And I say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.

Luke 11:9

We trust you have had a wonderful Christmas, especially remembering how our precious Saviour came to pour out his love! As we reflect on the past year we can celebrate in all that God has done. We want to say thank you for all your support via prayers and giving in 2019 both to TCFDT and to ourselves, We commence this new year in anticipation to see what God has in store and fully trust Him to meet every need.

Thank you for your prayers for Pauline as she traveled back on the 17^th December. Her flights went well and the connections were all on time. She had a surprise welcome party at Tabora Airport.

It’s hard to believe that the Christmas season is over for another year. This has been a particularly busy time for us here at the children’s home. It started on the 21^st with our annual Christmas dinner for the staff and children. We had a meal which consisted of rice, pilau, beef, beans, kachumbari and cabbage with an optional pili pili mbuzi sauce (hot pepper sauce), soft drinks and ice cream to finish. After the meal the older children performed a nativity play including carols for all to join in. On Christmas morning we had planned to take most of the children and staff to the joint Christmas morning service at the Ipuli church. John tried to get to the church the previous day to see how the road was and failed to get even within reasonable walking distance. So, we made the decision to have our own little service here. We sang carols and pondered on Luke Ch. 2 verses 10 and 11, for who Christ came into the world for. We had something special for dinner on Christmas day – Chicken and Chips. You may think that they’re nothing special! For our children here it is, as most of them have never had this combination before. It went down a treat. John cooked 10 kg of chicken and 10kg of chips, carrots and spinach to feed us all. We also had fizzy drinks and ice cream to finish. At 1.30pm our time via live Skype we joined our church service in Northern Ireland and our children sang ‘Hark the Herald Angels sing’ in Swahili.

Please pray for school commencing on the 6^th January. It has been so busy with all the preparations. Twelve children will be in private schooling this next school year. This involves the purchase of 2 sets of uniforms each, track suits, pencils, crayons, exercise books (approx 160), diaries, text books, etc.

We asked for you to pray for Esther. She is due to go for an assessment on the 9^th January and then the way forward will be discussed regarding the options available here in Tabora.