It's Hot! But God carries us through!

Hey there friends! We pray you are all well. We are doing well here in TZ and we continue to thank God for His many blessings as He continues to provide all we need for our ministry. I think I speak for Emily and myself when I say that we are so grateful for all of the thoughts and prayers that come our way, as that is an integral component to our work. Over the past few weeks we have been working hard while trying to stay energized and renewed each day in this heat. When it’s 95 degrees in our house it is sometimes hard to get motivated to get out in the heat and leave the comfort of a fan blowing in your face. Thank God for solar powered fans is all I have to say about that. It makes sleeping bearable, as it is so important that we get adequate rest to continue pressing on. Please pray we make it through this next month strong and healthy. Thankfully after March it starts to cool off again. You’re probably trying to remember what it’s like to be hot outside since it’s been quite cold and snowy in many parts of the States this winter. Trust me- enjoy it while you can. Beyond the weather, there’s much to update, so let’s get started!

School: We are excited about school this year and all 4 classes are hitting their stride. We will have our first round of tests to assess the kiddos at the end of March, so in about 3 weeks we will be busy preparing. I am encouraged by how hard our teachers are working. We currently have 2 temporary teachers who will be leaving at the end of March, so it will change a bit once April hits. I am praying that the teachers will step up and adapt to continue pouring into these kiddos with more love and attention than they receive anywhere else. I have been studying chronological Bible storying with one of the teachers for a while now, and I am excited that 2 more teachers want to start studying with us! It will be a good opportunity for language growth as well as equipping the teachers with culturally appropriate tools to be sharing the Word of God with our kids and their families and friends in the village. It has been on my heart to encourage and pour more into the teachers, and the fact that they want to study is a huge encouragement! The teachers have also been meeting once a week on their own to pray together, sing, and study the Word of God. How awesome is that?!? Two of the teachers attending are not believers, so it is amazing to see their interest! On another front, I have started working with some of the students with learning disabilities one-on-one this past week, and I can say it has been the highlight of each day. Though it is a true challenge to try to meet their learning needs and instruct them in another language, I can see how much they enjoy our special time together, and I hope that the teachers will continue this individualized instruction once I have returned to the states. I know it is still 4 months away, but it will be here before we know it! We are still working through the school registration process, and we are hoping to not have to make another trip to Dar es Salaam, but it all depends on the officials in the government office there. Some want to talk in person, and others are ok communicating over the phone. We keep getting tossed around between people. All the paperwork is there; we are just waiting on a letter of approval. To get the ball rolling you often have to show up at the government offices and sit there until they give you what you need. I continue to learn more about the culture, and though it is sometimes frustrating, it is also encouraging to witness some support from individuals in the government who want to see our school registered because they recognize the impact it has on the community here. In all this work, it is easy to lose sight of our overall goal, which is to reach the community for Christ, so please pray that in all these things, we don’t lose sight of God’s vision for our school as an avenue to share the Gospel and empower the community through quality education.

Village Ministry: Oh how we love our friends in the village. We continue to study Kiswahili with our language helpers and grow in our relationships with them. Em just threw her language helper a birthday party at our house. A few family members and friends attended, and we had yummy food and cake and listened to music. We then sang happy birthday and told her some birthday traditions we have in America. Everyone enjoyed the day and Em even got a hug from her language teacher…something she has never done before! It was an awesome day! As for my language helper, she’s simply my best friend. She’s our go-to person if we have questions about the culture, which is a much-needed resource. We continue to get to know her better and better with each day, and she remains open to talking about anything and everything. I know she admires our faith and the freedom we have in that, so I pray she continues to remain open to talking about the Word of God and studying with me. I thank God for her, as she just gets me and knows me so well. We continue to visit friends from church and families from school, and we are always encouraged after we spend a day out and about. Though it is exhausting, especially in this heat, we see how important it is to get out there and maintain the relationships we have developed. Please pray for endurance and perseverance through the hot season to keep visiting and getting out in the community!


