Latest from Mwanza and Sukumaland (part one)...

Here is an excerpt from our teammates (and close friends), Jason and Emily Miller. Jason and Emily arrived in Mwanza in March, and we will work alongside them when we get to Mwanza in May.

This is part of their first newsletter home, and it provides much information about the current situation in Tanzania... as well as some glimpses into how we hope to work with churches to build relationships that empower emerging leadership. So here goes:

The Work

Recently, there has been famine in the rural areas. This has built up over the last year as the first rains did not come at all and the second rains were late. Everything was planted later and therefore will mature later, and any stores that someone might have had are gone. There are about 7000 Christians in the rural areas that we are trying to reach and organize for a food dispersal, which is one thing that has been occupying time for the past month.

These meetings have been very interesting. There are clusters of churches down to the south of Mwanza (about 70ish churches of about 5000) which have good leaders and generally are self-sufficient when it comes to daily matters. We young missionaries have had to keep quiet and listen as these older wiser leaders told us how to best implement a food distribution, even if it meant double the work for us. So in these meetings we have discussed every aspect of the distribution in great detail, because of the wisdom they have to offer and also because we are not the missionaries who planted those churches…those missionaries are old enough to have retired from the field. You see, we’re just the young pups. What a blessing to have these leader’s wisdom to light our paths…and to beat our egos into the ground.

On the other hand, the younger churches in the younger clusters to the east and west (about 30 churches and 2000 Christians) are in more of an asking stage. There is not nearly as much discussion (if any, no matter how much we encourage it). Here, the Christians ask questions and the missionaries provide answers. We’re pretty uncomfortable with that setup, but that’s the stage at which the younger churches stand. There are good leaders in these newer areas, just not enough that have the complete trust of the Christians to have good discussions.




Jason and Emily have some other insights on the transition from our culture to the Tanzanian culture. I will post them soon.

Easter... what is it about, anyway?




Easter is the most significant reality in history. Without a doubt. It is the reality of Easter that propels our lives and decisions, especially our decision to go to Tanzania.

This may seem bizarre, especially since most associations with Easter include chocolate bunnies (which, I must add, I am TOTALLY in favor of... and peeps, too) and new Easter dresses.

Of course I am referring to the reality of the resurrection, perhaps the best-known and least-lived story the world has ever known. The resurrection that turns history, life, truth, upside-down, scandalizes our intellect, intrigues our imagination, and stirs our inner sense of hope.

We can embrace it, ignore it, redefine it (the Judas Gospel, which I will write about later), but the questions it raises--and answers--must somehow be addressed.

Some of these questions include:

Is there life after death? (can you imagine a more significant question?)

What does that life look like? How do we attain it?

What is the greater power in our world, rule and violence, or self-sacrifice and love?



Easter is a remembrance of the one person who has fully lived according to God's ideals, truly loved all he encountered, and emptied himself that others may be filled. We go to Tanzania to invite people into an Easter community, a worldwide body of people who answer the most important questions of life through the story of death followed by birth, pain followed by healing, fear followed by faith, subjection followed by freedom. May we learn to live these truths.

Blogging...

just returned to Montgomery, after a couple weeks in California and Las Vegas. We returned and found our apartment ransacked; all of our stuff gone, random papers scattered all over the place. We were going to call the police, until we remembered that we had ransacked the place ourselves to fill up our container. Then we searched frantically for Josiah's birth certificate, throwing papers everywhere, before giving up and traveling without it (thankfully, the airlines didn't ask for proof of age for him... it would have been a lot of work to chase down the container, unpack it, find our filing cabinet...).

(Actually, we have a history of this. When moving from Vegas, Charity was flying to Tennessee with 8 month old Josiah; I was going to drive the rental truck we stayed up all night packing. Two hours before the flight, as I was getting ready to take Charity and Josiah to the airport, we remembered we needed his birth record to get him on the plane... and remembered that it was in the filing cabinet. Which was, conveniently, the very first thing we packed. So I climbed over everything in the 15 foot truck, burrowed down from the ceiling to the cabinet with flashlight in mouth as I dangled head first Tom Cruise style in the truck. You would think we would have learned our lesson!!!)

Anyways, we know are less than 2 months away from our departure to Tanzania. May 29th is the date. Our excitement is building each day!!!

Over the course of our travels, I have realized that more people visit this blog than I realized. And they would kinda like to know what is going on with us, what we are doing, why are we moving to Tanzania, why no pictures of the baby lately, etc.. So I hope to be more deliberate and purposeful on the blog thing...

Goodbye from sunny, warm Alabama!!!