice over the years, he could have easily squandered the pineapple profits, but for now, it’s most important to get his business going for the true future of his family and his service to the Lord.

There truly are ways that the mission field can be blessed by outside help, whether by skills, trainings, financial contributions and other ministries, as long as great care is taken to make sure we are not doing for others what they can do, or can be trained to do, for themselves. The first man spends his life looking for sponsors; the second man looks for a way to succeed.

And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work… This service that you perform is not only supplying the needs of God’s people but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God. (2 Corinthians 9: 8,12)

MARGARET NELSON