Tanzania: Mikumi National Park & Lake Tanganyika
In April 2026, Kerry and I had the privilege of traveling to Tanzania to teach at the Hope of the Nations Bible School and Primary School. While I taught Bible School students about the Days of the Creation Week, Kerry was working with the Primary School teachers and Kids Club leaders. We both fell in love with the people of Tanzania. It was amazing to see how God is working through His faithful servants and allowing their hope in Jesus Christ to permeate through them and into their communities.
I know, this testimony series is supposed to be featuring national parks and how I see God's testimony in them. But I saw evidences for the validity of God's Word in Africa as well. So safari (Swahili for "journey") with me to Tanzania to see what evidences we can find in Africa.
"Let all the world look to Me for salvation! For I am God; there is no other. I have sworn by My own name; I have spoken the truth, and I will never go back on My word: Every knee will bend to Me, and every tongue will declare allegiance to Me." Isaiah 45:22-23 NLT
Testimony #1: The East Africa Rift
The continent of Africa is a place of incredible geologic diversity. From the towering 5,895-meter (19,341 ft.) high Mount Kilimanjaro to the Danakil Desert that is as low as 155 meters (509 feet) below sea level, the continent touches the Atlantic and Indian oceans, and the Mediterranean, Red, and Arabian Seas. The continent also contains the longest river in the world (the Nile River at 6,650 kilometers (4,132 miles)) and three of the ten largest lakes in the world (Lakes Victoria, Tanganyika, and Malawi). The terrain is equally diverse. There is the 9.4-million square kilometer (3.6-million square mile) Sahara Desert in the north part of the continent, the Congo Basin which is the second largest rain forest in the World in the middle of the continent, and the mountainous Eastern Highlands on the southeast side of the continent.
Arabian Plate
These geologic features are largely due to the tectonic plates upon which they rest. The historical and current movement of these plates have shaped Africa into the continent that we recognize today but continue to subtlety change the continent at the present time.
At the time of the Genesis flood, Genesis 7:11 states that God supernaturally caused the "fountains of the deep" to break apart. If this involved the breaking of the earth's mantel and separation of the plates, the underlying asthenosphere on which the mantle rests would have become more fluid and would have allowed rapid movement of tectonic plates.
Today, tectonic plates are still moving, albeit, at a much slower pace. Some plates move towards each other (converging) with one plate sinking below (subducting) the other. In other places in the world, the plates are moving away from each other (diverging). The point of divergence is referred to by geologists as a rift. Typically this occurs at the bottom of an ocean and the separation is filled with fresh magma.
However, rifts do not only happen under the sea but can occur on dry continental crust. One such place is in East Africa where the Nubian and Somalian Plates are quite literally tearing apart from each other forming what is known as the East African Rift Valley. Plate movement today is considerably slower than it was during the flood moving on average at a speed of about 2.5 to 5 centimeters (1 to 2 inches) per year. Secular scientists, who assume that this rate of movement has always been constant, have measured the distance of movement and concluded that the earth is billions of years old.
But Genesis describes a geologic mechanism that would have enabled rapid tectonic plate movement. The recently exposed Kenyan crack in the East Africa Rift Valley could have been a crack that opened during the geologically turbulent post-flood years and subsequently filled with volcanic ash. It remained hidden until 2018 when runoff from heavy rains eroded and transported away the more easily erodible volcanic ash. The fact that this erosional event did not occur until 2018 would suggest that the geologic history of the East Africa Rift Valley is not as old as many secular scientists claim. It seems to suggest the Biblical timeline of approximately 3,500 - 4,500 years rather than millions of years. With the odds of having an earlier large erosional event over the previous millions of year being pretty high, the crack should have been exposed much before 2018 if it was indeed that old.
The Kenyan crack was exposed in 2018 by an erosional event caused by heavy runoff. It reveals surface stress has occurred in the past and continues to occur today due to seismic activity and the movement of tectonic plates. Photo credit: BBC News 2018
The East Africa Rift Valley is Part of a Much Larger Rift - The Great Rift Valley
The East African Rift Valley is part of the larger Great Rift Valley which extends to the northern border of modern Israel. Map credit: Geology In
It is fascinating to think that the longest scar on earth originated from the consequences of God's judgement on sin. But this terrestrial scar is also located where the Son of God was scarred for our sins so that we would not have to face the ultimate judgement for sin - death and eternal separation from God. As we already discussed, the Genesis flood would account for the formation of this scar, but some interesting geologic accounts related to this scar are recorded in the Bible.
