Pictured above is this year’s delegation.
“Bega Kwa Bega” is the Swahili term for mutual support between partners, and describes our relationship with our sister-synod, the Ulanga Kilombero Diocese in Tanzania, a partnership going back 35 years. This year, a delegation of 12 individuals from the NWIM Synod will travel to Tanzania, leaving June 5th.
Unlike what you might typically imagine for a “Mission Trip,” our role and expectations for this trip is similar to what you might think of when going to see distant relatives. We will visit with Pastors Ezekiel and Wilson, who just visited us last fall, along with others who have visited here over the years. We will make new friends. We will travel throughout their Diocese visiting their ministry sites and churches where we will just live alongside one another, engaging in fellowship, worship, work and play.
This trip will be led by Janet Boyer and Cory English, who were part of the delegation in 2024. They are looking forward to sharing the blessings they experienced during that trip. It is a wonderous thing to worship in Tanzania, to encounter God in a setting where you don’t know the rituals, the words to the songs, or even understand the sermon, but you DO deeply recognize and experience the joy of our salvation and the presence of God that we share when we worship together with our siblings in Christ.
This year, we will have the opportunity to see the work begun on the new solar kitchen at Tumaini Lutheran Seminary. We will meet the children who are students at Strobelt Elementary School, and visit Lugala, the Lutheran hospital providing care to a vast region in remote Tanzania.
Most of the population within the UKD are sustenance farmers, each working a small ‘shamba,’ or farm. Even the pastors and evangelists often augment their meager income with food grown on their shamba. Our good friends in the UKD are such gracious hosts, that they don’t expect us to work while there, but we have asked for opportunities to join with them in their everyday work. This year our “bega kwa bega” walk will include working together on the shamba, in a sewing center, and in the schools. We will also host an American barbeque dinner for 80, where we provide the food and BBQ technique, but share in the preparation and work of cooking and serving.
Please keep us in your prayers as we travel: for safety, for wellness, for wisdom in our walk, and for mutual blessing in this partnership. After we return, each of us will be full of stories to tell and blessings to share. We would welcome the opportunity to come to your church and share in any way.