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Published: January 29th 2007
We did a little driving down the road less traveled this weekend on our trip to the village of King'ore Friday night we went over to the Brown's to have dinner with Anthony & Shasta. She made a great big pot of our favorite spaghetti so the kids were thrilled! Emily & I needed to help Shasta work on some preparations for our quilting class on Saturday, so we were cutting out the back pieces and measuring the batting for the centers of the quilts... and then pinning the 3 peices together for easy transport and for the ladies to have an easier time of tacking them together the next morning.
So, on Saturday morning, we had another Quilting class with the Arusha ladies and I have a new friend that I have met through taking clothes and visiting the Camp Moses Children's Home, named Sarah and I brought her along with me She and her husband Phil are here for a temporary 10 months volunteering at the Home and school for street children. Sarah is from the UK and Phil is from Ohio, I believe... But I invited her to come and join our ladies
bible study and Quilting class at Arusha this week as well.... We picked her up and met Shasta at the church building.... Where the men had House to House going on at the same time, they were gathering up to head out to do some home studies in Arusha.
About 20 ladies met together and Shasta had asked me to teach the devo, before the quilting began, so we had a Bible study on piecing together parts of your life and how the more you patch and quilt the good pieces together the stronger the out come will be.... We were in the final stages of tacking and binding the baby blankets that we had started about 2 months ago... We began this project with the Cradle of Love Orphanage babies in mind... making blankets for the 30 or so children age 2 and under that they house there... We have been so impressed with the enthusiasm of the ladies and their excitement about the project. They have even started bringing in quilt tops of their own design and material to add to the ones that Shasta had pre-cut out in the beginning... the ones I love the most
are the ones they have cut from various colored African congas... and Emily & I were saying that we need to make one simluar to take home to show everyone back in the states...
Saturday was also our 11 year anniversary and my sweet husband took me out to dinner here in town... we went to the Flame Tree restaurant, which we never seem to go to with all the kids, due to the fact that they don't serve burgers, hot dogs or french fries.... So we had a wonderful candle light dinner for two, while Kelly stayed home and watched the kids for us. Eleven years has flown by, with so much love, excitement and joy in our lives that I can't begin to ever thank God enough for the blessing of a wonderful marriage that I have.
Sunday morning we were supposed to pick up two students in Arusha to take them out to Kingore with us, they were supposed to go and translate for Brent while he taught class and preached.... Well, to make a long story short, we waited and waited and waited but they never showed up, so we went ahead and took
Brent Helping out his translator...
He spoke no English at all... So Brent had to preach in Swahili and the translator repeated after Brent word for word.... in Swahili... occassionally correcting his grammaroff towards where we knew Kingore to be and hoped that by some possibility we might happen to find the church... We of course called Elly, and got a rough set of directions, which included a left turn at the dirt road, through the sunflowers, a mile past the termite mound and a right turn at the tractor..... (yeah that's what I said too....) Well, we found the general area... several tractors, seeing how we were in AFRICA!!!! in the bush.... in a farming community.... several termite mounds and what-do -ya know... a bunch of dirt roads too..... well after asking a sweet old lady in the middle of a sunflower field where a family lived that we knew were members of the church, we sighed with the relief that we were still headed in the right direction... she said "a ju" (up there) which by African standards, we were happy to just find out that she knew the name of the people we were looking for that in and of itself was a small victory! ... but who knows just how far, up there... over there could be...