The East Africa Rift is only part of a much longer rift. It extends northward on the African Continent to the Red Sea where it follows the middle of the sea and exits onto the Sinai Peninsula, extending north through the wilderness where the Israelites wandered for forty years, it passes under the Dead Sea, and up the Jordan River Valley to the Sea of Galilee; making this the longest geologic scar on earth.
The Great Rift Valley route through modern Israel. Map credit: https://geoexpro.com/the-dead-sea-transform/
"But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed." Isaiah 53:5 NKJV
Biblical Evidence for the Great Rift Valley
Scripture Reference
Tar pits near the Dead Sea and the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah are referenced in Genesis. Today, asphalt (bitumen) still rises from faults beneath the Dead Sea. Interestingly, this region's bitumen is high in sulfur content which God may have used in His judgement of these two cities.
God supernaturally caused the ground to split and swallow the rebels during Korah's rebellion in the Sinai Peninsula.
The Arabah (Aravah) plain extends approximately 100 miles from the Dead Sea to the Gulf of Aqaba on the Red Sea. It is an arid plain (the Hebrew meaning of Arabah) ranging in width from about 10 to 40 kilometers (6 to 25 miles) and is located between the Edom highlands and the Negev Desert. This is the wilderness where the Israelites wandered for 40 years after leaving Egypt. It receives about the same amount of annual rainfall as California's Death Valley.
A significant earthquake occurred during the days of King Uzziah (circa BC 750). Historian Josephus claims that the earthquake occurred the moment Uzziah was stuck with leprosy for trying to enter the holy place in the temple. Archeological evidence suggests that the earthquake was significant and ranged from 7.8 to 8.2 on the Richter scale.
Another earthquake occurred in this same location when the holy place was once again breached. Upon the death of Jesus, the curtain separating the holy place in the temple was supernaturally torn from top to bottom as a sign that through Jesus' death we now have access to God. At this same moment, an earthquake occurred that broke open graves and caused some saints to be resurrected.
Some scientists believe that someday (far in the future) Africa will become two land masses separated by an ocean that flows into and over the East Africa Rift Valley. Whether this will happen or not is hard to say. I personally believe that Christ will return before then. But prophecy in the Bible does seems to indicate that there will be some rather significant geologic events related to the Great Rift Valley. Consider the following prophecies:
Future Prophecies Involving the Great Rift Valley
Scripture Reference
When Christ returns and His feet touch the Mount of Olives, it will split and separate with half moving north and the other half moving south.
A river will rise out of the ground beneath the temple and flow to the Dead Sea bringing healing and life to the Sea.
During the tribulation, a great earthquake will once again cause great damage to Jerusalem and will destroy ten percent of the city and many will lose their lives. It is interesting to wonder if this earthquake follows the pattern of the previous two significant Jerusalem seismic events and might coincide with the "abomination of desolation" spoken of by Jesus and the prophet Daniel concerning the Anti-Christ desecrating the temple.
1 Catastrophic Plate Tectonics: A Global Flood Model of Earth History
by Steven A. Austin, Ph.D., John R. Baumgardner, Ph.D., Andrew A. Snelling, Ph.D., Larry Vardiman, Ph.D., and Kurt P. Wise, Ph.D., July 1994
2 The Dead Sea: Its Forgotten Resource—Asphalt , by Ward Sanford, Oct 12, 2022
3 The Scientific and Scriptural Impact of Amos' Earthquake, By Steven A. Austin, Ph.D., Institute for Creation Research, February 1, 2010
Testimony #2: Lake Tanganyika
Lake Tanganyika is a meromictic lake which is a unique type of lake having layers of water that do not mix or circulate with one another.
Structure of a Meromictic Lake
These lakes are typically divided into three distinct layers:
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Mixolimnion: The top layer of fresh or lower-density water that mixes seasonally with wind and temperature changes.
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Chemocline: The middle boundary layer where chemical concentrations and density change rapidly.
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Monimolimnion: The bottom, stagnant layer containing dense, salty water that lacks oxygen (anoxic) and remains isolated for decades or centuries.
Lake Tanganyika is located within the western section of the East African Rift between Burundi, Tanzania, Zambia, and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Lake Tanganyika is the largest rift lake in Africa and the second-largest freshwater lake by volume in the world. It is the deepest lake in Africa and holds the greatest volume of fresh water on the continent, accounting for 16% of the world's available fresh water. The lake extends for 676 kilometers (420 miles) in a general north–south direction and averages 50 kilometers (31 miles) in width. The lake covers 32,000 square kilometers (12,000 square miles) and has a maximum depth of 1,471 meters (4,826 feet) (in the northern basin).
