{"id":200,"date":"2011-05-10T05:10:14","date_gmt":"2011-05-10T09:10:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/francois-hattingh\/?p=200"},"modified":"2011-05-10T05:10:14","modified_gmt":"2011-05-10T09:10:14","slug":"we-understand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/francois-hattingh\/2011\/05\/10\/we-understand\/","title":{"rendered":"We understand!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>On this picture: Some of the people stayed after the meeting. They could not get enough! Here Francois is explaining about the New Testament Greek. On the board is written in Greek and in eMwinika: God (Theos\/Muluku)<\/p>\n

We saw the Lord move in a wondrous why today! May this be the first of many such opportunities where people are starting to understand what a huge thing it is that God\u2019s Word has finally reached them, the Mwinika people:<\/p>\n

We had a meeting with the leaders of our near community this morning. The Literacy classes have not been very well attended lately and we feel that we need to clarify again why we are here and what we are doing. This is especially needed since the teaching is in the neighbouring community where the Hendersons live and although we have a faithful group of neighbours going to the teaching each day, most of the people around us still need to hear. If they are not interested, they may never hear the Truth!<\/p>\n

Since there were several funerals today (yet another reminder how needed the teaching is!), many of the leaders could not come, but Francois used the opportunity to explain again what we are translating, and why the Literacy is such a vital part of the process\u2026<\/p>\n

Francois opened the Old Testament written in Hebrew and told the group that this is the Word of God as it was written in its original language. He explained this in terms used by the middle eastern religion of most of our neighbours. Everyone were very interested and gathered around to see if they can read the Hebrew. No! Not even the religious leader in the group could read it\u2026<\/p>\n

Francois then showed them an Arabic translation of Gen.5:3-5. This the religious guy could read! Imamu Djuumwa \u201csang\u201d the Arabic words\u2026 Could they understand anything? Nope. Nobody understood even one word\u2026 And our Djuumwa? No, not even him. He explained that he can read the sounds, but have no clue what he just read. Most people know this and everyone were nodding their heads and agreed that they don\u2019t understand Arabic. Francois put the two texts next to each other and then again explain that the Scriptures were written first in the Hebrew and then later was translated into the Arabic.<\/p>\n

Now he held up the eMwinika translation: this is the Word of God in eMwinika\u2026 And for the first time ever, understanding dawned! There was an excited stirring and everyone leaned forward, waiting to hear what God says\u2026 Salimo then picked up the Word in eMwinika and with great skill, almost like speaking, read the same portion our Imamu just read, but this time in a language that everyone understood: their heart language. This met with big smiles! They were beaming: yes! THIS we can understand! Can\u2019t you read more, some asked. \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

The excitement build as everyone started talking\u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cWe cannot understand the Arabic! It makes no sense! It is just a bunch of sounds like singing! We always hear you religious leaders sing these words and we can even recite some of it ourselves, but what is it saying?\u201d<\/p>\n

There were still more smiles as both religious groups (89% middle eastern religion and 5% Roman Catholic) agreed that they can\u2019t understand the Arabic. One RC guy said that that\u2019s one of the reasons why he prays at his church and not the mosque, he hoped that he would understand more\u2026<\/p>\n

But, he then admitted, even the Portuguese we don\u2019t really understand! He is one of only a handful of people that has the Scripture in Portuguese. Many things he reads he can\u2019t understand, he now admits. Huge parts of the Word has no meaning to him. He wants to know God!<\/p>\n

And now, now we hear God\u2019s Word in our own language! They declared this with a sense of wonder and great pleasure. Now they understand (a bit more of) what a huge thing this is: God wants to speak to them! He send us who are His messengers to translate and teach the Word so that they can understand too.<\/p>\n

Pray with us as God reveals Himself to Mwinika people and as they start to recognize Him more and more. Pray that the Truth will become a reality in the lives of those that hear it and that He will stir in each and every one of them a growing hunger for more.<\/p>\n

Tomorrow afternoon we have another meeting. Pray with us that the people of our community will grab hold of the opportunity to hear, read and understand God\u2019s Word.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On this picture: Some of the people stayed after the meeting. They could not get enough! Here Francois is explaining about the New Testament Greek. On the board is written in Greek and in eMwinika: God (Theos\/Muluku) We saw the Lord move in a wondrous why today! May this be the first of many such […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":808,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-200","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/francois-hattingh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/francois-hattingh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/francois-hattingh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/francois-hattingh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/808"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/francois-hattingh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=200"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/francois-hattingh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/francois-hattingh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/francois-hattingh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/francois-hattingh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}