Wanawake Watumishi wa Kristo (WWK)

The WWK of Tanzania is the equivalent of the Women's Ministry groups in American churches; once a year they have a national convention and this year it was in Moshi, TZ.

I was privileged to attend along with the other TZ missionary women; there were several women from the Mwanza area that were also able to attend.

It was a three day conference packed full with reports, excellent speakers, prayer and worship, fun and fellowship. This is the one time a year when the women escape the confines of their lives here in Tanzania and have a break from the never-ending responsibilities they have on a daily basis.

Here, they are able to know the joy of coming together with hundreds of other women and receive encouragement, strength, friendship and be told that they are valuable and vital to the Kingdom of God. There is a balance of tears/sorrows and laughter/joy; it is the highlight of the year for these women.

There was, however, a few drawbacks. We were all expected to purchase and wear bright yellow polo shirts to the meetings; I wore mine even though I felt like a very large yellow lemon.

We sat for hours on the platform as honored guests listening to Swahili all day and understanding a portion of what was being said.

The evening service of the last night went well past dark; dark means "the invasion of the mosquitos". We missionaries knew this would happen so we all came prepared with mosquito repellent; unfortunately, on this particular evening we all left it in our rooms. We were attacked by swarms of mosquitos which made it hard to concentrate.

On the last day all the groups from the various sections of the country present gifts to the Christian Girls School and to the host District where we were meeting; we missionary ladies had purchased several mattresses to present as our gift.

When it came time to make our presentation, we hefted our bright pink mattresses and sang and danced our way across the field in the traditional way and placed our gift with all the others. The Tanzanian ladies were delighted that we took part in this event and that we made the effort to present our offering in the traditional way. It was fun, and, I might say, quite a colorful sight! A group of white women dressed in bright yellow shirts carrying pink mattresses across the field as we sang our Swahili chorus and tried to "keep in step"and move forward at the same time!

The yellow shirt is hanging at the back of the closet now; hopefully never to be seen again!

Blessings.

Full Life Study Bibles

“Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth” II Timothy 2:15

What if the only tool you had available to you to preach and teach the Good News was a simple Bible; no commentaries, Bible dictionaries or any other resource material.
One of the greatest needs among our Pastors and leaders in Tanzania is for study materials in their own language of Kiswahili; there are very few available and even fewer that have any help specifically in the area of the Holy Spirit relative to the Pentecostal experience. We have been amazed at the lack of knowledge and understanding of the Scriptures that many of our pastors have when they come to Bible College; much of this is due to the fact that they have no resource materials available to them and have had no formal teaching or training. The faculty at the Bible College often find ourselves in the position of correcting erroneous beliefs among our pastors/students who do not understand the Word of God. Their intent is NOT to teach false doctrine; they have simply misunderstood the Word of God as they have struggled alone and without assistance to grasp it’s meaning. They are also very vulnerable to the efforts of Satan to twist the written Word of God; much like the Serpent did to Eve in the Garden of Eden. “Did God really say…?”

A few years ago, the Full Life Study Bible (known to some as the “Fire Bible”) was made available to us in Kiswahili; this Bible is a study Bible as well as a Bible Commentary. Tanzania received a shipment of these Bibles while we were in the states on furlough and they were made available at General Council in Dar Es Salaam. Very few of our pastors in the western third of Tanzania travel the distance to General Council because the trip is very costly for them and so only a handful of our pastors were able to purchase a copy of the FLSB in Swahili.

We have a graduating class of 70 this year at the Mwanza Bible College, most of them pastors, who will be graduating in November; they have repeatedly asked us to try and locate the Kiswahili FLSB before they graduate and return to their homes. Due to the fact that many live in remote areas and small villages, they may never have another opportunity to have access to this valuable resource tool. For many of them, this will be the only other resource tool they have besides their Bibles to help them teach and train the people in their churches.