Axes of divergence in cichlid fishes. A selection of physiological and behavioral traits and their variation in cichlid fishes. For example, highly diverse traits include trophic adaptations such as head shape (including the evolution of hypertrophied lips in crevice-feeding insect eaters) and teeth and jaw variation. Moreover, cichlids exhibit great variation in body shapes and fin morphology and variation in color patterns (including egg-spots) and behaviors, such as mating rituals and social behaviors.
There are at least 250 species of cichlid fish in Lake Tanganyika. Of these, approximately 98% are endemic to the lake, meaning - they are only found in Lake Tanganyika. This is because their habitat is relatively isolated from other water bodies and the fish have adapted in morphology and function to their local environment. But why are there so many different types of cichlids? Is this evidence of evolution as many secular scientists would assert? On the contrary, God commanded the fish and other marine life to be fruitful and multiply, and He put in their genetics the ability to do just that. He created these creatures “according to their kinds” (Genesis 1:21), which means they were designed to reproduce within the limits of their kind. God designed living creatures with the ability to adapt to their environments which includes allowing physical (morphology) or behavioral changes to occur to better suite the creature to find food, reproduce, and survive in a new or changing environment. For cichlids, this means their genetics allow them to change the shape of their heads, bodies, fins, coloring, and even social behavior.
Testimony of Tanganyika's Fossil Water & Sediment Layers
Lake Tanganyika is so large and contains so much water that the water tends to stay in the lake a very long time. Scientists estimate the average residence time for water molecules in the lake to be 5,500 years before they evaporate or discharge from the lake. Furthermore, deep water in the monimolimnion layer is even less mobile and rarely will leave that layer because of the thermocline boundary.
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This means that much of the water that currently resides in Lake Tanganyika is remnants from the Genesis Flood. This is especially true of the water below the thermocline. As the tectonic plate movement subsided near the end of the one year flood and gave way to uplift of continental plates, much of the water covering the land drained off into the oceans. But flood water remained in the deep rift valleys formed by the diverging plates and, according to scientists, it is still there.
Temperature - depth profiles of Lake Tanganyika from south to north in December and July. The monimolimnion thermocline varies seasonally within a depth range of about 50 feet. Water below this layer is anoxic (devoid of oxygen) and stagnant.
The sediment layers on the bottom of Lake Tanganyika also testify to the events described in Genesis. Approximately 5 to 6 kilometers of sediment layers are below the lake bottom. The current estimated rate of sedimentation is 1 mm/year, which is a very slow accumulation of sediment. (To put into perspective, an average home accumulates 0.33 mm/year of dust.) So the sediment buildup on the bottom of the lake has either taken millions of years (as secular scientists claim) or there was an event that produced copious amounts of sediment that settled to the bottom of the lake. What is of particular interest is that scientists studying the sediment layers have noticed a sudden change in the sediment layer patterns, which they call an unconformity. Surface sediment layers are relatively flat with a thickness of about 20 to 30 meters; at which point there is a transition where all the deeper sediment layers are angled upward, seemingly shaved off, and covered with the above flat layers. What caused this unconformity? It would have to have been a geologic / hydrologic event of significant proportions. What is interesting is that we see a very similar pattern at the bottom of the Grand Canyon. I believe this is evidence of the Genesis Flood.
Unconformity
In 1997, sediment layers at the bottom of Lake Tanganyika outside of the Kigoma Basin were mapped using seismic reflection sensors and physical coring of sediment layers. Approximately 5 to 6 kilometers of sediment are on the bottom of the lake. But an interesting unconformity of the layers was observed.
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4 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meromictic_lake
5 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Tanganyika
6 East African cichlid fishes, Santos, M. & Lopes, João & Kratochwil, Claudius. (2023). East African cichlid fishes. EvoDevo. 14. 10.1186/s13227-022-00205-5.
