Sun
Nov 1
2009
Pastor Martin Russell
Assistant to the Bishop
Nebraska Synod, ELCA
At the invitation of the Northern Diocese of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania, the Nebraska Synod recently sponsored a special vision trip to the Rukwa region of Tanzania. Rukwa is a relatively remote region of Tanzania that lies to the east of Lake Tanganyika. The two main towns in Rukwa are Mpanda and Sumbawanga. The Rukwa region is also a “mission area” of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania where the Northern Diocese is a leader in mission work.
Like all vision trips, visits were made to several ministry sites (congregations, schools, health centers). Special visits were made to two large refugee settlement camps (Mishamo and Katumba) that are each home to nearly 70,000 Hutu refugees from Burundi. The trip included a safari in Katavi National Park and a visit to the Kallambo Water Falls along the border of Zambia.
This trip exposed travelers to multiple cultures and geographies as we traveled across the country of Tanzania. Due to the distances and remoteness, we were less able to control events. Support systems along the way, such as medical care, vehicle repair, and road maintenance, were extremely limited. Our travelers came expecting the unexpected and were ready to accept whatever came graciously.
This trip, like all vision trips, had tremendous value.
The people of Tanzania have so much to teach us, especially about what is most important in life. They do not have the luxury of assuming that external things will offer them fulfillment. They don’t have access to them, so they have to find life at a deeper, more available, and more simple level. In that, they have a huge head start in the spiritual life, and that is probably why Jesus begins his Sermon on the Mount with the very direct “How happy are the poor” (Luke 6:20).
A woman in Tanzania once told me: “We have nothing except God and one another.” I believe that’s the only thing the Gospel ever promised us. It offers us a path to God and a path to one another.
When we spend time with those who daily endure the crushing burden of poverty and have only their faith in God to sustain them, we begin to understand why Jesus so often spoke of the danger of wealth and the way to true treasure (Matthew 19:21-24). It is one thing to hear that 800 million people in our world are chronically malnourished. It is quite another to know some of those people personally, to share a meal with a family who may not eat tomorrow, to become friends, to stand in their village and hear about the child who was taken by malaria and in the next sentence about their vision of creating a trade school at their church.
Vision trips offer travelers a chance to gain an understanding of what life is like for new friends in Tanzania, to see it with our own eyes, to worship in modest churches, visit villages, hospitals, schools, and homes. We will learn about the economy, educational and healthcare systems. We experience the breathtaking beauty of the land and the wildlife it supports.
We did not travel to Tanzania as missionaries. We did not step off the plane and set about building a church or a school. We went to learn from our brothers and sisters in Christ, to pray and worship with them, to bring encouragement, support and love.
As we traveled together, met and talked with people, developed personal friendships, and saw with our own eyes how others live and struggle to survive, all the while keeping the faith, our travelers said over and over again, “I just had no idea! Of course, you see the pictures and read the statistics, but actually knowing these people, and having them as friends, that’s very different. Now poverty has a face and a name. This is my friend we’re talking about who is trying to feed her family on a dollar a day! And I want to do something about that!”
Our lives were changed. In learning to know fellow Christians who struggle daily just to survive, we discovered that survival is first and foremost a matter of faith in the God who provides what we need. We learn that we, who are wealthy in the world, have been given these blessings by God as a trust, an inheritance, to be shared with those in need. We learn that this is God’s plan; this is how God intends the world to work! We learn that we need these wonderful friends as much or more than they need us. They have an experience of God that we cannot live without.
One does not have to travel all the way to East Africa to find such teachers. They are close by, in the inner cities, on the reservations, hidden in rural communities, yes, even right here in Nebraska.
Jesus says,
“As the scripture has said, ‘Out of the believer’s heart shall flow rivers of living water.’” (John 7:38).
I would never have believed that this living water could flow so freely in a place as impoverished as Tanzania, especially in the remote Rukwa region. It does. I’ve seen it with my own eyes, and I am eager to share it with you!
May the Lord bless you as you continue to bless others through your life and ministry.
Traveling to the Rukwa Mission in Tanzania from the Nebraska Synod were Val Christensen (Salem, Ponca); Bill Davis (Trinity, Omaha); Pastor Donna Durrette (Calvary, Swede Home); Bill Huelle (Calvary, Scottsbluff); Layton and Carolyn Jensen (St. Luke, Emerson); Dave Mackie (Holy Trinity, Sidney); Greg and Sandy Olson (Our Saviour’s, Lincoln); Pastor Gretchen Ritola (St. Luke and St. Paul’s, Emerson); Joyce Sebade (St. Paul’s, Emerson); Pastor Martin Russell (Nebraska Synod staff); Jill Stevenson (First, North Platte); and Stephanie Wood (Holy Cross, Omaha).
My comment is on the Global event held at Southwood. I didn’t fill out a sheet, but just wanted to tell you what a wonderful event it was. The music team was INCREDIBLE and the speakers were good also. I am the Mission Interpreter for our church, so felt I came away with lots of material. Thank You!