Medical Ministry: Wow…what a difference it makes having Emily back in the village! Praise Jesus! There are so many medical needs with the kiddos at school and others in the community that it is nearly impossible to keep up with all the needs. Having Em back definitely increases our ability to help more and more people. She continues to work with the kiddos at the school, and started health assessments last week to check the students’ growth and weight gain. It is encouraging to see that they are growing. Many already look totally different than when we arrived! Still others still have serious medical needs, and Em has been making home visits to talk with their parents about these health issues to educate and encourage them as to how to prevent many of the things that we see. Skin issues are at a high with the hot weather too. Many kids have boils, scabies, or other fungal issues such as ringworm. We are thankful to provide the medicines they need on a regular basis so they can recover from these often irritating and painful conditions. As gross as it is, Em wins the prize for popping the most boils! She has developed quite a gift. Not only does she help with medical needs, she always has a smile and is willing to give out band-aids and hugs to all kiddos. Yesterday we brought 4 sick people in to town with us to take to the clinic/hospital. Before heading to the hospital, we had a nice breakfast at our favorite little spot, and it was good to get to visit more before getting down to business. I got to take a little boy who is about 10 years old to the disabled children’s clinic to get fitted for a new foot brace for his clubfoot. They were very proactive in treating him, and upon doing so realized that he had some cognitive delays and possibly some mental issues and were quick to say he needed to see the doctor. He was prescribed medications that will hopefully help him to function more properly each day! I was very thankful for their help and willingness to fully explain to his mother the reasons for the medications. We will return in the next few weeks to report on his progress and see how the meds are helping him. I think his mother was encouraged, because having a special needs child in the village is very difficult. Em took one of our friends to an eye clinic because she has some sort of infection in her eye. She also took two other families to the hospital. Hiya it is Emily here. Sarah has summed up things well, but a little about my adventure to the government hospital. Heading to the hospital with sick people is not one of my favorite things, but the opportunity to help people and be their much-needed advocate is huge. The smell alone at the hospital can be overwhelming. One family I took has a daughter that has been sick with pain in her abdomen for over a year. We saw a doctor who is very attentive and cares about children (which is a bit of a rarity), and she took a proactive approach, so we will see how this child improves. It is difficult though as there are not many diagnostic tests that can be done to figure out what problems are exactly. But her mother was just pleased to see a doctor who cared, and we will continue to pray for this sweet little three year old. After this, I headed to the HIV/AIDS clinic with a mother and son who are sick with HIV. I wanted a better understanding how the system works for those who are sick with HIV and what resources are available for this little boy who is sick more days than he is not sick. But upon me asking a question, the doctor became very defensive, which has been a trend with some African doctors I have met. It was not a very positive interaction, but I held her accountable as to why she was making decisions she made. I get a bit discouraged when I see the how the “Haves” treat the “Have-nots” in Tanzania. All people, especially those with HIV/Aids, deserve to be treated with dignity and respect, not looked down upon for a bad decision at one point in their life. We are all guilty of making bad decisions, some just have life long consequences. Join us in prayer for those in our community sick with HIV/Aids. Back to you Sarah!

Overall despite the challenges and obstacles we often have to overcome in communicating, we are confident that God is working through our ministries here, and there is nothing more encouraging than helping to meet the needs of people by being an advocate for those who don’t yet know how to speak for themselves. We hope that by going to the hospitals and clinics with them, it will give them the confidence they need to make regular updates on their own.

Again thank you all for keeping up with our ministry and for praying faithfully for God to work to transform the community and to forever change the lives of the D people. We love you all!!!

Peace out,
Sarah & Emily

Here are some pics of our time in the village and other adventures...In no particular order!!!

emily with one of our little friends



More birthday fun!










my birthday card from Joyce...it's awesome!






















spice tour in Zanzibar...sporting some bling.






































when National friends take pictures





























































































































Friends preparing for Christmas!!!






























































































































































































Cleaning rice for Christmas Dinner at Church































































































































































































































































Emily's birthday party in the village






























































































































































































































































































































































































teachers and Em at the beach celebrating the end of the school year






























































































































































































































































all dressed up for a wedding.

Is it really February???

