Happy 2011!

We hope you had an enjoyable Christmas. Katy and I have spent the last month travelling around the country and spending good times with family and friends for our last Christmas before heading out to Tanzania (God willing).

Katy Cold Christmas Market Stall

Katy was back at her market stall in Greenwich in the run-up to Christmas and stood for many hours in the freezing cold enduring repetitive Christmas muzak. The snow disrupted what should have been the busiest shopping weekend of the year, but fortunately she didn’t make quite the losses of her competitors John Lewis and Selfridges.  If you are looking to decorate soon, we can give you a good deal on the website price list! Email: Katy@kjray.co.uk

Katy was un-able to join me on our visit to St James Hill, Sutton Coldfield as she had the coughing cold that seems to be going around. Nevertheless, I was given a warm welcome by folk at the church and was encouraged by the friendly conversations over our Neema Crafts stall.

Off sledging in Bradgate Park

This was the first year Katy and I have attempted to cook a family Christmas lunch. After 30+ years of  spending Christmas day in the kitchen we offered my Mum a well earned break. I couldn’t believe quite how much preparation and planning was involved. Fortunately, Katy took care of most of this. I was just careful to obey orders and offer a hand when the enormous turkey needed hoisting out of the oven – it had one of those pop-up timer things embedded in it which helped to ensure no one was poisoned. On reflection, Christmas day isn’t much of a holiday when you’re cooking and I think I’ll give it another 30 years before attempting it again.

Having celebrated Christmas Eve with my family, we headed up the motorway to Katy’s parents in Leicestershire. We were just in time to join John Woolmer (Katy’s Dad) give the midnight communion at the local parish church. I rubbed my inward hands with glee as I saw a few visitors wander in from the pub, quite unaware of the mind-blowing testimonies of angelic visitation and Christian conversion that would be shared later. John referred to his book ‘Encounters’ during a gospel-loaded sermon and we were pleased to see that all of the free copies of this book were taken at the end of the service.

It was so special for us to have a white Chistmas before we head out to Africa. We were able to go tobogganing twice on Christmas day in Bradgate Park. We were all shocked when my Mother-in-law Jane consistently overtook us on every hill….see video for evidence… she’s cutting the straight path down the middle! 

We spent New Year’s Eve with our close friends Pete and Amy who run Pulse Ministries – an organisation that runs childrens’ holiday clubs and events for training and youth and children’s leaders. See http://www.pulseministries.org.uk if your church might be interested,

Since then we have continued to travel across the country visiting friends and family. I have picked up two large boxes of tools in recent weeks that will be greatly appreciated at the Neema Crafts workshop. If you happen to know anyone else who is clearing their workshop we are looking for woodworking tools, specifically: chisels, hand-planes, marking gauges, tenon or dovetail saws and metal rulers. It would also be great to find a wood lathe!

We are now back at All Nations and I have already been persuaded to start training for a half-marathon... I don't know if Katy's committing yet, but watch this space to see which we do! 

December Prayer Update

Finishing Enroute

This Saturday Katy and I bid farewell to ten other members of our enroute course, who are all now heading off to their various places of calling, from Argentina to Ethiopia! We became very close to these guys over the last month and it was sad to see them go.

Katy was not so sad to say goodbye to the moustache I had been nurturing during the month of ‘Movember’ - I can't think why! 

Christmas Market

We have been running Katy’s stall again down in a wintry Greenwich Market this week. It's been a great place to spot Christmas presents when business is slow. 

Link Visits

Veteran Cars outside Immanuel, Streatham

Last month we enjoyed our visits to two of our link churches Immanuel, Streatham and St Mary’s, Charnwood. We had a slow but entertaining journey through London on our way to Immanuel as we were caught up in the London to Brighton veteran car run. Despite an average speed of four miles an hour we were pulled over by the police on suspision of having stolen our car – it must have been the extra facial hair!

Neema on Vimeo

The Neema Crafts Centre

While back in the UK for their furlough, Andy and Susie Hart have been working tirelessly to raise the support they need for a new guesthouse at Neema Crafts. When they arrived back in September their target was £50K, they are now only £5K off this figure (PTL!). The guesthouse should encourage much-needed tourists through the centre.

It is well worth viewing the latest short videos about Neema Crafts on the Vimeo website: http://vimeo.com/15281476

If the link doesn’t work search for ‘Neema Crafts’ on www.vimeo.com

Prayer and Praise:

• Praise God for our tutors on the en route course who have supported us so well and for all of the top quality teaching we have received over the last 10 weeks
•  Praise God for helping Andy and Susie to raise money for the guesthouse.
•  Thank God for all the woodworking tools people have been generously passing on to us for the new workshop – pray this continues!

• Pray for all those heading out to their mission fields after Christmas, that they would be protected and sustained in their work.
• Pray for Andy and Susie Hart as they prepare to head back to Neema in January. 
• Pray we choose the right courses to study in our second term at ANCC.

Thank you for taking the time to pray for us and the work of Neema, you are a vital member of the team.

Love Ben and Katy X

Kirby Muxloe

This Sunday we really enjoyed our visit to St Andrew's church of the Kirby Muxloe Benefice. A friendlier congregation would be hard to find.

Speaking from the Anglican Lectionary was a new experience for me, but fortunately it was Ephesians 1 for All Saints Day which happens to be a favourite passage of mine. There were three ordained ministers on hand in case I slipped into heresy though.

