The Eads to Tanzania

Building Project Update

We have been able to finish the construction of the parsonage in Sengerema. This is a real praise. They completed the finishing (plastering, door installation, etc.) while we were in Nairobi, so I was able to see the (near) finished product when we returned from Nairobi. Hamisi and his family were able to move into the house at the beginning of July. This has meant that he is on the property where the church has been meeting and has had even more opportunity for study and for visitation.

We are hoping that we will be able to begin construction of a church building sometime within the next two months. The building committee still has to sit down and discuss plans. The committee is made up of Pastor Elias and three representatives from Nyakaliro, Evangelist Hamisi and three representatives from Sengerema, and Pastors Paulo and Samson as representatives of the churches in Sweya and Shadi. This has been the group that has hammered out the budget, design, work delegation, and implementation. This group has met once to plan these project details, but because of the distance for the committee members, they delegated most of the day-to-day implementation to the Sengerema representatives. Hopefully, this group will meet again to plan the second plan of construction soon.

 

Prayer Requests

A number of our blog readers have asked us to communicate some updated prayer requests every couple of months, so I have been trying to put something up every two months or so. Here is a list of update praises and prayer requests:

1. Thank God that Jana safely delivered our daughter, Moriah Hope, on 7 July!

2. Thank God for sustaining the spiritual growth of his children, us and our Tanzanian brethren.

3. Thank God that we have been able to complete the construction of the parsonage in Sengerema.

4. Thank God that I have had a number of discipleship opportunities and edifying conversations with the pastors and students since our family returned from Nairobi in July. Pray that there would be many more fruitful opportunities like these in the coming months.

5. Ask God to make the three 40-hour weeks of Bible Institute, 5-23 September, a very productive time for learning and spiritual development for the students. I will be teaching "Acts and Pauline Epistles," "General Epistles," and "The Life of a Pastor and His Ministry." This will be my first time teaching for this length of time in Swahili, so I would appreciate your prayers as well.

6. Ask God to help us as we assist in the construction of a church building in Sengerema. We expect to start sometime in the next two months.

7. Pray for Jana and me, that we would grow stronger in our love and faithfulness to our Lord during the next two months.

 

 

Ducks

Most of our neighbors have some kind of livestock that they care for and breed: chickens, goats, cows, pigs, and ducks. It is a great way for them to supplement the diet, and depending on what you kind of livestock you have, it doesn’t necessarily take a lot of work.

So, I went out and did it. I bought some ducks. I have been thinking about it for a while, and it is something of an experiment to see what we can do. The kids are calling them Mr. Gumgum and Mama Gumgum, from the Adventures of Dr. Doolittle. I told them that it was alright to name them as long as they knew we will probably be eating them sometime.

 

Sengerema Schedule

Now that we are back from Nairobi, I have been falling into something of a rhythm in my church visits. After talking with Hamisi, I am now out in Sengerema for two Sundays a month and plan on visiting with the other congregations during the other two weeks of the month. So, our first two Sundays back (23^rd-24^th, and 30^th-31^st), I was with the church plant in Sengerema, going out on Saturday morning and coming back on Sunday evening. During these two visits, my time with Hamisi has primarily been discussing his questions from his visitation, Bible reading and his review of his Bible Institute notes. I am really encouraged by his desire to look for biblical answers to the church’s issues and his diligence to use the resources that he has to get those answers.

The last two Sundays, I have been to Shadi (7^th) and Sweya (14^th). It has been good to reconnect with these churches and to encourage them with the preaching of the Word. This Sunday, I am looking forward to being out in Sengerema again.

 

The Prodigal God

Tim Keller’s book, The Prodigal God, is a quick but well-aimed bullet. In this short work, he does a great job of explaining the meaning of the parable of the prodigal son, showing us that it has much more to do with God’s offer to the self-righteousness who are trying to earn his favor through obedience than it does with his acceptance of the wayward and licentious. This is a great book for preaching the gospel to yourself anew and for preparing to share it with those who think they need it the least but need it the most.

