Tanzania Partnership

Usolanga Parish visit: welcome, chapels, making bricks, collecting photos and stories for prayer cards, and planning for three guests to visit SOTV in November. We visited Mtera Secondary School on Friday. What a welcome! x On our way to Tungamalenga and Makifu We bought so much medicine we needed an extra vehicle to carry it out to the Tungamalenga dispensary. Spent the first morning in Iringa catching up with Diocese General Secretary, Nayman Chavalla, and Pastor Msigwa. Then lunch at Neema and a walking tour of the market. Still to come, a visit to Huruma Center and dinner at Mama Iringa’s. Ran into a former student, Diana Saga, now a nurse at the regional hospital. Today (July 8) we drove to Tungamalenga and Makifu, enjoyed a warm welcome, participated in the final stages of the pipeline project to Ikwavila, walking the pipeline path, and then worked with the experts to figure out why the system is at less than optimal condition. The...

Blessed for travel - some leaving the beginning of July, others leaving on July 15.

Last night our traveling group got together to pack some gifts we're carrying this year, and to go over final plans, schedules and questions. Now I'm ready to go. This year's journey ( itinerary details here ) is both the same as previous year's trips, and very different.  In early July, a small group of travelers will visit the three parishes we call our companions: Usolanga, Tungamalenga and Makifu.  During these visits we'll be asked to go from village to village, meet new people every day, observe and monitor parish projects, celebrate all that has been done in the coming year, sing and pray together, dance, and together with the partnership committees, plan for the coming year.  On the day that group heads back to Dar for the long journey home, a second group will arrive in Iringa for a very different experience. A twenty member choir, with people representing six different metro area congregations, will be based in Iringa for rehearsals and co...

Meet Asia Kilelii, a Maasai girl from Mahove. Asia’s life changed when water came to Mahove seven years ago. Instead of spending many hours a day carrying water for her family, finally water was available just outside her family’s home, and Asia was able to attend school regularly. She excelled, and graduated at the top of her class. Now she attends college – the first girl in her extended family to do so. Her life was changed first by a water project, and then by a scholarship. Each year Shepherd of the Valley provides about $45,000 to support secondary and university scholarships for 150 students.   Scholarships range from $400 for most secondary students to $3000 for college students. Most of our students have parents who have died, or who are subsistence farmers earning less than a dollar a day. Your generous support makes a world of difference. Give online at http://www.sotv.org/giving/ or write checks payable to SOTV with TZ scholarship in the memo lin...

When we visited Mtera Secondary School in July, on our way back to Iringa after the visit to Usolanga, we met a remarkable man. He is the second headmaster at the school, Mr. Tibery Mbossa. He started by thanking us for our visit, saying we can see the love of God in you today; your scholarship support is a very big gift. But you don't just pay the fees, you even come to visit the students. It means a lot. Then he began to tell us his own scholarship story.  I anticipated having a life in the village. Without going to school, it is tough. Villagers have nothing to do but work hard, trying to dig by hand hoes, and work to feed their families. One day I went to the school. I met a certain man who asked me a simple question. Why don't you go to school? I told him, there is no one to pay for me. He asked, do you like the school? I said yes. I want to be a student. I think it is possible. He is a pastor. He joined me, I think it is possible. He asked me, what do...

Bishop Blastone Gaville Just this week we received a letter from Bishop Blastone Gaville of the Iringa Diocese. Greeting Pastor Rick Summy and all friends at Shepherd of the Valley, he recalled his visit to Minnesota a year ago. Bishop Gaville at SOTV in 2017 He wrote, "It was so great and good news to receive the letter from the Senior Pastor of SOTV and to see a group of the folks in August. Just after receiving the letter, I remembered a good time we had during my stay with you in US." Bishop Gaville had just been out to visit our partners in Makifu and Tungamalenga Parishes, the letter continued. " I had very busy days in both parishes." In Makifu, he dedicated the new pastor's home, placed a cornerstone at the new chapel in Kisilwa, and visited Ikwavila and Malunde. He baptized 14 people. The next day he visited Tungamalenga Parish, starting the day with worship and the dedication of the new chapel at Namelok.  Attending ...

At Shepherd of the Valley on August 12, we prayed, we walked, and we gave money to support water projects in Ikwavila and Mpalapande, Tanzania. Every gift of prayer, walking, and funding is a blessing. Why did people walk three kilometers up hill to fetch a bucket of water on a hot, hot day?  Why, when we have a perfectly good spigot and all the water we could possibly want right within reach? We walked to remember our friends in Tanzania. The girls and women in villages like Mpalapande and Ikwavila walk every day to collect every drop of water they use for cooking, drinking, washing, and watering their gardens. Girls spend so much time each day collecting water that they often are not able to attend school. We walked to experience in some small way, the reality of their daily life. Carrying water is hard work.  A five gallon pail weighs 40 pounds.  We used the water that was collected to water the garden...