Like the widow knocking, Tanzanian team hopes for return

By Tohru Inoue | Tanzania in East Africa

Stock from Unsplash by Jack Sharp.

Since December 2019, SIM’s Tanzania team has been longing to serve again in the place God has called them. They have prayed and waited … and prayed and waited … and prayed and waited. The lapse of time has ground away at their initial confidence that they would be returning to the country soon.

Tanzania is a beautiful place to minister in. The weather is temperate for most of the year. It is quite visitor friendly; the sand beaches of Zanzibar, snow-capped peaks of Mount Kilimanjaro and plains of the Serengeti where the wildebeest migrate are all very inviting. The test of faith for SIM workers comes from the long-postponed return to the country and its communities.

Month after month they have persevered in prayer alongside supporters for the same thing: a breakthrough that will allow them into the country.

It takes a certain toughness to keep praying the same old prayer. Like the widow in Jesus’ parable knocking on the judge’s door, yelling, “I know you’re in there! I’m not leaving!”

And the team keeps knocking on God’s door because the work is not yet done in Tanzania. The good news has not yet made inroads along the coastal regions. There are many places where there is no significant witness of Jesus. So, the team prays for the doors to be opened.

With the same breath, they pray for their Tanzanian friends. They pray for the churches where they’ve worshipped to spring into areas where there is no witness of Him. They pray for the mothers’ groups they’ve worked with to keep leaning into God. They pray for Tanzanians to take the good news into communities where He’s least known. Even from afar, as the team anticipates rejoining the work, they pray for the Spirit to rush through the open windows and fill thousands of upper rooms where his people are gathered.

Maybe the Tanzania team have to wait today and even wait for our entire generation. But even in the waiting, with eyes of faith, they trust the doors will not be closed forever. They will open again someday. So, they keep knocking.

There is a widow’s hope that the door will be opened to people from all the nations to come and preach the good news in Tanzania.

Like the widow, they’re not quite deterred yet. Because they know there is someone home. And they know He can hear them. If you feel the same way, would you knock on the door for them too?

Pray

- For our team to be able to return to Tanzania soon.

- For Tanzanian followers of Christ to continue testifying joyfully to the risen Christ.  

SIM Asset Publisher Portlet

Agrégateur de contenus

SIM Asset Publisher Portlet

Agrégateur de contenus

Related stories

Phil Bauman est le nouveau directeur international du SIM

Phil Bauman prendra la relève en tant que directeur international de SIM lorsque Joshua Bogunjoko quittera ses fonctions à la fin du mois de février 2024. Nous attendons avec confiance et foi ce que Dieu fera avec le SIM à travers le leadership de Phil dans les années à venir.

Gospel bears fruit in hard-to-reach places

SIM writer Lee Forland shares the joy of seeing how the good news is spreading and bearing fruit among the Yao people in the hard-to-reach rural areas of eastern Malawi.

How did he make you feel?

SIM Kenya director Dr. Peter Okaalet sadly passed away last year, having made a significant impact in the field of HIV/AIDS medicine, as well as in the lives of the people around him. SIM stories writer Tohru Inoue remembers his personal experience of the man behind the medic.

Bathtub baptism brings joy in North Africa

More than a year after stepping into a SIM woker's local church just to find out what it looked like inside, a woman in North Africa comes to faith and is baptised.