Breanna’s Graduation Announcement

Dear Friends and Family,

We are sending out a few of Breanna’s graduation announcements through the mail, but I want to make sure that all of our friends, family, prayers, and supporters get a copy. So I’m attaching the graduation announcement and three pictures to this message.

Thank you for celebrating Breanna’s graduation with us!

Debby Thomas

New Everything

New everything: Since our last newsletter our lives have changed drastically!

New home: we live in Newberg, Oregon in a beautiful house that we enjoy very much. The school playground is right out our back gate so the kids can go for a run and play as often as they want (that is when the rain in Oregon lets up for a while).

Kids: we asked many of you to pray for our kids during this time as they adjust to a new home, new culture, new foods, and especially a new school and new friends. It has been quite a process for them, but they are all doing well. Some days they come home so tired from school they can hardly sit up, just all the figuring out what to do and what to say and who to sit with makes them tired. Sometimes they are outright thrilled because they made a new friend, or aced a test. It has definitely been a valuable cultural experience for them all.

Health: We have been spending a fair amount of time in Dr’s offices since we’ve been back. There have been a number of things accumulating that need a doctor’s attention in the last year or so and we’re so thankful that we have found doctors who are helping us. Aren was diagnosed with gluten (wheat) intolerance, and we are all being tested for it now. We are all on a gluten free diet, which has been a challenge, but we’re getting the hang of it now. Debby has been struggling with various health problems for the last year. We now feel that we are getting to the bottom of it all. It is estimated that it will still take her another nine months to a year to fully regain her strength and energy.

Church: Newberg Friends Church has graciously allowed us to be a part of their family for the last months. Even though Dave and I have done some traveling to Ohio, Phoenix, etc, we are happy to have a church home that we can be a part of. They have been extremely supportive and loving.

David just finished his masters degree that he’s been working on for 10 years! We are thankful for all he learned, and thankful that he’s done.

Starting in January we will be spending the bulk of our time in fundraising efforts. We are presently at 45% of our needed funding.

God is taking care of our every need, and we are thankful to be his beloved children.

Debby

December 2009

Is it December already? It’s hard to remember that its December when its warm and sunny outside and everything is growing like gangbusters.

It has been a busy time and lots of things have been going on.

We had a blessed Yearly Meeting with about 150 delegates from churches attending. Lon Fendal taught on listening to God’s voice in the decision making process. We had a number of tough decisions to make and the clerk stopped a number of times to just listen to God in prayer. After a time of listening there were new ideas, and the decisions flowed smoothly. We sensed God leading us during this time.

Dave and Brad made a Disipling for Development Film featuring lives that are changing in the Cyangugu district. Its an hour long (and in Kinyarwanda). We showed it one evening at Yearly Meeting and had some very positive responses from the delegates there. Many were amazed at the progress people with making in their lives even though we weren’t giving them money or project. It’s a moving film and we hope to subtitle it into English.

We are making slow buy steady progress on Ubuzima Moringa. The month of November we had the Food Health Commission come check out the Moringa. We are still waiting for the report, hoping for good news and a green light to start selling where ever we want to. We are also waiting on permission to build. Apparently there is a freeze on building in the area where we are located. We are presently appealing to the Mayor for an exception. We aren’t sure how long that might take.

Today I met with a Christian Business man who helps start businesses in Rwanda. I was encouraged as he feels he can help me connect with some people who can help me think through the next steps with the business.

Another thing we are working on these days is finding someone full time who can carry on with D for D and Ubuzima Moringa when we go on furlough next August. Pray with us that we find the right person and that the right person will be willing to lay aside other work to work for us.

Here is a picture of the Moringa field and the new fresh water well that we have on our property and share with the community. This well should have cost us $16,000 USD but instead, we ended up getting it for free. Isn't that cool?

Moringa Field--Chelsea Carpenter

Here is an update on the Moringa business from Chelsea Carpenter:

Ubuzima Moringa is a business that Debby Thomas started as a way to minister life and show God’s love to Rwandans. The business will enable them to buy moringa at a cheap price which will help them very much nutritionally. The business also has a vision to be Christ’s light in the communities in which it works , through relationships with farmers, workers, salespeople etc!

Ubuzima Moringa is growing its moringa trees right outside the city of Kigali in a low-lying swampy area. Moringa leaves need to be washed with water once they’re harvested but dirty, slimy, swamp water would have had to do the job since wells are very expensive to dig, about $15,000 at the least. Debby inquired into having a well dug on their property, but the business did not have the necessary funds.