On a recent trip to Nairobi we discovered that the Kenya Assemblies of God has a supply of the Full Life Study Bible in Kiswahili; most of their pastors have purchased the English version. We can purchase these Bibles for approximately $25 each and would like to purchase at least 50 of them to make available to our graduating pastors. The money we receive from the sale of this first batch would be used to purchase more FLSB’s so that we can keep them available to our pastors in this part of the country. Some of them will need to save up for a few months or even as long as a year in order to purchase one of these Full Life Study Bibles.
Unfortunately, we do not have the money needed to purchase the Full Life Study Bibles before the graduation on November 7; we are writing to ask your help with this project. We have found transport to bring the Bibles from Kenya to Tanzania if we can purchase them and have them ready by the middle of October.

We are asking you to prayerfully consider helping us place a Kiswahili Full Life Study Bible into the hands of our pastors so that they can have access to valuable information that will help them “correctly handle the word of truth”.

We appreciate each of you and pray that God will continue to bless you so that you may be a blessing to others.

Menial Tasks

Menial tasks, those tasks that are mundane, boring, time-consuming but necessary, seem to take up so much of our time. Here in Africa, even simple tasks that take a few minutes in America can consume a lot of time.
As missionaries, even though we are on "the frontlines" doing "God's work" we are earthbound and part of the human race; thus, we have our share of menial tasks to be done.
Food shopping, for instance, takes up a good part of a day. There are no "super centers" or "one-stop" shops here. For fresh fruits and vegetables you go to a huge open market and you must barter for each kind of fruit or vegetable individually. You can never say, "I'll take all of this stuff, ring it up". Each item is sold at a different booth and must be bartered for, weighed and paid for one at a time as you twist your way through the maze of stalls carrying your straw market bag. If you pause or make eye contact, it is impolite to continue without greeting them and at least glancing at their wares.
Meat is purchased at the "meat market"; you must view the meats, choose your selection, tell them how much to cut off and wait for it to be weighed and wrapped and then pay for it.
Pre-packaged foods, are available though expensive. Often, you go to several little stores the size of a bathroom, before finding all the items you need. Not all items are available all the time so you must have a "treasure hunt" of sorts.
After shopping you arrive home and you must wash and soak all the fresh fruits and vegetables and while they soak you can cut up the hunks of meat into the appropriate amounts and place them in plastic storage bags in the freezer.
Canned and packaged goods are placed in the pantry; if you find a particular item that is hard to find in stock, you buy a number of them knowing it may be a long time before another shipment comes in.
Anything that is not in a metal can must be placed in a sealed container or tightly sealed bag to keep out any small living creatures that may seek to dine on your precious commodities.
Some items are stored in the freezer for the sake of freshness.
That's just the grocery shopping!
We will pay bills another day. No writing checks or paying on line here! We go to the water company and then to the electric company and stand in long lines waiting for your turn to pay. Mail is collected at the Post Office in town. If you have a water problem or electrical problem that must be looked at by the appropriate department, you must drive to town, pick up the necessary personnel, take them to your home to deal with the problem and then return them back to their work place; they don't have company vehicles to use for transport.
As I ponder these menial tasks, I stir the dog food that I am cooking on the stove; yet another menial task. Our outside worker is off sick for a few days with malaria and typhoid, both common ailments here, so I am cooking the dog food. It's a mixture of ground grain flour, water and dagaa (small dried fish) that must be stirred while it cooks to avoid having it stick to the bottom of the pan; the aroma that fills the kitchen is not a pleasant smell.
These small, seemingly insignificant routine tasks are mixed in daily with the ministry tasks such as teaching at the Bible College, praying for the sick, writing college courses, holding crusades, etc.
All of this mixture makes up what we call "Life"; a blending together of the mundane and the magnificent.
Have a magnificent day!

Our 109 Students

We took a picture of our 109 students enrolled this term at the Mwanza Bible College; it was the highlight of the day and possibly the week for our students. They were excited when I told them that it would be placed on our website so that friends, family and churches all over America could see it. For most of these students the computer world is a strange and unreachable place that they may be able to visit but will never live there.

However, for this special day they went immediately after chapel and changed clothes, fixed their hair and prepared for the big event. It was all accomplished with much laughter and good humor as we arranged and rearranged them in order to get them all into the picture.