7 Cichlid Variety—Fishy Evolution, by Mike Wild on November 1, 2019, Featured in Answers Magazine
8 Yohannes, Okbazghi (2008). Water resources and inter-riparian relations in the Nile basin. SUNY Press. p. 127.
9 Kamulali, T., Goodman, P., Russell, J., & Cohen, A. (2025). Understanding the 3D hydrodynamics of Lake Tanganyika: Insights from modeling circulation patterns using a 3D ROMS model. Geophysical Research Letters, 52, e2025GL116448. https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2025GL116448
10 Paleolimnology of Lake Tanganyika, East Africa, over the past 100 k yr Christopher A. Scholz, John W. King, Geoffrey S. Ellis, Peter K. Swart,
J. Curt Stager and Steven M. Colman; Journal of Paleolimnology 30: 139–150, 2003
Testimony #3: Mikumi National Park
Mikumi National Park is located within a floodplain basin of the Mkata River and is bordered by the southwestern escarpment of the East African Rift Valley and the Uluguru Mountains. The Mkata river, with its swamps and pools, flows through the park. The main road linking Dar es Salaam and Zambia passes through the park, skirting the floodplain to the north and a range of low hills to the south. In May 2026, my wife and I were able to stay in the park and go on a "safari" (Swahili word for "journey"). While in their natural habitat, we observed many amazing creatures God created. Creatures that give testimony to God's greatness.
Mikumi National Park was established in 1964 and covers 3,230 square kilometers (1,247 square miles). It is located along the Dar es Salaam–Iringa highway, which crosses the park for 50 kilometers. The park is particularly renowned for its wildlife. Visitors are able to observe elephants, buffaloes, lions, and leopards. Occasionally, African wild dogs may also be spotted. The world’s largest antelope species, including eland, greater kudu, and sable antelope are found within the park. There are more than 400 species of birds such as the colorful lilac-breasted roller, African openbill, marabou stork, Guinea fowl, the split-tailed drongo, kingfishers, the secretary bird, and the oxpecker which sits on the backs of large mammals and removes vermin.
Beyond its abundant wildlife, Mikumi National Park is home to a wide array of plant ecosystems ranging from swampy marshes, to lush grasslands, and the arid elevated hill country. On Day 3 of Creation Week, God created plants well suited for each ecosystem to provide food, shelter, and habitat for birds, fish, and animals that He would create on Days 5 and 6, and ultimately provide a home for the crown of his creation - humans!
Testimony of the Kiboko (the hippoptamus)
My favorite animal that we saw on the safari was the hippopotamus. It was their enormous size and surprising abilities that caused me to be fascinated with them. We spent a considerable portion of the day observing them in their natural habitat. Normally, they stayed submerged with just their nostrils and wiggling ears showing out of the water. But one relatively young male decided to put on a show for us.
God created these animals to be specially suited for the Sub-Saharan climate of the East Africa Rift Valley where the sun can be intense and the environment alternating from wet to dry conditions. In spite of their very formidable teeth, hippos are herbivores. Although they will eat some water plants during the day, hippos primarily eat at night by grazing on grasses. They will consume an average of 40 kilograms (88 pounds) of food each night, which is about 1% to 1.5% of its total body weight.
Hippos have large tusk-like incisor teeth that are used for grabbing and striping vegetation but also for protection. Their bite can exert up to 2,000 psi. More human deaths are caused each year by hippos than by lions. Despite their large size and short legs, they can run pretty fast at 19 to 20 miles per hour (30 to 32 km/h).
Kerry with her foot in a hippo foot print. Good thing it is daytime and they are all in their pools!
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An average adult hippo measures 4 meters (14 feet) in length, stands 1.3 to 1.65 meters (4.3 to 5.5 feet) tall at the shoulder, and weighs 3,200 kilograms (7,000 pounds).
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The name hippopotamus is Latin but originates from the Greek and means "river horse".
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Hippos can project sound underwater and can hear both under and above water. Underwater sound is picked up by the hippo's jaw. While at the same time, the hippo's ears hear sound above the water. Because sound travels faster in water than air, hippos can hear the same sound twice. Scientists believe this ability allows the hippo to very accurately determine the distance of the source of the sound.
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The skin of a hippo burns easily in the hot African sun which is why they stay in the water during daytime.
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Hippos are very territorial. Males will battle one another for dominancy of females and location. With their long tusk-like incisors, they can inflict severe wounds on each other.
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Because of these two characteristics, God created hippos with a special ointment that oozes from the pores in their skin. Because it looks like red sweat, for years people referred to it as hippo sweat or blood sweat, but it is neither blood nor sweat. Scientists have found it to be comprised of hipposudoric acid and norhipposudoric acid. These acids quickly harden on the skin forming a pink to reddish colored coating which has antibacterial and UV protection - a natural Neosporin ointment and sun screen! If God is so resourceful and creative in protecting hippos, I know He can also protect me and my family.