One organization that Debby had contacted had problems with some equipment and had to have a foreign team come to repair it. Once it was repaired, they needed a place to test the equipment, but it couldn’t be on one of their contracted sites. Out of all the possible places, they thought of Ubuzima Moringa and of the well that they wanted at their field! Having a well dug to test the equipment would cost exactly nothing.

As I was finishing my lunch with the school kids the other day at the Thomas house, Debby announced that the well-diggers were at the moringa field about to start digging…and would we like to go watch? This invitation included all the students as well, once the parents were asked, and since the digging would start any minute, we had to hurry and get everyone packed into the vehicles and onto the road.

We had barely started our twenty-minute drive, however, when the timing belt broke on the Thomas’s land cruiser and Dave had to pull over. Our car went back to get another car so we could still all go see the digging, but then realized we were almost out of gas so stopped on the way. We finally all got to the field, having found enough vehicles and drivers, and got to see the magical well-drilling machine and workmen.

There is no way I could explain the mechanics of it all, I just knew that when we got there, a hole was already in the ground and a few people from the community were watching the whole process. We gladly joined them. When we reluctantly turned around to leave, the workers started digging again! This was the exciting part, the loud noise, the spinning drill, the dirt flying up out of the hole (and the poor operator getting covered with it). I saw a child holding two jerry-cans (water containers) and thought of the blessings that this water would bring - not only to help provide moringa, but also as a water source for the whole community around the field.

Discipling For Development Seminar

Last week we had all of the currently active community voulenteers (24 in all) come to a three day seminar in Kiagli. It was encouraging to hear the storeis of change in the communities. We also noticed that their world view has gone through some major changes since we first started teaching them a year and a half ago.

The lessons were fun! We used a lot of discussions, pictures, small groups, etc. so that the participants were actively involved in the learning experience.

We are moving into the stage of teaching lessons about the topics that the communities identify as their biggest problems, the things that keep them from moving out of poverty. Its a big step for all of us, we are moving into unknown ground. But there is a sense of hope and expectation among them.

The communities so far have identified animal husbandry, farming methods, health issues (especially malaria, worms, diarrhea, and dirty drinking water) as major issues they want to be trained in.

Pray with us as we start this new phase in our communities. We trust in God's transforming power to be working in and through each of us.

Thank you for your prayers!

An excerpt from Molly about Moringa

Molly is one of our new teachers. Here are her reflections on going to the Moringa field:

A few days ago I went to Debby Thomas’ moringa field. Debby is one of the main Friends missionaries here. In January she started a business with a plant called a moringa. Moringa trees have a huge amount of nutritional value and are really easy to grow here in Rwanda. Debby has bought a few acres of land and has started planting. She has hired several Rwandans to work for her. The business has many purposes, but Debby’s model
is to do business as missions. She is hoping that her interactions with the local community and the impact of this nutritional plant will bring God glory, bring nutrition into more Africans’ diets, and bring people to the Lord.

Going to her field was really neat. She has worked really hard and learned a ton. I enjoyed getting to see all of the different ways to farm moringa, and the view of the valley was an added pleasant surprise. Alandra, Gwen, and Aren kept all of the neighborhood kids and us entertained. Those kids thought we were the best things they had seen in awhile. They all stood on the edge of the field and just watched us walk about. I think it was because of the girls’ really fair hair and skin, as well as the Thomas family dog Kenzie. Rwandans tend to be really afraid of dogs! The idea of having them as pets is crazy to them.

Love, Molly

Our Summer

We have been having a fun and busy summer. Dave spent two weeks in Congo and Burundi with the Saltshaker team. The kids have been having daily language lessons and occasional tennis and swimming.

We just returned from a 10 day missionary retreat at Kumbya. Dave was leading it this year, we had 100 missionaries from Burundi and Rwanda. It was a really good time for all of us, good worship, good teaching and good times of fun and rest. Dave and I had less rest since he was leading the retreat, and I'm leading the effort of ongoing development of the Kumbya property. In any case, it was the highlight of the kids summer, as usual.

In just two days we are headed of to Uganda for a time of vacation. We haven't gone there for vacation in about 9 years. We are going to climb a mountain, camp, stay on an island, do a family river rafting, and spend some time with David's cousin Karina, her new husband Andy, and their new baby boy David. We are looking forward to getting away from the normal hustle of life in Kigali!

So...we'll be back in two weeks, getting ready for Breanna to go back to boarding school, and our other three to start their school too.