Through a contact we made at Kirby Muxloe we hope to link up with 'Tools for Self Reliance' which is an organisation that collects old tools, repairs them and then sends them to developing world countries. However, if you happen to have any old chisels, planes or tenon saws that you don't mind sending on to Neema do let me know...the older they are the better.

Movember

All over campus this month men are disgruntling their wives by growing moustaches to raise money to fight prostate cancer. The annual event is called 'Movember' and has as one of its slogans 'every man deserves a little luxury' (see: http://www.uk.movember.com/). This is to appologise for any extra facial hair if we are visiting your church over the next few weeks.

 

Be still and know...  (from Katy)

Every term each pupil and staff member at All Nations College keeps the tradition of Week 5 ‘Quiet Day’. It’s just as you might expect, all the students are asked to keep this day in silence as a time for reflection prayer and Bible Study. All lessons, activities and duties are stopped for 24hrs, where even spouses are encouraged not to talk to one another. As you can imagine, some people find it harder than others!

As a ‘reflector’ on one of our latest personality type tests I embraced the day and loved the stillness and harmony of the campus. Just for a brief moment, all busyness and hurry stopped, as we took time to seek God. I just hope we are able to keep this important discipline once we have left All Nations.

Scarecut

The ultimate test of faith in one's marriage is to allow your spouse to cut your hair. As there will be few hairdressers trained in cutting 'wazungu' hair in Tanzania we are having a couple of practical lessons. This week it fell to me to give Katy's barnet a trim. After a brief demonstration from an experienced hairdresser, I was let us loose with the clippers.

While other couples around us got on with combing and cutting in quiet harmony, Katy was less assured of my capabilities as a coiffure. An hour of intense concentration followed, and not a small amount of front-seat driving, but I think you'll agree the style I have named the 'asymmetric bob' quite suits Katy.

Next week Katy gets her own back...

October Prayer Update

Dear All,

Please would you remember us in your prayers for the following:

All Nations CC, Easneye

• Praise God for All Nations Christian College.  We have really appreciated the committed staff members, all the other students and the 'En Route' course we are studying on in this first term. Please pray for extra strength for all of the mission partners in training here as they make such big transitions in their lives. 

• Thank God for the hard work and vision of Susie Hart - the founder of Neema Crafts. Susie recently won a 'Women of the Year' award (see http://mission.typepad.com/) . Please do pray too that this can raise lots of awareness for the project in the future.

• Pray we can raise enough support to go.  We are now at just about 2/3rds of our target figure, but without evidence of support we won't be going. So pray that more individuals can start to get a vision for being involved with what we are doing. See Links, 'Partner with us'

• Pray for courage, boldness and faith as we look to the future of Neema. In my old home church in Blackheath, someone reminded me recently of Joshua 1:9: "Be strong and of good courage; be not frightened, neither be dismayed; for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go." A command given to Joshua, but an encouragement to us as we look to trust God more. 

• Pray that God can provide us with the right team of support in Tanzania and the UK. In September a new Bishop of Ruaha - Joseph Mgomi was instated. Please pray that he has a vision for the future of Neema as his predecessor did; his support will be vital. We are also putting together a panel of advisors from the UK, who may later make up part of the Neema Crafts UK trusteeship. Please pray for discernment in asking the right people for this and that those who take it up can have the time to commit to the project. 

• Pray that we can use our time at All Nations as fully as possible. As you may have guessed, Katy and I are really enjoying our time here at All Nations. Someone compared the En Route course we are doing to the 110m hurdles, because there is so much to cover in a short space of time. Please pray that we can read the most useful books and give time to reflect on things that will be most appropriate to our time in Tanzania, as well as have the energy to keep going!  

Thank you for taking the time to read through this. Your prayers are greatly appreciated.

Love Ben and Katy XXX 

Neema founder wins women of the year award

Click on the following website to hear Susie Hart, winner of the this year's 'Women of the Year' award talk about the work of Neema Crafts.

http://mission.typepad.com/

What is Mission?

J John said, ‘A missionary is not someone who crosses the seas, but someone who sees the cross.’

This week En Route has got us thinking about the nature of mission and reminded us of its centrality to the Christian faith.  We have looked at the commissioning of the disciples in all four Gospels, and at Jesus’ perfect model for mission. One of the most encouraging aspects of the week were ‘The Bible’s Big Story’ in which were reminded of the big picture of the Bible and God’s overarching plan for brining hope to the world, first through Israel and ultimately through Christ.

It has been fascinating too to find out about the ‘majority church’ and to reflect on how the huge expansion of Christianity in Sub-Saharan Africa and China will influence faith and mission in years to come.

A Barnabus in Homerton

St Barnabus , Homerton

This Sunday Katy and I enjoyed our first visit to St Barnabus, Homerton. We were close to not finding it on time as we’d lost all our directions and our sat nav had packed-up a week before.  After some ‘laying on of hands' prayer the sat nav was miraculously healed and another congregation was able to hear about (and smell) the wonders of ele-poo paper!

This church visit was particularly special for me as their curate, Naomi Nguruvi had been a good friend and encouragement to me during my time in Tanzania in 2004.  It was fascinating and helpful to hear about her cross-cultural journey from Tanzania to England and how she was lead into becoming ordained, something that is still impossible in her own country.