“We prepare now for the two-day journey home,” wrote the Rev. Dawn Elizabeth Taylor-Storm in a Facebook post from Tanzania on Monday. “What a joy it has been to experience revival and to learn and grow with our friends in Tanzania.”
The Rev. Dawn Elizabeth Taylor-Storm with children at the Bamia UM church in Tanzania.
Indeed, her seven-member team from the Greater New Jersey Conference will return home today, weary but wiser perhaps, and no doubt deeply inspired by their journey of friendship and faith.
Taylor-Storm serves EPA&GNJ as Assistant to the Bishop for Leadership Development and also serves the Eastern PA Conference as Connectional Ministries Director. “This year, in addition to the Pastors School, we expanded teaching and prepared curriculum in Swahili for children and youth,” she wrote. “Thank you, EPA&GNJ, for your commitment to partnerships locally and globally.”
GNJ clergywomen join United Methodist women pastors serving in Tanzania in a group photo.
Taylor-Storm posted photos of the new United Methodist church in the Bamia community of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania’s largest city. “From vision to reality!” she wrote. “A new church is planted in Tanzania, built literally by hand and through your (GNJ) sacrificial giving. To God be the glory!”
The Rev. Dawn Taylor-Storm (right) with Yunisi (Eunice) Kulanga, who became Tanzania’s first UM woman pastor in 2007.
In addition, she shared photos of women serving as United Methodist pastors in Tanzania and of Yunisi (Eunice) Kulanga, who became the first woman pastor in 2007. “Thanks be to God!”
We expect to gather and publish many more photos and comments from GNJ team members after they return from Tanzania, full of stories to share about the great work of mission outreach and nurture God is doing in Tanzania with our help.
Also read “GNJ-Tanzania UM friendship grows with funding for new church and pastors.”