Hey friends! Em has been a champ at blogging, but I confess I have not updated the blog in quite some time now. So much has happened in the last few months with a surprise trip to Dar via Zanzibar, school closing for 2009, Christmas in the village, hosting 2 visitors, climbing Kili, and returning to start a new school year. And all since December. I started off 2010 by traveling to Moshi to trek Kilimanjaro with 2 of our teammates. It was the adventure of a lifetime, and I might have developed a hiking addiction as Emily mentioned…though not every mountain I climb has to be 19,340 feet-that last part to Uhuru Peak was a little tough. Emily had a safari of her own traveling to Kenya then Uganda to visit friends and raft the Nile. She has since been working on Lake Victoria with other friends of ours who are doctors and nurses specializing in mobile clinics and midwifery medical care. They also provide testing and counseling for HIV/AIDS. This has been an intense and challenging experience for Em as there are huge needs there, and it is a very dark place spiritually. In some places the HIV/AIDS rate is 80%. She has been stretched physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually, but I know she has learned to rely on the Lord more than ever, and she has been able to use her nursing skills in a new and different way which is exciting. She has learned a lot and is coming back home on the 8th to share her newfound knowledge and put it into practice in the village. We are psyched about that. I have enjoyed some alone time in the village over the past 3 weeks, but I am definitely ready for her to return. It was good for us to work individually for a period of time, but we both have reflected on what an encouragement it is to experience this with a friend and fellow newbie. It makes a huge difference, and I don’t think either of us will take one another for granted over these next 5 months. It is crazy to believe that we have been living her for over 7 months now. While Em was away the rest of our team met with our unit leaders over a 3 day retreat to discuss and reflect on our work over the last 6 months. It was refreshing and renewing to get to talk with them and get some advice and direction about our various ministries and relationships with local people and our Tanzanian teammates. It was also the perfect time to refocus our vision for what God has for us here. After the hustle and bustle of getting the new year started at school, I was reenergized and even more passionate about reaching the teachers, kiddos, and their families. It is difficult to think about leaving and how to continue this ministry when we are gone, but it is important to establish sustainable programs and ministries that will continue and flourish long after we leave. This is my task and challenge for the next 5 months. Please join me in prayer as we seek to establish a clear vision and long term program/curriculum for teaching the children the Word of God and the Good News of the Gospel. I also want to encourage and meet with the teachers regularly to study and talk about the Bible and how it applies to our lives. My desire is to pour into them and thus overflow into the lives of the students at our school. We will hopefully complete the government school registration process by March, and we are eager to implement even more programs upon completion. Beyond school, we will continue to build relationships with our friends and neighbors. One of my main goals is to focus on a few key relationships that have grown in my time here, especially my relationship with my language helper. She is my best friend and I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t get to see her and visit every day I am in the village. She is a source of knowledge, joy, encouragement, and laughter. I have started sharing stories from the Bible with her through our language lessons. She wants to continue despite my lack of storytelling ability, so that is awesome. God can work even through limited language and vocabulary. I have definitely learned that His power is made perfect in my weakness. I can’t wait to update you all again…sooner rather than later, but until then, thank you for your continued love, prayers, and support. Keep ‘em coming!

Peace out,
Sarah

Happy New Year

Hiya Dearest Friends and Family,

My heart has been moved by the words of Isaiah 1:17, "Seek justice, encourage the oppressed, defend the cause of fatherless, plead the case of the widow." This week, those words have taken on new meaning for me. I had the pleasure of visiting two orphanages while traveling around with Samaritans Purse in Uganda. I met a lady named Grandma Mary who has 38 children who live with her and a young man named Timothy, an orphan himself now in his 20's, raising 11 children. Both Timothy and Mary have felt the Lord placing a tremendous burden on their hearts to care for the orphaned but both face major struggles to provide for their family of orphans. They struggle to make ends meet between feeding, clothing, sheltering, and paying school fees for their orphans. But you know these are just two homes of many throughout this country and continent where the need is so great. I do not tell you this to make you sad, but to encourage you to do something about the "oppressed...fatherless...widows." As a body of believers, we are called to care for those in need, but it does not have to be overseas or in a different country, there are great needs all around. I encourage you in this new year to seek ways to serve those in need, not necessarily with money, but time. Volunteer somewhere, love on and play with children who do not get enough of it, buy a meal for someone who is hungry, listen to someone who needs to share! I will explain to you that orphans in my community are generally taken in by extended family, but can be neglected meaning they are last in the family to be provided for. Thanks for reading what the Lord has placed on my heart to share!

