July, 2012
Dear Friends and Family,
Greetings from sunny, dry, and dusty Mbeya. Only 6 or 7 months till the rains come again. Life here has been wonderfully hectic. On Friday morning the 6th of May, a team from Grace Bible College (8 people) arrived in Dar es Salaam. Please allow me to give you a brief summary of our week with them.
Friday: The team arrived at the airport at 7am, I (Cory) had arranged transportation to their guest house with all of their luggage. After a brief rest for the team, their luggage had to be transported to the bus station office for transport to Mbeya (apart from the team). I was in constant communication with the driver and guest house making sure everything was alright and on schedule.
Saturday: The team left on the bus from Dar es Salaam to Mbeya at 6 am, the driver notified me at 6:20 that they were aboard the bus and on their way. I stayed in communication with the conductor (kind of like on a train, but without the snappy hat) so he could let me know when the bus was getting close to Mbeya. The team arrived around 6:30 pm, and we hauled them and their carry-on luggage back to our house. Some fellow missionaries, the Bentons, were here as well so we had 17 people at our house for dinner.
Sunday: Off to church. The team performed a drama, shared some testimonies (in Swahili) and preached. We had lunch after the service and introduced the team to delicious Tanzanian cuisine (rice, beans, meat, greens). Sunday afternoon we rested in preparation for a busy week.
Monday: I met a local pastor and told him that I wanted for the team and his congregation to be involved in a project together. We went to the main bus terminal in Mbeya and did cleanup work, passed out tracts,and shared the Gospel. Afterwards we had lunch at the church (possibly more delicious than the day before) and the team performed a different drama, shared testimonies,and preached again. After this we were back to our house and I had the guys dig a large stump from the ground.
Tuesday: We went back to the church in Nzovwe (same as Sunday) to break up an old foundation and haul the dirt to a new place. The team was also introduced to sugar cane.
Wednesday: We went to a waterfall called Kaporogwe Falls about 2 hours away. Kim packed a great lunch for everyone and we ate behind the falls. Some of the team members went for a "swim" at the base of the falls. It was beautiful with an interesting drive.
Thursday and Friday: Painting and varnishing at Grace College. Some of the team members scraped and filled the walls, while others sanded the doors and window frames and coated them with a fresh coat of varnish. One of our pastors helped the team, and he was able to finish what the team could not.
Saturday: Big pancake breakfast with everyone, and then on the road. We stopped about 42 miles from Mbeya and had lunch with a pastor and his family. 20 Miles after that the pavement stops and there was another 100 miles of lovely dirt road to contend with. We made it to the village of Kapenta where some of our other missionaries live.
The team is with them right now and everyone will be back to our house Sunday night and will leave Monday morning.
We still seem to be recovering from the week, both mentally and physically. It was a real blessing having the team here and hope their week in the Rukwa Valley with our other missionaries will be as fruitful as their time here.
In other news, we will begin building the office for the correspondence course in about three weeks, so please pray for that.
In His Service,
Cory, Kim, Naomi, and Elijah Hodgson
Dear Friends and Family,
While we were in the States, several different people asked me what a typical day and or week is like for me in Mbeya. This was and still is a difficult question for me to answer. Although our official ministry here is the Bible correspondence course which Cory is working to get into as many hands as possible, we also have a ministry of hospitality. This means we house and feed our fellow Grace Ministries International missionaries and their various guests as they come and go through Tanzania. Occasionally, we also have missionaries from other organizations stay with us as well. There are times when it is just our family and life around our house is "normal".
Last week, our house was a very busy place. On Wednesday, I was planning for seven guests to sleep at my house and to serve dinner to 19 guests. This is not the first time we have had 23 (including my family) for dinner, but it is certainly more than usual. Because we make almost everything from scratch here, my cook and I started preparing Wednesday's dinner Monday. In the midst of all the food preparations, I home schooled the kids and made sure the house was prepared to receive all the company. I was feeling a little apprehensive Wednesday morning when I woke up.
The food was not a concern. One soup was already made and ready to reheat. The french bread and rolls were ready to serve. The other two soups were partially prepped. I had a plan for how the rest of the food would come together. My concern was where was everyone going to sit? Usually when I have this many people at my house, I have no problem with some of them sitting in the living room. However with a soup bar, I didn't see this being a good idea. I put this worry out of my mind and went on with the day.