We kept on driving and the roads kept getting smaller
and smaller.. more like cattle paths now than actual roads... but the view was amazing, from where we were you could see a gorgeous side view of Kilimanjaro off to the right side of the car and just as clear and perfect of a view of Meru off to the left... so I was snapping pictures out both windows... We found the infamous termite mound.. and laughed... well we must be going the right way!! Then we saw a man walking with a Bible in hand and stopped again to ask if he knew where this family lived and he did... he hopped in the car and took us to their home, (which I dare say we would have never found otherwise) We were greeted by a sweet smile and warm hugs of a husband and a wife... a herd of cattle and goats just being released from their pens, and brought out chairs for us to sit out under the tree in until they were ready for church.... The church building we could see down the hill was not far from their home and built on the land owned by this man's family. A pole building with a tin
roof surrounded by the abandoned construction work of 4 walls, encasing the old pole wooden building... At first sight, you think, how sad, to have been left unfinished...undone, with so much already accomplished... But then as we were there longer you see the 12 members of the church there, and their desire to learn and grow, but without anyone being there with them, it's a struggle to grow on your own... A small young church with what will be a large building, out in the bush country of King'ore. Brent quickly found out that no one there spoke English well enough to translate although they volunteered to stand up and try to help Brent with the grammar of His Swahili, so Brent taught and preached his first ever sermon totally in Swahili, with a little help from a man in Kingor'e who helped to correct any errors in Brent's Swahili grammar.... It was quite funny actually, Brent would say a sentence in Swahili then the translator would repeat the same thing, again in Swahili! Brent would translate a little into English for the kids and myself to understand and then continue on in Swahili... I was very impressed... and although
Our "why we go through so many tires" Postcard
Parking in the bush like this, go figure, we got another flat tire and for those of you who've been wondering, this is the truck we are driving now.. after switching with the Gees. I think he was a little nervous, he did an amazing job!
After services, we began visiting with the members there and took a group picture to add to our collection of churches here... when I recognized the sweet face of an old man..... Penda Elly was his name, and about 3 years ago in the 2004 campaigns in Moshi he was there, had been baptized and was at 80 something years old, insisting on helping the younger men walk around and pass out tracks.... he and his wife were both there, of all places to find a familiar face, Kingore was the last I expected....
After leaving there, we continued to drive on out to Moshi, since we were half way there anyway.. we were early so we drove around looking for more rent signs on fences... (it so hard to find a place to rent here) but we looked over a few fences, asked a few questions and got a few leads... so the search is on.... After Brent finished language school this week we will hopefully be able to spend more time locating one and getting this one checked off the to-do list.... We went
to Moshi for evening services... and enjoyed the sweet smiles and warm faces wishing us down there as soon as possible... I think the entire congregation is looking for us a home now... When we were just about to leave, we went to the truck to find a flat tire, sank all the way to the ground, of course after where we had been driving and what we had been driving through that day, what could you expect... the bad thing is tires for this truck here run about $250 for new ones... and we seem to be going through at least one a month...
As we travel to these out lying churches I begin wishing and praying that there was some way we could put a missionary family in each and everyone of these places to grow the churches that we have been seeing.. right now, the major problem is a good one... RAPID GROWTH! yet too few workers in the field to focus on each and every one of these churches as they should be... We wish we could be in so many places at one time, but it's just not possible... So we do what we
can and try to continue to make the rounds as often as possible....Doing what we can with what we have, finding the needs are everywhere, some for song books, most all for Bibles, some lack the communion supplies, benches, some just without any leadership or guidance... I am working on creating the "Churches in Tanzania" page on our web-site to have information and pictures of each church of Christ we work with and find here in the out lying regions of Northern Tanzania... To see who is working with them full time, how they are developing, and growing over time... So that when you come over to Tanzania, you can select somewhere to focus on or work with, to help grow the church in that area. We will always have work to be done, studies that we can't get to and places that we wish we could be in, while we are working in so many areas.... YOU ARE NEEDED HERE IN THE MISSION FIELD OF TANZANIA, and you can come stay in our home in Moshi with us, we would love to have you here.
Well I had better let you go so the kids and I can
The kingore Pole Building...
Kelly and Emily sitting in the back... finish up their school work for the day. I hope you all know how much we love you and miss you and how grateful we are for all your love, support, and prayers. You mean so much to our family. With each kind word and every letter we open, we smile thinking about you our family back home! You are the hardest part of being here.... Because we do miss you so much!
Love, Julie
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Mildred Whitlock
non-member comment
Hello to the Richardson's family, Your travelblog is so interesting and heart warming for your zeal, love and service attitude to share the Gospel with others. I'm just so amazed at the positive outlook and grateful humble nature you live and the non stop sacrifices you make everyday. Thank you all for being such a loving church family and may God continue to bless you and your! With much love to all, Mildred