Cloudy, Rainy Days

It is dry season, or at least we thought so. After having most of the ground dry and dusty and many of the trees shed their leaves, we have had three very cloudy day and two rather heavy rains. Usually, the rains do not start until later in September or in October, but it is not completely uncommon to get some showers in August. The farmers are happy, and I have heard that people have already begun to plant in Nyakaliro and Lusolelo. The folks that were trying to form and burn mud bricks for building are less happy. If the bricks have not yet been fired before the first rains come, then all of the work of forming the bricks is lost.

We have enjoyed these cool, rainy days. It is nice to have a reason to wear a sweatshirt in the morning. Sometimes days like these make for trouble with drying laundry or collecting solar power. Right now we have ropes strung up across our livingroom with wet laundry from yesterday, and the solar batteries have been hovering on empty the last couple of days. That is typical during the rainy season but less so during dry season.

 

Bible Institute Preparation

Ferdinand Mwailafu, one of the graduates of the Bible Institute is helping me by editing my class notes for the third week in September. Weeks One and Two (5-16 Sept), I will be teaching the Acts and the New Testament Epistles. Week Three, I will be teaching a class that we are calling Maisha ya Mchungaji na Huduma Yake or “The Life of the Pastor and His Ministry.”

I have tried to remain very deliberate in making sure that Bible Institute prep does not take over and pull me away from my more primary work of individual discipleship with the pastors and students, so I have been trying to split my time in the office with my time spent visiting and discussing with the men. I have been thankful to find something of a rhythm as I am trying to work out my ministry priorities and plans. I am prayerfully anticipating my time together with the students next month, and I hope that you would join me in pray for it too.

A Word from Grace and Silas

This is Grace and this is my fruit I got on Sunday and was having fun 'cause I was breaking the muwa up (that's what sugarcane is called in Swahili) and the ukwaju is called tamarind in English. The ukwaju tastes really sour and the sugarcane has a yummy taste in the juice. There are these big trees and then at the bottom of them there are these big sugarcanes that you can pull down from the ground, and then at the top there's a part that you have to pull off. With the ukwaju, um, I climb a tree to get them, but it doesn't really have much and it is starting to be rainy season so then they'll grow ripe and they won't be as sour.

Hi- this is Silas. John made this car for me. John at Tumaini is my friend and he really wants to play with me and he gave this car to me. The end.

This is Grace, again, and this is my birdy. Masheshela here at the orphanage-- he gave me this birdy and I brang it home, then it died.

The Reformed Pastor

In June, as part of preparing for the pastoral theology course in September, I picked up Richard Baxter’s classic work, The Reformed Pastor. Like I said, I picked it up in order to prepare to teach others, but as I was reading it, it became more for my own soul and my own ministry than it did for anyone else. The book is the fruit of Baxter’s exposition of Acts 20:28, “Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood.” He planned to preach the text at a pastors’ meeting in 1654 but fell ill and was unable to attend. He prepared the book at the request of the pastors that had anticipated hearing his address.

Baxter divides the book into three sections, “Take Heed to Yourselves,” “Take Heed to the Flock,” and “Application,” this third section being devoted to challenging the pastor in his work of personally counseling and catechizing the members of his church. I found the book penetrating, and I pray that I will walk away from the book changed. I certainly walked away challenged and convicted.

Learning to Ride a Motorcycle

I have just been able to get my dirt bike running recently, and I have been working on learning how to ride it. I haven’t been a motorcycle driver from way back, so I am still learning how to coordinate the clutch and shifting, the brake and the throttle With diesel at $5.45 a gallon right now, it is a much more affordable way to get around for doing ministry, just as cheap as public transportation, but far more efficient. I have been using it this past week to go to Sweya (about a 6 kilometre drive from our place). No major falls to report, and I am definitely getting better coordinated with practice.