It’s hard to believe that we are already halfway through the year. This past month has been a very exciting and busy month for us all here at Kazima. It was a great joy and privilege to welcome Trevor and Karen Gillan along with Rachel and James, who spent three exciting and eventful weeks with us here at Kazima. We were richly blessed during their visit, and we trust that they were also greatly blessed as they served the Lord here. Trevor was able to help John with many of the tasks, including, fixing lots of bicycles, and working on the new replacement building putting in over 800 meters of cable with the help of Craig Waldock, who is a qualified electrician. We were also able to harvest honey from our hives and move a swarm of bees from the storeroom at the farm. We were delighted with the fantastic amount of 54kgs of honey harvested. We hired 2 past students from the bee college in Tabora, which was a great asset. The next harvest is due in December. Karen was able to help Pauline in all the daily duties, which can run into the evenings. This included first aid, an exercise routine with baby Jacqueline and ‘tucking in’ and praying with the children at bedtime. Karen also did a medical check on all the staff, resulting in two being referred to hospital due to severe high blood pressure. She was also able to have a ‘women’s health’ discussion. James and Rachel managed to improve the staff payroll Excel spreadsheet to make the salaries easier and quicker for John. They all also put a coat of primer paint on the fresh walls of the new building, helped extract the honey from the honeycomb and assisted with homework’s. They organised a holiday Bible club which was spread over 5 days. The children just took it all in. In one of the meetings a question was asked, “who was saved?”. Saidi told Karen that he was. This was quite a surprise to all and was questioned over the following days to find out when and where it had happened. He said that he had got saved the “last Sunday”, but in Swahili last Sunday could have been several Sundays ago. He then went on to say that he had accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as his saviour in church. He was very clear about it. The following Sunday John asked Pastor Jerry if Saidi had got saved and he said he did. Jerry didn’t want to say anything to us as he wanted Saidi to tell us. We praise the Lord for this, and it was a real encouragement to hear him say his memory verses in English at the holiday Bible club. Trevor also led the morning devotions for the staff and the little ones, with John translating.  One morning after devotions was over, Peter aged 5 came to John and asked, ‘Babu can I read your Bible’? John randomly opened his Swahili Bible and Peter began to read. We were totally amazed at his ability to read so well. Then a day or two later he again came to John and wanted to read again. John said, “why don’t we get you a Bible of your own so that you can read it whenever you want”? He was just thrilled to bits and news soon spread that Babu was going to buy Peter a Bible on Wednesday. We bought 3 new testaments in Swahili, Peter received one along with Andrew and Samuel who are also able to read very well. We now have to get a few others for the two girls that are the same age and are also able to read. We just praise the Lord for the work that our teacher Agnes puts in, teaching the children to read at this early age. May our prayers soon be answered in seeing others putting their trust in the Lord. An amazing month!

        This month’s group photo is of David 3yrs 10mths, Bless 2 yrs and Anna 3 yrs, both July birthdays.

This month we also want to start listing some prayer requests. We have just recently had our AGM which is always an opportunity to look back and realise how God is answering our prayers. We would value your prayers for personnel in key locations, and in other areas of the work here in Tanzania. Our God is able. We are grateful to you for your continual prayers and financial giving for the work of the Lord. Love in Christ, John & Pauline