Letters

One of the simple joys of this partnership  is exchanging letters, particularly between the students we sponsor and the families who sponsor them by providing scholarships.

Dear My Sponsor,

I am very glad to write this letter to you.

I greet you in the name of Jesus Christ our Savior.

I hope you are going on well in your daily activities.

May God bless you.

I am fit mentally and physically.

The aim of this letter is to thank you for sponsoring me and for paying my school fees.

Now I am in form one.

I hope you are praying for me.

I pray for you.

God bless you.

Yours faithfully,

Paulos V.

Many times the Tanzanian students are just beginning to learn English.  Sometimes the students gather together in a room and share ideas about what they should write.  The letters coming from a particular school have similar themes and phrases.  That's okay.  We applaud the sincere effort and are humbled by the genuine gratitude that is expressed.

We invite our sponsors to send letters to their students when SOTV members travel to Tanzania.  It's easy for us to deliver the letters in person, and the letters often help start a conversation with the students.  "Yes, I know your sponsor.  They are a lovely family -- he sings in the choir and she teaches Sunday School at our church at home." The students love to meet someone who knows their sponsor.

Sometimes we are in the awkward position of meeting a group of 20 + students, but are carrying letters for only a handful of them.  We know -- and the students know -- that the gift of the scholarship is gift enough.  But they want to establish a relationship with their sponsors, even if it only amounts to a letter exchanged once a year.

So for a couple weekends before our travelers take off, we will be in the narthex between worship services inviting people to write letters to our students.  We'll supply the stationery, envelopes and list of student names. 

You don't have to be a sponsor to send a letter.

We currently have about 25 students who are not matched one to one with a particular sponsor. We'd still like to take letters of greeting and encouragement to these students.  We also have sponsors who for whatever reason prefer not to send letters.  That's okay.  We still want to send a letter of greeting to all the students.

So look for the table in the narthex this weekend and the weekend of July 15. Feel free to bring along a family photo to include with your letter if you wish.

Since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding. And we pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and joyfully giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light. For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.  Colossians 1:9-14