By LAURA BROOKHART / Community Columnist

“I went to Uganda, thinking that they needed me and I was going to do all these things for this country. But the truth is that I needed Uganda way more than Uganda needed me,” said Katie Belue, a 2013 PHS graduate now attending UA.

Belue spent nine weeks in Uganda, May 2­–Aug. 5, on her first mission trip. She found it a life-changing experience, and this is the first of two columns that will share her story.

“Leading up to the trip, I was nervous about a lot of things: Being away from everyone and across an ocean for the first time; not able to come home, getting sick and having to go to the clinic,” she began.

She experienced homesickness and “missed the little securities that America provides.”

“I started this adventure with 15 strangers,” Belue says. “I expected that we’d get along and laugh and serve together. God blew my expectations out of the water.”

“It’s funny how much better your perspective is once it’s not focused on yourself.”

“These 15 strangers quickly turned into friends that quickly turned into family. They’re the best picture of what the Father intended community to look like that I’ve ever had.”

“They laughed with me, cried with me, peeled vegetables and potatoes with me, prayed with me, and loved me like we were blood.”

“They were articulate and thoughtful, 16 beautiful examples of Jesus.”

Belue tells of morning talks with “the coolest person ever,” Auntie Dorah, a house mom at Sozo and in charge of the twice-weekly women’s ministry.

Auntie Dorah, Belue related, is a person in constant passionate prayer with high expectations about everything the Lord will do. “While challenging us and loving us, she was sassy and fun, as well.”

Belue still recalls the “smiles and giggles of the sweet kids at the village as we spent the afternoon running 90 to nothing” and the “nightly devotions where the kids praised with so much passion you couldn’t help but smile your very biggest smile.”

“Uganda taught me to celebrate every moment because life is bursting with beautiful, passionate, radiant things that are just tiny glimpses of God’s glory and the things He has for us if only we shift our focus from ourselves.”

The Belue family lives in Helena.