Here is a summary of the history of our Tanzanian partnership.
2000 Pastor Beebe received information about MWANGAZA, an educational partnership program between the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and the Evangelical church in Tanzania. He passed this information to Gerry Lidstrom, a member of St. Paul Lutheran and a junior high English teacher.
2001 Gerry Lidstrom becomes involved with the MWANGAZA program and is paired with Haran Ngede, headmaster at the Mtera Secondary School in Tanzania.
Spring 2001 Haran Ngede comes to Minnesota to work with Gerry Lidstrom for two months.
Summer 2001 Gerry Lidstrom goes to Tanzania to participate in seminars and training with Haran Ngede and MWANGAZA.
2001 St. Paul Lutheran joins the BEGA KWA BEGA program, a partnership between the St. Paul Area Synod and the Iringa Diocese in Tanzania. We are partnered with the Mtera congregation. The Tanzanian Task Force is formed to support and strengthen this relationship.
April 2004 Couban Letema comes as an exchange teacher through the MWANGAZA program.
February 2005 Pastor Beebe, Carole and Bill England and Fran Nordhausen travel to Tanzania and visit our companion congregation in Mtera, Mtera Secondary School and various ministries partnered with BEGA KWA BEGA.
Summer 2005 Vacation Bible School students raise $600 for bicycles for Mtera Evangelists.
September 2005 The Tanzanian Choir visits.
February 2007 Pastor Jeff and Melissa Beebe, Marcia and Kirby Smith and Dave and Fran Nordhausen travel to Tanzania. They assist in a food distribution at Izazi preaching point where there is famine due to drought and purchase and deliver bicycles for the evangelists using the funds our congregation sent in 2005 for this purpose.
September 2007 Bishop Mdegela and Provost Bangu visit our congregation.
October 2007 $5000 is sent to St. Paul Partners for drilling a well at the Chamsisili preaching point.
January 2008 Carole, Bill and Stephanie England, Michael and Allision Beebe, Stephanie and John Kennedy and Jenny Coozennoy traveled to Tanzania. In addition to visiting various ministries and preaching points, they worked at the Mtera Secondary School. Jenny stayed for three months.
May 2009 Pastor Jeff, Melissa and Allison Beebe and Dave and Fran Nordhausen visited Mtera and discussed plans for Pastor Lufyagila and two members to visit St. Paul Lutheran.
September 2009 Pastor Lufyagila visits St. Paul Lutheran
July 2010 Fran and Dave Nordhausen visited Mtera Parish and Secondary School while on a “Discovery Safari” with a group from an organization called Godparents for Tanzania.
2011 The name of the working group was changed from “The Tanzanian Task Force” to the “Global Ministry Team”.
May 2011 A sending service was held for our cluster leader, Rev. Tom Nielsen, before he left for Tanzania.
May 2012 Dr. Faires Ilomo, professor at Tumaini University and a visiting professor at Luther Seminary, was a guest preacher.
2013 Team members attended events and meetings sponsored by SPAS and BKB affiliates to reorganize the Bega Kwa Bega partnership under the new coordinator, Rev. Pater Harrits. A $500 annual commitment for three years was made to Radio Furaha for agricultural programing.
February 2014 Pr. Patterson, Kathie Marabella, Fran Nordhausen and Pr. Jan Mehlhoff headed to Tanzania to visit our partner’s congregation in Mtera and the students we support at Mtera Secondary School. With the help of Haran Ngede and his daughter, Judith, we purchased science textbooks and visited many of the BKB affiliates in and around Iringa.
2014 Working with H2O for Life and Wyoming Elementary School, we contributed approximately $3000 to St. Paul Partners Water Development Project for the upgrade of the water system at Mtera Secondary School.
2015 The congregation committed to a separate partnership with Migoli parish, formerly a preaching point of Mtera parish and now an independent parish. Jim and Betty Wolf presented a video of the celebration marking the completion of the water project at Mtera Secondary School at our annual Tanzanian Sunday service.
2016-2017-2018 It may appear that our small but mighty team has not accomplished much in the past three years. But contrary to what you may be thinking we have touched many souls, not only in the two partnership congregations we have in Tanzania, but even here right at home in St Paul Lutheran. The two congregations that we partner with are Migoli partnered in 2001 and Mtera which we added in 2015. St Paul Lutheran helps them both monetarily and our team helps them out with funds for some of their specialty needs. For instance, in 2018 we bought each congregation a "biki-biki", (more commonly known to us in Minnesota as motorbikes). Prior to having the biki-biki's the pastors would have to walk to their "outpost" preaching points. It would take a day to walk to the preaching point and an additional day to walk back to the home church. Now they can make the trip in one day! If you are wondering what Preaching Points are, they are small groups of Christians that live out and away from any villages or towns. African ministers from the larger congregations go out as missionaries to these small churches. Mtera was once a "Preaching point" of our partner congregation Migoli.
Our Global Missions Team also helped monetarily when a storm went through the Mtera region and damaged the roof of the school. The funds were used for supplies to repair the damages. We are also in the process of accumulating funds to help build a new church building in Mtera.
How do we get money to fund these endeavors?
Tanzanian Sunday. This special service is put together by the Global Missions Team in the Fall of each year to celebrate our union with "our churches" in Tanzania. We collect a special offering on that Sunday that goes directly to the Tanzanian Fund.
Creation Vacations. What is that, you ask? It is a time when local crafters" get together on a weekend to work on their crafts and enjoy each other's company. A lot of laughing, chatting and camaraderie goes on in the two days that our guests are together. Did we mention EATING? Our group provides all the meals, desserts, drinks and snacks for the Creation Vacation. Our crafters are treated royally and enjoy the time they have together. We've had as many as 40 guests and many of them are repeat customers.
