In Sumbawanga

The new Mennonite church being built, and already in use.
The former church is to the right, and is now used for the
church sponsored nursery school.

We have heard that Sumbawanga is a town in the Harry Potter series, but we did not go to that one. The real Sumbawanga is an energetic town in western Tanzania, but cut off from the rest of Tanzania by poor roads. Even the electric supply comes from neighboring Zambia, about 50 miles away.

The Mennonite church has been there since the early 1980’s, when a group of youth read church history and were impressed with the Mennonite story. They sent 2 of their group to Musoma, the central office of Tanzania Mennonite Church for more information. They returned with an endorsement from Bishop Hezekiah Sarya and organized themselves with an evangelist, treasurer, and secretary.

Founding Pastor John Sikazwe (left), Doris Sikazwe,
Pastor Gabriel Magwega, Tabora

 The evangelist, John Sikazwe, was later ordained pastor and provided leadership until his recent retirement. The Sumbawanga churches are part of Tabora Diocese, but Tabora is 365 miles away and visits are difficult because of the cost of travel.
We were in Sumbawanga nearly a week to provide training for holding their own leadership training program. They expressed a lot of interest in the insights gained from reading the gospels to learn what the Bible says about being disciples of Jesus, not just Christians in name. The other subject which was greatly appreciated was Mennonite history and faith, which they knew very little about.

Gloria meeting with the women.

Seminar participants getting practical experience in
group Bible study.

 We were enriched by their warm hospitality. Our visit was especially meaningful to them, since we were only the second visit by Mennonite missionaries in their 30 years, and there have been few visits by local Mennonite leaders. The earlier visit was by Harold and Christine Wenger in the 1990’s. We are also challenged by their commitment to learn and teach and to bring the gospel to villages that have no church.

Sumbawanga faces economic and educational challenges. There are few persons with leadership skills and training, but they do not lack vision. Our challenge is how to empower them and develop the capacity to meet the needs around them.

At the end of the seminar, the ladies presented us with a piece
of African cloth, to be used to make a shirt and dress .

Emmanuel - God with Us!

December 2013

A little more than a year ago we arrived in East Africa – in many ways it felt like we picked up where we left off 21 years earlier. The same area, same language, some of the same people, similar work. And overall it has felt good. Not a bad way to start our retirement!

With it all, we feel a deep sense of gratefulness. For good health, for meaningful work that makes a difference (we hope!), for safety in traveling many kilometers, for the opportunity to live with people who are so welcoming and hospitable. And through it all, a sense of God’s presence – “God with us.”

We arrived late September 2012. The first 3 months (October – December) we traveled to the 8 dioceses in Tanzania Mennonite Church and 7 dioceses in Kenya Mennonite Church, to hear what the bishops and leaders feel are the training needs in the churches. We heard that many lay leaders do not have training and are not able to attend Bible school. The next 3 months (January – March) we began developing and introducing a program with simple study materials that pastors can use locally to train their lay leaders. Then in April, we met a change, when the Mennonite Bible college needed leadership, since the governing board decided to replace the principal and Joe was asked to fill in temporarily as “coordinator.” That meant we put the training program on hold for 6 months (April – September) while we stayed near the Bible college. Since October, we have been focusing on the training program again. We will be traveling to conduct training seminars for the pastors and introducing the study materials.

The Mennonite church stretches from Lake Victoria to the Indian Ocean, about 500 miles (further by road), so that means a lot of travel. East Africa is a beautiful area and we have enjoyed traveling – Lake Victoria, Mt Kilimanjaro, Serengeti plains with its wildllife, the rolling hills of central Tanzania, the Kenyan highlands with the tea fields, the hand-tilled gardens and simple houses in rural areas. We are finding the roads are much better than 25 years ago. The main roads are nearly all paved, especially across northern Tanzania and southern Kenya.

It was a special time in November to take our annual vacation in the USA to see family. The time was too short, but we were able to spend quality time with each of our children and their families (12 grandchildren) in Delaware, Maryland, and North Carolina.

We enjoy working together as a couple, using our experience and training to resource and encourage church leaders. All of our travel has been together. We are both using our gifts to develop study materials, Joe focusing on biblical studies and church leadership, and Gloria on health and family issues.

We are grateful to see “God with us” in new vision and vitality emerging among churches. Leaders are beginning to talk about mission beyond their borders, some, especially youth, are searching for deeper spirituality instead of focusing on organization and positions of power. Africa as a continent continues to struggle with economic challenges, political instability, food shortages, civil wars, refugees, and occasional religious conflicts, and these affect us in various ways. But in all, the assurance of “God with us” gives hope – we are not alone, and Africa is not forgotten. We are grateful for your prayers, your encouragement, and your friendship.