Well Happy New Year! I cannot believe we are entering a new decade. I apologize for the long time between posts. I wrote a long post last week while in Nairobi, then internet went down and was unable to save it, so today getting to another one. Drumroll please...I have some most exciting news to report. Sarah summitted Mount Kilimanjaro, "The Roof of Africa" at 5896 meters, or over 19,000 feet early last Sunday morning. She said it was challenging, but an unbelievable experience. Sarah might be hooked on hiking/climbing now. Our team members, Wayne and Joyce, joined her on this journey, but shortly before the summit they turned back due to the effects of the altitude. The three of them are amazing. And for those of you who do not know, Sarah also ran a marathon last April, so a marathon and climbing Mount Kilimanjaro all in 9 months is quite an accomplishment. Sarah had only a day to rest this week which included lots of errands to run, then back to the village. She is helping get many things organized for the new school year which just started. We are both very detail oriented people which can be a bit of a challenge in an African culture, so lift up Sarah in prayer as she is putting together many details for our school in these next few days. She has a lot on her plate with work and remember we still are working very hard on language. Another drumroll please....our school is almost registered. This is a process Sarah has shared a lot about and it is almost finished, after over 2 years in the making. Once our school is registered, we can proceed forward with working towards getting government funds to help with school costs and maybe move towards working with an organization like Compassion or World Vision to have our students sponsored for school. You all have generously supported us already, but if you would like to sponsor a child it is around $10 a month. Shoot us an email if interesteed.

Right now I am at the end of my time off as well. Since climbing and mountains are not really my thing, I decided to escape the hot weather (we are entering our hotest months), to head to Kenya and Uganda. I felt blessed to get to wear pants and a long sleeved shirt while in Kenya. I have been in Uganda for almost a week and have been able to see one of the five children I transported last year with Children's Heart Project. He is a 4 year old who had heart surgery at the hospital I worked at in St. Louis. He is growing and his mother is very thankful to the Lord for his healing and he has not been sick since this surgery. I also visited some of my Ugandan friends who work for Children's Heart Project. And I am proud to say I conquered the Nile river. Tuesday I headed to Jinja were the Nile starts from Lake Victoria and boarded a raft for one of the most exhilerating days of my life. It was unbelievable to say the least and maybe a bit scarier than I would have liked, but I think I would do it again. We went down several class 5 rapids and had to get out and walk through one class 6 rapid and many class 3-4 rapids. Our raft flipped twice and it seemed like a long time before I came up for air one time, but crazy fun. The first time we flipped, I ended up way far from my raft so had a kayaker come rescue me. There were 10 rescue kayakers for 6 boats. If you like an adrenaline rush, head this way to conquer the Nile. Sarah likes her mountains and me my water! No more extereme sports for a while for the both of us.

I had a few extra days of rest in Uganda due to some changed travel plans but it has been a restful time of reading, praying, and enjoying God's presence without lots of distractions which we have in the village. The Lord knew I needed this. Tomorrow, I head to work on a large island on Lake Victoria on the Tanzania side. I will be shadowing a team of doctors and nurses. I look forward to seeing a large public health ministry in action.

Thanks for reading and we treasure your prayers! Until next time...

Hugs,

EM

Merry Christmas

Hiya Family and Friends,
Merry Christmas! What a special time of year this is to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. I pray you can enjoy this holiday with family and friends and truly focus on the reason for the season.
I am just returning from another trip to Dar es Salaam to work on finalizing my work permit and I praise God that the woman working in the Ministry of Health office said it would be completed next week. This is such a huge answer to prayer to have this, especially as in January I head to the Lake Victoria area of Tanzania to do some more hands on nursing as I shadow a team that includes 1 doctor and 3 nurses to increase my knowledge of medicine in this part of the world. I have a lot to learn with tropical medicine and look forward to gaining experience in HIV/Aids ministries. So anyway I am very thankful to soon have a work permit, after over 6 months of work to get it.
You may wonder what we are doing for Christmas. For December 24th, we will have a team member, Mary, and another single missionary woman visiting us, Kim, over for dinner. Christmas Day we will spend at our church. Our pastor is putting on a Christmas presentation and there will be lots of food and fellowship. From what I hear, many people come from the community. I am excited to experience this. A few days later, our team will come into town and celebrate Christmas Eve and Christmas day together. We drew secret santa's to buy presents for and will plan to cook lots of good food. It is not home, but again we are so blessed by our team and community and I look forward to celebrating together.
Rejoice! Merry Christmas!
Christmas Blessings,
Emily
PS-Sorry this is so short, have to head back to the village!