2000 Pastor Beebe received information about MWANGAZA, an educational partnership program between the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and the Evangelical church in Tanzania. He passed this information to Gerry Lidstrom, a member of St. Paul Lutheran and a junior high English teacher.
2001 Gerry Lidstrom becomes involved with the MWANGAZA program and is paired with Haran Ngede, headmaster at the Mtera Secondary School in Tanzania.
Spring 2001 Haran Ngede comes to Minnesota to work with Gerry Lidstrom for two months.
Summer 2001 Gerry Lidstrom goes to Tanzania to participate in seminars and training with Haran Ngede and MWANGAZA.
2001 St. Paul Lutheran joins the BEGA KWA BEGA program, a partnership between the St. Paul Area Synod and the Iringa Diocese in Tanzania. We are partnered with the Mtera congregation. The Tanzanian Task Force is formed to support and strengthen this relationship.
April 2004 Couban Letema comes as an exchange teacher through the MWANGAZA program.
February 2005 Pastor Beebe, Carole and Bill England and Fran Nordhausen travel to Tanzania and visit our companion congregation in Mtera, Mtera Secondary School and various ministries partnered with BEGA KWA BEGA.
Summer 2005 Vacation Bible School students raise $600 for bicycles for Mtera Evangelists.
September 2005 The Tanzanian Choir visits.
February 2007 Pastor Jeff and Melissa Beebe, Marcia and Kirby Smith and Dave and Fran Nordhausen travel to Tanzania. They assist in a food distribution at Izazi preaching point where there is famine due to drought and purchase and deliver bicycles for the evangelists using the funds our congregation sent in 2005 for this purpose.
September 2007 Bishop Mdegela and Provost Bangu visit our congregation.
October 2007 $5000 is sent to St. Paul Partners for drilling a well at the Chamsisili preaching point.
January 2008 Carole, Bill and Stephanie England, Michael and Allision Beebe, Stephanie and John Kennedy and Jenny Coozennoy traveled to Tanzania. In addition to visiting various ministries and preaching points, they worked at the Mtera Secondary School. Jenny stayed for three months.
May 2009 Pastor Jeff, Melissa and Allison Beebe and Dave and Fran Nordhausen visited Mtera and discussed plans for Pastor Lufyagila and two members to visit St. Paul Lutheran.
September 2009 Pastor Lufyagila visits St. Paul Lutheran
July 2010 Fran and Dave Nordhausen visited Mtera Parish and Secondary School while on a “Discovery Safari” with a group from an organization called Godparents for Tanzania.
2011 The name of the working group was changed from “The Tanzanian Task Force” to the “Global Ministry Team”.
May 2011 A sending service was held for our cluster leader, Rev. Tom Nielsen, before he left for Tanzania.
May 2012 Dr. Faires Ilomo, professor at Tumaini University and a visiting professor at Luther Seminary, was a guest preacher.
2013 Team members attended events and meetings sponsored by SPAS and BKB affiliates to reorganize the Bega Kwa Bega partnership under the new coordinator, Rev. Pater Harrits. A $500 annual commitment for three years was made to Radio Furaha for agricultural programing.
February 2014 Pr. Patterson, Kathie Marabella, Fran Nordhausen and Pr. Jan Mehlhoff headed to Tanzania to visit our partner’s congregation in Mtera and the students we support at Mtera Secondary School. With the help of Haran Ngede and his daughter, Judith, we purchased science textbooks and visited many of the BKB affiliates in and around Iringa.
2014 Working with H2O for Life and Wyoming Elementary School, we contributed approximately $3000 to St. Paul Partners Water Development Project for the upgrade of the water system at Mtera Secondary School.
2015 The congregation committed to a separate partnership with Migoli parish, formerly a preaching point of Mtera parish and now an independent parish. Jim and Betty Wolf presented a video of the celebration marking the completion of the water project at Mtera Secondary School at our annual Tanzanian Sunday service.
2016-2017-2018 It may appear that our small but mighty team has not accomplished much in the past three years. But contrary to what you may be thinking we have touched many souls, not only in the two partnership congregations we have in Tanzania, but even here right at home in St Paul Lutheran. The two congregations that we partner with are Migoli partnered in 2001 and Mtera which we added in 2015. St Paul Lutheran helps them both monetarily and our team helps them out with funds for some of their specialty needs. For instance, in 2018 we bought each congregation a "biki-biki", (more commonly known to us in Minnesota as motorbikes). Prior to having the biki-biki's the pastors would have to walk to their "outpost" preaching points. It would take a day to walk to the preaching point and an additional day to walk back to the home church. Now they can make the trip in one day! If you are wondering what Preaching Points are, they are small groups of Christians that live out and away from any villages or towns. African ministers from the larger congregations go out as missionaries to these small churches. Mtera was once a "Preaching point" of our partner congregation Migoli.
Our Global Missions Team also helped monetarily when a storm went through the Mtera region and damaged the roof of the school. The funds were used for supplies to repair the damages. We are also in the process of accumulating funds to help build a new church building in Mtera.
How do we get money to fund these endeavors?
Tanzanian Sunday. This special service is put together by the Global Missions Team in the Fall of each year to celebrate our union with "our churches" in Tanzania. We collect a special offering on that Sunday that goes directly to the Tanzanian Fund.
Creation Vacations. What is that, you ask? It is a time when local crafters" get together on a weekend to work on their crafts and enjoy each other's company. A lot of laughing, chatting and camaraderie goes on in the two days that our guests are together. Did we mention EATING? Our group provides all the meals, desserts, drinks and snacks for the Creation Vacation. Our crafters are treated royally and enjoy the time they have together. We've had as many as 40 guests and many of them are repeat customers.
