Steve and Barnabas in Tanzania

I have another confession to make:  I have never read the Bible starting with Genesis 1:1 and reading in order until Revelation 22:21.  I have participated in Disciples I and II, I have participated/lead Bible studies on just about every book of the Bible and I am positive I have read from every book doing the reading tracts that come with most new Bibles.  But to say I read it all from beginning to end and in order-NO I have not.   When I laid out my spiritual preparation for becoming a missionary, and sought the council of my minister, Rev. Kanipe. I really looked at a lot of great Christian texts on being a missionary, the history of missionary work, the changes over time.  There were two books I had the privileged of reading before I started the latest leg of my journey.  One, Rev. Yon, gave me a copy of when he went to Seminary called Cross Cultural Servanthood .  The second was one through a Bible Study lead by a friend called When Helping Hurts .  When I was accepted to United

Before I get started on this week's blog entry, let me thank everyone who helped make the first Barnabas Bear Newsletter a huge success.  I am hearing stories of a Chick-Fil-A in New York that printed the newsletter at their cost and gave it to customers purchasing a kid's meal.  Another story from California is a church kindergarten that sent printed copies home with all the kids.  Thanks to all the folks who sent encouraging words concerning the newsletter.  We will continue to do them and I will look at doing them more frequently if we continue to get such great feedback.  Those events happened because you, my friends, shared the newsletter with others and shared it with others, but it started with you. Now to this week's blog.  Yes Communication and Banking do go hand in hand here in Tanzania.  You see while there are real banks here, they charge for everything.  The reason is that unlike more developed countries, where people get loans for everything, it is difficult

This one is going to be very different.  Because Blogger will not allow me to post a PDF file, I had to do this kind of weird.  So Barnabas' newsletter is on Facebook in two image files.  I am posting the main article here but if you would like the count in Kiswahili, games and other fun items you will need to follow the link to download the two images.  The answer to the crossword puzzle is also there in image file and I have given a link below. Page 1 of Newsletter Page 2 of Newsletter Answers to Crossword Puzzle A Kid's Life in Tanzania-School Since I spend more of my time with the kids in Tanzania than I do with adults, I thought it would be good to tell you a little about what their life is like.   Let’s start with school.   Pre-Primary is similar to kindergarten and is for children 5-6 years of age and normally lasts 2 years.   However it is normal in rural (outside the city) areas for there to be no pre-primary type school and if there is it normally is

As I am two days late with this blog and part of that is due to falling sick to some very small sardine like fish in a soup that was absolutely no fun while traveling from Yulansoni to Singida and then a day later to Arusha, I am not doing a normal blog but instead a couple of small items I thought were interesting.  Please feel free to comment if you run into similar situations. First a note about traveling while having a stomach problem-they don't stop for bathroom breaks or at least nothing that would help.  It used to be they stopped at a midway point for a significant amount of time but since they finished paving the roads they no longer do that on the 6 hour trip to Arusha.  They did make one very quick stop-not nearly long enough for me to risk getting off the bus for.  The second travel day while not pleasant was much better than the first that was at the height of my problems. Speaking of traveling on buses:  It was interesting that a policewoman came on the bus and ma