Proverbs 1:5 "Let the wise hear and increase in learning and the one who understands obtain guidance"

Tennis team after tournament with gifts

Soccer Team 

Greetings from the Rafiki Village in Tanzania. I am amazed again, at how quickly the year goes by. We continue to have healthy children and eager learners at our Village. The children going out to secondary school are eager to return to the Rafiki campus, however, we are still negotiating with our registration process. We continue to pray that we will have a registered secondary school by July 8, 2019. We continue to ask God for wisdom and endurance during this process.

The teacher’s training program continues to do well and we are praying for wisdom to push forward for the registration of that program. In the meantime we continue to train students in good teaching techniques for classical education. The students continue to work hard at their studies.

Our school term ended with a four week break. Most of our resident children were able to go off the campus to be with relatives during two weeks of the four week break. One of our secondary students was privileged to travel about 2 days south of our village to participate in a regional basketball tournament. As she returned seven (five resident girls) of our primary girls were chosen to play at the same area for girls soccer. Three of our secondary students and one primary student traveled to Dar es Salaam to a tennis tournament. We are so thankful that these students are provided the opportunities of traveling with their sport. All of the students played well and represented Rafiki in a good way with their behavior as well as their playing. 

This has been an unusual “Spring” in our area. Our rains were six weeks late and shortly after they began, it became unseasonably cool. We hear that many of you are also experiencing unusual weather this year. We are praying here for the farmers who were able to re-plant their maize crop because the rain has not yet been enough for good growth. I must say we are enjoying the cool mornings and evenings.

Biology Lab 

We continue to love what we do and strive to do it with purpose and wisdom. We need guidance and wisdom as we continue to push through our registration processes, we need guidance and wisdom to raise these sixty children as God would have us to do it, and we need wisdom as we travel the roads here. We covet your prayers and are so grateful that God allows us the health to continue to work here in this beautiful place. Thank you to all those who contribute financially for us to continue this work. You are all dear to our hearts.

Yesterday was one of those unusual days which come along illustrating what life is like out here. A pastor invited me and three of my students (two are leaders in the discipleship program) to go out in the bush to his old home town where he led a church and started a new school. He has been referring students to us for the teacher’s training program. It was an all day trip. We drove on tarmac for about an hour then turned off in

to the bush. As usual the tracks for vehicles soon disappeared and I was just instructed to turn right or left. The only things which allowed me to keep my orientation was the two huge mountains on the distant horizon.

You will notice a girl drawing water from a deep well. Not long ago her father decided she had progressed far enough in school that she needed to get married. She was going to an evangelical church and was even in the choir. One night after choir practice she went to bed in her mud and stick hut. In the middle of the night she was awakened by two men with her father standing nearby. Her hands and feet were tied, then she was carried out to a waiting vehicle. On the way out she asked her father where she was going. He replied to her new husband’s house. They drove away to another area and she was taken into a hut with a lock on the door. Even though they are just mud and sticks they are fairly substantial. I doubt if I could kick my way out. She was there for three days and given food with water.

Meanwhile her pastor found out what had happened. He had a recent photo of the girl and took it to the police. They came to search for her but the father denied he had anyone living in his settlement by her name. The police knew he was lying so started circulating the photo. Eventually she was located and taken to be live with her pastor. The father threatened to kill him. In the meantime the pastor came to see us at our school, asking if we would take her since she had such good grades. She is enthusiastic about our training program and the discipleship opportunities which go along with it.