We are happy to announce that Steven Hendrix has joined Blessed2BlessU Ministries, Inc. as a full-time missionary engineer at the Tumaini Evangelistic Pre & Primary English Medium School in Kiruani, Tanzania in 2017. Steve comes to us from Greenville, SC where he is a member of Mauldin United Methodist Church. While Steve has served his church as a youth ministries leader, Methodist Men’s Fellowship President and Outreach/Missions Chair; his is best known for starting their foreign mission teams which have now served Tanzania and Peru for over 15 years. In addition to his work with the church, he was the principal engineer in charge of civil and environmental projects at Hendrix Consulting Engineers, Inc. for 15 years.
Some of the engineering projects Steve is most proud of are those he managed on short term mission trips. Projects like the 100,000-liter rainwater harvesting system built over 20 years ago in Tanzania and a bridge built in the high jungles of Peru using nothing but scrap wood in just a week.
For 3 ½ years he served as a missionary engineer in a remote area of the Singida region of Tanzania. In that role, he lived on the site where he had been on several short-term mission projects dating back to 2001. That first trip over to Yulansoni, Tanzania was to complete a medical clinic and design a rainwater harvesting system.
During his time there, Steve worked with the community on rainwater harvesting projects, solar power projects, coordinating mission teams, working with the pre-school and teaching vocational classes. The work provided him many opportunities to come up with creative engineering solutions to everyday problems without the wealth of modern world tools.
Steve, who is friend of Frank DeVita, first visited our site in March of 2017 to offer advice from the perspective of an American who has lived in Tanzania for several years. One of the biggest challenges facing a project between two cultures is not just the language but how we do things. These cultural misunderstandings are often much bigger than anything Google Translate can fix. Having someone on the ground, living a life like the folks we are working with can help to bridge those misunderstandings.
A fortunate series of events lead to his now being able to work with our ministry full time. He lives at the site with our teaching staff and assisting with school operations as well as working with the contractors to complete the school buildings. He is excited that this site will have running water in the house he will use so he does not have to walk 10 minutes for the bathroom.
In addition to finding creative solutions to problems, Steve likes to write (both a blog and fictional stories), crochet, weld, woodworking, upcycling, hike, photography and reading. He also likes to travel with his best friend, Barnabas Bear who started out as part of his church’s crochet ministry and became the first mission bear. Barnabas has his own Facebook page and occasionally “writes” blogs about his conversations with the kids of Tanzania. Barnabas’ biggest contribution to the school has been to start the “Reading with Barnabas” program to encourage the students to read.
If you would like to find out more about Steve a feel free to check out his blog or other social media platforms:
Facebook: Steven B. Hendrix
Twitter: @steveintanzania
Email: steveintanzania@gmail.com
Blog: https://steveandbarnabas.com/
