It’s great to be home again after completing a long Fall ‘tour’ of the Asia Pacific region, during which over 2,000 more verses of God’s Word were checked and approved. Since we know that God’s Word powerfully works in the lives of those who read it, we can confidently say that the churches in each of the four language groups will mature and grow as a result of the additions to their available ‘library’ of Scripture.
During this trip I not only had the privilege of working with various church-planting teams on their translation of the Scriptures, but also was able to further train a fellow translator so that he can also serve as a translation consultant. He accompanied me to all four locations and had a lot of good input for the translators with whom we worked. I’m confident that he will continue to provide valuable consulting help as he expands his ministry.
The first two locations are still helicopter only access due to the rugged terrain. So we flew by helicopter into the first location and there we checked the majority of the Gospel of John, so now that book is finished and can be used by the small local church there.
In the storytelling culture at our first location, the climax of the story is usually marked with thunder. So when the team told the story of Jesus’ crucifixion and the people heard that there was thunder at the time, they understood that this was the climax of the Gospel story. During our check, in John 12.28-29, right after the helper had retold the passage about thunder, we had a singular, distinct rumble of thunder over the mountain ridge. This is another example of the unique ways God sometimes uses to assure his people of the truth of his Word.
Our second stop was at an elevation of just over 7,000 feet, so I was able to enjoy some cool Fall weather, with highs in the upper 70’s and lows near 60 at night. This young church still has no church building, so at the clearing used for meeting together, everyone grabs a rock large enough to sit on and settles in for a lesson from the Scriptures. No shade, no walls, no comfortable seats, and no sound system! Here we were checking translation of epistle material for the first time, and it was exciting to see how the native speakers were impacted by hearing the truths of 1 Timothy, Titus, and 1 Corinthians for the first time.
After several revisions of a tough passage in one of the epistles, one of native speakers who was helping us check the translation gave us a memorable comment that makes the job rewarding: “Now those words are as clear as if you wrote them in my heart!”
The third visit of our tour found us checking about 250 Old Testament verses as well as the epistles of Ephesians and 1 Timothy. We were very encouraged to see the growing interest and excitement among the local church leaders over having more of God’s Word in their language. Before the check started, the leaders gathered and each one prayed for health, strength, wisdom, and endurance for those of us who would be evaluating each passage over the next ten days.
Our last stop brought us together with our fellow believers from the Tugutil tribe. We were also joined by a consultant who came over from the USA to check my translation of 1 Peter and Romans, which I had translated several years ago. Unfortunately it often happens that our resistance is lower when we are in a different setting, and two of our four believers from interior ended up in the hospital for three nights. Then on the day those two were released another one developed an infected sore, so on the last day of the check we were down to just one healthy native speaker. In spite of the illness, we had a great time of fellowship with our ‘old friends’ from Tugutil as we worked through the Scriptures – but I think they were very glad to get back on the boat and head for their jungle home.
Here on the home front Debbie is continuing with her pursuit of a degree in the Physical Therapist Assistant program at Seminole State College. She is doing very well, maintaining an A average and really enjoying the classes and lab experiences. A few days ago she and some of her classmates experienced visiting the ‘cadaver lab’ in order to further their study of how muscles and nerves are connected in the human body. To her credit, the only thing she found disagreeable was the strong smell of formaldehyde! She is counting down to May 2014, which will be her graduation from the program.
Thanks for reading our latest news!
As always, we highly value your interest in, and support of, our ministry in the Asia-Pacific region!
Because of Calvary,
Bob & Debbie Clark