Joe and Gloria Bontrager

One Year Later

We now have completed one year, and although we have spent at least 6 months of that time in activities other than what we had originally planned, we have felt God’s direction and blessing throughout this year. We are thankful for God’s grace to accept and bring us through this time.
We continue to enjoy good health and safety in all our travels. We are aware of God’s protection in so many ways. We have been blessed with many new friends and co-workers who encourage us in our work and have truly enriched our lives.
We have seen signs of commitment to mission and outreach among leadership of the churches that will present opportunities for growth. But we are also concerned about some aspects of church life and the need for a new touch of the Spirit of God to bring repentance, confession and commitment to discipleship.

The Bible College will be experiencing changes and developing vision under the leadership of Pastor John Wambura. The current semester has been postponed due to lack of funds and the present plan is for the college to reopen in January, but churches will need to get behind the college with financial support in order for that to happen.

We are leaving for 4 weeks of vacation and travel to the states in November, hoping to reconnect especially with family and friends. Pray for our safety in travels throughout the month.

Pray for our return to our scheduled training program once we return in December. We are scheduling about 9-10 Training of Trainers sessions from January to April. Pray that God will prepare these leaders for his work among them. 

Chepilat

Chepilat is a town in tea country, near Sotik on the main road to Kisii in western Kenya. Pastor George, himself a young man, is leading and mentoring a group of leaders. He says, “They call me overseer, but I am really just one of them. That is a name they gave me.” But it is clear that they look up to him and respect him. Pastor George is not Masai, but he grew up among Masai, he speaks their language and he feels like one of them. That prepared him to be a peacemaker when violence broke out in Chepilat during national elections in 2007 between the Kisii and the Kipsigis tribes. His ethnic background made him acceptable to the Kisii, and his upbringing made him acceptable to the Kipsigis, a tribe related to the Masai. He felt called to be a peacemaker so he moved his young family to Chepilat and began to call other pastors and community leaders together. The result was greater understanding among them and today there is peace in Chepilat.

Approaching an estate on the tea plantation near Chepilat

Besides his peacemaking efforts, Pastor George is a church planter. He took us to a tea plantation where a church is growing among the tea workers. The workers live on the plantation in “estates” of about 500 people each. The plantation we visited has about 20 such estates, but many of them have no church and it is difficult for people travel to a church. So Pastor George is leading efforts to plant churches on the tea estates and in the surrounding towns.  He reported that the general manager of the tea plantation encourages the church development efforts among the tea workers and has offered, if they continue, to build them a church building.

My question to Pastor George, “How many churches do you hope to plant in the next year?”

Picking Tea

“Thirteen.”

“How many churches do you have now?

“Six.”

“How many of those six are less than a year old?”

“Three.”

We met with Pastor George and his leaders to discuss training for their congregational leaders. So we are planning to return in January 2014 for a two-day training seminar where the church elders will be given training and study materials to lead Bible study and leadership study groups for their own people. It looks like they will be needing to train many new leaders.

Meeting with the leaders of the Chepilat churches

Turning the corner

It feels like we are getting back to what we really want to do. The meeting on August 10 appointed a new committee to oversee the changes recommended for the Bible college, and I am not on that committee. That means that someone else is now in charge of the Bible college and we are free to focus on the training programs in the church districts. So it feels like a weight has been lifted and we have started making a schedule and working on study modules that we will introduce in the training of trainers seminars. We are grateful for your prayers for us and for the training programs here in Tanzania and Kenya. There are a number of other meetings with church leaders coming up in the next couple months, so that has affected our schedule. Too many meetings gets too heavy for them, so we are in conversation with some about the best time for a training in their area.

One of the outcomes of the meeting on August 10 is that the Bible college clearly lacks financial support and effective leadership. We are hoping and praying the local churches will rise to the challenge of making contributions towards operation of the college. The annual grant from Eastern Mennonite Missions has been received and used for operations and for paying off debts, and there is very little for the semester that should begin in September.

August is deep into the dry season and there is almost no green grass in sight, unless we go down to the lakeshore. But we look forward to rains coming back within the next 3-4 weeks. It will be welcomed by everyone. We wish we could have gotten some of the extra rain that we heard the east coast of the USA was getting this summer.

Challenges at MTCEA

Happy are those whose strength is in you, Lord, in whose heart are the highways to Zion. As they go through the valley of Baca they make it a place of springs; they go from strength to strength. Psa. 84:5-7

The past several months have certainly felt like a valley in many ways, as we have been involved in leadership at Mennonite Theological College of Eastern Africa (MTCEA). But in our utter dependency on His strength and wisdom, we have been forced to seek His face constantly, and hence, have also felt the refreshing springs of His spirit!