This group of people are mostly pastors from small churches scattered across western Tanzania; they consider themselves blessed to be able to attend Bible College. They, their families and their churches have sacrificed for the privilege of being here.

Of course, we will need to figure out how to make 109 copies of this picture; they will all want a copy and it will be placed in a place of honor in their homes or churches as visual proof that they accomplished a phenomenal task.

Time flies...

Yesterday I felt like I blinked and somehow in that infinitesimal amount of time I lost 25 years. Yesterday was our daughter, Jenn's, birthday. Where did all of that time go?
We sent her a bouquet of her favorite flowers, yellow roses, and called her and chatted for a few minutes via Skype.
Time stretches out in front of us sometimes in what seems like a road that has no end; then suddenly, you find that you have traversed a huge chunk of the road and can't quite remember how you got from point A to point B so quickly.
Today at the Bible College we had a staff meeting and realized that it had been several weeks since we had our last one; how did that happen?
We were also reminded today the it will be time for mid-term exams after next week; we haven't even finished closing out the business from the first week of school.
We have finished our first year in Tanzania and have started into our second; I still haven't done a whole list of things that I thought would need to be done in the first few weeks after our arrival here.
I am reminded today of how quickly time can pass and how valuable a commodity it is to most of us. The thing that bothers me the most about the passage of time is not the things that remain on my "To Do" list. It is the time that I have wasted through the years striving to accomplish tasks instead of making good memories with people I know and care about.
Make a memory today that will bring a smile to your face when you look back on it someday as you travel down the road of life.

Labor Day

Labor Day almost passed us by here in Tanzania since it is an American Holiday. The only holidays that Tanzania and the U.S. have in common are Christmas and Easter, so we often forget about all the others.
Our Labor Day was business as usual at the Mwanza Bible College. We arrived in time for chapel; Monday is "Principal's Day" each week and Tim always speaks on that day. If Tim is out of town then "Mama Principal" speaks; that's me.
Most of our 109 students have returned; classes started over a week ago but they often take up to two weeks to arrive back for classes. The reason is usually because they are desperately trying to raise their tuition fees.
After chapel, we met with the teachers for "chai break" (morning tea break) and dealt with all the issues that had developed since Friday. We met with the Academic Dean about a number of student issues ranging from lost transcripts to failing grades.
Usually, because Monday is so busy, Tim and I "split up" and handle different situations to expedite things. Tim met with the Dean of Students and they looked over the situation in the library to determine what was needed to get our computer lab up and running.
I met with Mabesa, she is our Registrar and also one of our teachers, about a theological issue that came up in her first class of the day. We made copies of courses to be sent out to the various Districts for their Church Planting Schools, we filed records in the registrars office and did general office work.
Immediately after his meeting with the Academic Dean, Tim met with the Business Manager to decide what to spend money on this week, other than food, which is a necessity. Providing food for 109 students is the single largest cost the school has each term. The decision was made to hold off on paying the utilities one more week and buy a new pump for the well and some cleaning supplies for the bathrooms.
Time was then spent figuring out why there was no water coming onto the property; Tim walked part way down the hill and found a water line was shut off for repairs. Hopefully, it will be taken care of in the next few days. We have a tank for surplus water but it was discovered that the pump was not working. All the water used on Monday was hauled up with buckets lowered into the well since the pump refused to work.
We arrived home in the early afternoon and had two guests. One of the guests is the wife of one of our local pastors. She stops in from time to time and offers to sell me bars of soap; she uses the few shillings profit she makes on each bar to help pay school fees for their son, Gospel. Of course, I can only use so many bars of soap so this time I decline since I purchased quite a few last time to share with our students.
Tim spent the late afternoon working in the garage and I did some laundry and worked on the never-ending pile of typing projects.
We watched a little bit of CNN to find out if all was well in the U.S.A and went to bed.
That was our Labor Day; I hope most of you had a restful day and maybe even one more cookout before summer comes to an end.