Choose your own adventure!

Hey there friends! What adventures we’ve had since our last post…I know I say this often, but life here really is an adventure. My tag line for most things I do has been “choose your own adventure.” You know…the books you read as a kid where you had to decide what happens next then turn to page 34 or 76. Such good times. Any who, I use this philosophy with cooking, visiting, traveling, etc… It works out well since most things don’t quite go as planned. In the wise words of my dear friend C.S. Lewis- make plans and hold on to them loosely.

So…the story begins last Tuesday at our team day when we found out Emily’s resident permit would finally be ready on Friday! Hooray! We couldn’t let Emily go to Dar all by her lonesome, so one of our team members-we will call her M- and I took the liberty of escorting Em to Dar on Thursday so we could head straight to the government offices on Friday morning. So…Thursday morning comes and Em and I are ready and waiting for the first bus at 6:10…we are a little antsy because we have to make a bus out of Tanga at 8am. Our village bus does not arrive until 6:45. We are laughing at this point and making slight adjustments to our plan if need be. We are put putting along when M calls and asks where we are. She’s in town and ready to go at the bus stand. This particular bus line leaves on time (the only one in East Africa), so we are trying to get to town on time and M is stalling at the bus stand. Suddenly it starts to rain and we are thinking…hmmm, maybe this rain will help stall the bus too. Needless to say all of our stalling was wearing on the workers’ patience and they decided to leave with M on the bus. We told her we’d jump in a taxi and chase down the bus…which is exactly what we did. It was like a scene from a movie…and though we were eager to catch the bus we didn’t want to die in a car crash either. Our trusty taxi driver got us behind the bus and they pulled over on the side of the road and we hopped on, wet and exhausted already from the first leg of our adventure. Good times.

Thankfully, we made it to Dar and even got to see a movie and do some Christmas shopping at a mall on Thursday…a real treat! Friday we went to the office eager to get the stamp in Em’s passport, but sadly we were told to come back on Tuesday…Tuesday?? This was only Friday. What were we going to do in Dar for 4 days? Hmm…when meandering around downtown Em had the genius idea to ferry over to Zanzibar for a mini holiday. Why else would her permit get postponed other than to provide a little island excursion? We thought about this for a while and weighed the pros and cons of going back to Tanga, staying in Dar, or going to an exotic island for a few days. The island won, and on Saturday morning we were off to Zanzibar. The funny thing about our trip was that the entire island was out of power and running on generators. We stayed at the beach and even though our power was rationed, it was an amazing time of rest and renewal. Em and I went on a spice tour and it was amazing! It was also a good time to practice language and meet new people. All in all, it was a perfect little girl’s getaway!

We returned to Dar on Monday and on Tuesday morning Emily got her resident permit! Praise Jesus! We found out some info on her work permit and she has to return to Dar next week for that, but we are hopeful it will all be taken care of and completed so she can continue her work with no anxiety or stress. We are very thankful that things have worked out as they have, as you have to be very patient with these processes. We are learning to be grateful in all circumstances and to make the most of each day. We are now back in Tanga and will return to the village today. Even though it has only been 6 days, we feel like we’ve been gone forever. It will be good to get back and reconnect with our friends and neighbors. We are excited to share our joys of the Christmas holiday season with them. Pray we take advantage of every opportunity to share the real meaning of Christmas! We will celebrate with our church on Christmas day then on the 27th head into town for our team Christmas. Though it is difficult being far away from home during the holidays, we know we are right where God wants us, and there is great comfort in that! Thanks for your continued support and prayers! Keep them coming! We pray you have a blessed Christmas!

Love,Sarah (& Em too)!