We have completed the last term of the school year and had graduation on July 26. Joe has diligently tried to pay down as many outstanding debts as possible, and get the management of the college back on track. He made a special effort to see that the teachers were paid on time and were paid back salaries that they were owed. We are thankful that through careful management there has been a 40% reduction in the debt, however, there is unfortunately a long way to go to reach financial stability. Our management partners have been very affirming and supportive in making difficult decisions.

MTCEA Review Team meeting at
 Mennonite Guest House, Nairobi, Kenya

A review team looking at the college program has also met several times and is presently preparing their assessment and recommendations for strategic planning for the future. However, there are still major hurdles that need to be crossed. One of the biggest challenges will be to find a plan to make the college financially viable. EMM has been providing the majority of the budget (60% or more) for the past number of years. But EMM has changed the funding policy to align priorities with their mission emphasis and vision rather than ongoing management of programs, so financial assistance will terminate at the end of this year. This will require much more reliance on the local churches themselves for finances or searching for other sources of funds. We’d like to see the churches take more ownership in the college, providing financial assistance and also finding capable people to administer the college. We believe that there is the capacity in the churches to do this - $1 per year per member will provide the entire annual budget. But it is a new idea to the churches here and this kind of cooperation is complicated by internal issues. We think this it not time for a bailout, as difficult as it may be. It is time to face the consequences of over-dependence on outside funding, and for the western church to look for healthier ways to partner with the African churches, which we see as an opportunity, not an obstacle.

At present we are not sure of the way forward for the college but there are ongoing conversations. However, we are committed to assist in leadership training and hope in the near future to return to the diocese based training which we feel will meet a specific need for lay leaders who cannot attend Bible college. They are eagerly waiting for their training to begin and we are starting to look at our schedule and make plans. Thank you for your continued prayers and interest in the church in Tanzania and Kenya.

Detours and Speed Bumps

Traveling around here we have encountered a fair number of both detours and speed bumps. The detours are usually because of road construction, so we accept them without complaining, but they do slow us down. Speed bumps seem to be the only way to slow everyone down. Sometimes they say, "speed bumps cannot be bribed."
Our experience here has been a little like that - there have been detours, taking us places we did not expect or plan, and there have been speed bumps that slow down our planning. We recently noted that after being here for over 8 months, we have done a total of 3 training seminars. We thought we would be more than half way finished with the 18 Mennonite dioceses by now. First was the delay with our residence permits, so our seminars were put on hold. But we have heard from those 3 church districts that they have been having training seminars and are ready for the next round of training and materials.
We are happy to say that we have received our residence permits in Tanzania, but just as we received them, we were given a new assignment at Mennonite Theological College and our seminar schedule was put on hold. We have also applied for residence permits in Kenya and have received word that they are nearing completion.
I wrote about the assignment at Mennonite Theological College of Eastern Africa (MTCEA) in an earlier post. I am trying to be patient and a good learner for whatever God is trying to teach me. But to be honest, I feel like I am treading water, can't seem to get my feet on the bottom. I won't go into all the problems here, but just to say that weak leadership over the past few years has allowed an operating style to develop that led to lax enforcement of policies, a significant financial debt, and lower quality of education. Several students are behind on their tuition payments, but allowed to continue their study. Money was spent without following a budget so some obligations remained unpaid.
Some students and staff think my presence will bring some kind of miracle and lift MTCEA out of its problems, others feel threatened by my presence (and some should feel threatened!). So I struggle each day to maintain my own integrity and be clear about policies and procedures.
Because of the problems at MTCEA, a Review Team was appointed by the Board of Governors to explore possibilities and recommend changes. I am looking forward to meeting with them June 25-26 and discussing possibilities. There are 5 persons on the Review Team including me (Joe), two are from Tanzania Mennonite Church, one from Kenya Mennonite Church, and one from a seminary in Nairobi who will bring professional expertise. All of these are mature and experienced in education or administration and I think we have a good team. But I will need to write about the Review Team after we have met. After we meet, next week, we will travel to Nairobi for a meeting of the missionary team and some R&R. Part of that time will also probably be to write up the results of the Review Team meeting.
Again, we thank you for your support in so many ways, including your prayers. We are feeling there is a definite spiritual dimension to the problems we are encountering. There have been some church leadership situations in the past that adversely affected this local community, including the college. One of our prayers has been that underlying negative factors would become known, and we are beginning to see some of the attitudes. We are making it a priority to work with local leaders in that. So your prayers are needed and appreciated.