Well, as usual, God has a way of working things out in His own way. Did I mention I was expecting 19 people for dinner? Let me clarify this;
-nine(a couple more were added on) people were coming from Mumba which is five to 8 hours northwest of Mbeya
-six people were coming from Dar es Salaam which is about 12 hours east of Mbeya
-five people were coming from Iringa which is about 4 hours east of Mbeya
Their various destinations were: Mumba, Rukwa valley, Iringa, Dar es Salaam(to leave for US), and Malawi.
As is often the case here in Tanzania, the guests' travels did not go as planned. So instead of waiting for everyone to arrive, we decided to serve dinner in three separate shifts! At seven o'clock, nine people had dinner. Then at eight-thirty, eight more people had dinner. Finally at ten o'clock six people sat down to eat. Just about the time the third dinner shift was underway, one of our co-workers who had traveled here earlier in the day, returned to our house with the news that his passport and some money had been stolen. Cory quickly shifted into crisis management and assisted in this situation. As I served dinner to two more people, Cory printed passport documents, took and printed a passport picture so our co-worker could go to Dar es Salaam and replace his passport before heading back to the States in less than a month.
If you take the time to do the math, you will see that I ended up serving 25 dinners throughout the evening. Fortunately, soup and bread can go a long way. God is good. We can plan and prepare all we want, but ultimately it is up to His will and His timing.
Hope you have a great week! This week is going to be more quiet than last...I think.
In His Service,
Kim Hodgson
While we were in the States, several different people asked me what a typical day and or week is like for me in Mbeya. This was and still is a difficult question for me to answer. Although our official ministry here is the Bible correspondence course which Cory is working to get into as many hands as possible, we also have a ministry of hospitality. This means we house and feed our fellow Grace Ministries International missionaries and their various guests as they come and go through Tanzania. Occasionally, we also have missionaries from other organizations stay with us as well. There are times when it is just our family and life around our house is "normal".
Last week, our house was a very busy place. On Wednesday, I was planning for seven guests to sleep at my house and to serve dinner to 19 guests. This is not the first time we have had 23 (including my family) for dinner, but it is certainly more than usual. Because we make almost everything from scratch here, my cook and I started preparing Wednesday's dinner Monday. In the midst of all the food preparations, I home schooled the kids and made sure the house was prepared to receive all the company. I was feeling a little apprehensive Wednesday morning when I woke up.
The food was not a concern. One soup was already made and ready to reheat. The french bread and rolls were ready to serve. The other two soups were partially prepped. I had a plan for how the rest of the food would come together. My concern was where was everyone going to sit? Usually when I have this many people at my house, I have no problem with some of them sitting in the living room. However with a soup bar, I didn't see this being a good idea. I put this worry out of my mind and went on with the day.
Well, as usual, God has a way of working things out in His own way. Did I mention I was expecting 19 people for dinner? Let me clarify this;
-nine(a couple more were added on) people were coming from Mumba which is five to 8 hours northwest of Mbeya
-six people were coming from Dar es Salaam which is about 12 hours east of Mbeya
-five people were coming from Iringa which is about 4 hours east of Mbeya
Their various destinations were: Mumba, Rukwa valley, Iringa, Dar es Salaam(to leave for US), and Malawi.
As is often the case here in Tanzania, the guests' travels did not go as planned. So instead of waiting for everyone to arrive, we decided to serve dinner in three separate shifts! At seven o'clock, nine people had dinner. Then at eight-thirty, eight more people had dinner. Finally at ten o'clock six people sat down to eat. Just about the time the third dinner shift was underway, one of our co-workers who had traveled here earlier in the day, returned to our house with the news that his passport and some money had been stolen. Cory quickly shifted into crisis management and assisted in this situation. As I served dinner to two more people, Cory printed passport documents, took and printed a passport picture so our co-worker could go to Dar es Salaam and replace his passport before heading back to the States in less than a month.
If you take the time to do the math, you will see that I ended up serving 25 dinners throughout the evening. Fortunately, soup and bread can go a long way. God is good. We can plan and prepare all we want, but ultimately it is up to His will and His timing.
Hope you have a great week! This week is going to be more quiet than last...I think.
In His Service,
Kim Hodgson