Lot's Been Happening

Where does the time go I want to know? We have now been living in Tanzania over five months and it seems like we were just preparing to leave last summer. We have a lot to report in the last couple weeks with the end of our school year, school registrations, our team Thanksgiving, and the death of a dear little one. So I’ll try to update you on them all.
A kiddo who I have been closely following, who I think I have mentioned before, passed away two weeks ago. This was very challenging as she was the daughter of a dear neighbor of ours. She was a twin born in August to a mother who currently has 2 living children, 11 and 6. When the twins were born in August we were so surprised, two precious little girls, born in the village to an older mom. We were told by our teammate who left this summer, that the twin’s mother has lost her last two children at 4 months of age, so to watch the twins carefully. So I took this seriously and visited frequently. The littler twin started having small health issues which I advised them to go to the clinic twice, then things got a bit worse in October, so I took them to the public hospital in Tanga, the larger town 45 minutes from us. She was immediately admitted, given a blood transfusion for severe anemia and after a few days started looking much better and was even smiling a bit. I would go every weekend to visit and then she started deteriorating again having jaundice (indicator of liver problems). I spoke with the doctors and made special trips into town to see what I could do, even taking a blood sample to another lab in town to get more tests run. But it seemed our hospital did not have the capacities to help this child and they planned to send her to Dar es Salaam, but she died the night before she was to leave for Dar es Salaam. I was so saddened that there was nothing I could do but pray. God has taken this precious little one home and I look forward to seeing her again. The funeral was challenging to see all the people in community come and just dismiss her death as, “The work of God.” I was pretty open with my emotions of how sad I was. The community knew we were frequently visiting and helping care for the family, but I had inner frustrations as this community does not often help those in need, until someone is already passed away. Join us in prayer for this family.
Well onto some awesome news, our school had it’s end of the year celebration on Friday. It was a special time to see the kids perform in front of their parents. We were told by one mom, her son woke up really early and got on his uniform to get to school very early. You could see the joy in a lot of them, nervousness in others to perform in front of their parents. Each class did a few songs and the Standard 1 class even did a presentation in English about the importance of education verses money in which Sarah oversaw. I remember the day in August when Sarah was told about how she would oversee this presentation and how nervous she was, remember this was our first week on the job, and it turned out so well. The kids knew their lines to say and it was even up to them to come up with their reasons education is important. Four students from the 6 year old class read a poem to their parents. Many parents are still functionally illiterate, and reading as a 6 year old was once unheard of in this community, but thanks to great teachers and the Lord who has enabled us to build this school, great things are happening. Thanks to you all for supporting us in this. I even had a part in the presentation to talk with parents about the importance of caring for their child’s health. My language helper helped me write my speech and I think it went pretty well. My first speech in another language. After the presentations, there was a huge feast which many of the mom’s had helped prepared. The parents and kids had soda’s and as much as they could eat. I wish you could have experienced the excitement and enthusiasm parents had for this school. Hard to think of the opposition they once had warning parents not to send their children to our school. While there is still opposition out there, many are so proud of the work being done and even call the school, “Our school!”
School registration for the new class of 5 year olds was two weeks ago. Within 90 minutes, we had all 30 spots filled and a waiting list. It was a rainy day and many were not able to make it, so they have been asking us to open up another class, which we cannot at this time. Children interested in entering our Standard 1 and 2 classes had to take tests last week to see if they were ready, but we were saddened by the lack in quality education of the government schools and only a few can enter our upper grades (we wanted to fill the classes all to 30 students each). Education is what will change the future of this country, but it cannot be done without teachers and schools.
Well there is a lot to tell you about our school registration, but I will hit the highlights. God has worked miracles in getting three inspectors out to our school and we have two letters of approval and just need the third, but we may have to pay a fine because our buildings are not “Earthquake safe.” I hope this gives you a picture of the challenges we face here in trying to better our community. God knows the hearts of all people, so we will trust Him to work in people’s heart to get our school registered so we can remain open in January. And be praying as we need two teachers for next year with a special certification. And it is 5 weeks to the start of school.
We had a great Thanksgiving dinner last weekend. I planned the event and shared the cooking with my team. We had chicken kabobs which I think everybody enjoyed and had a special time of sitting around our table and just talking, like we do at my house for the holidays. And we had a special visitor, a man who teaches at a small Bible college in the Lake Victoria area of Tanzania. He was in for a couple days and we had great time with him.
Well this is getting a bit long, hope this catches you up to speed. We have three weddings to attend in the next week. We both really enjoy these cultural experiences.

Blessings,
Emily (and Sarah)