Holy Words

How many of you enjoy sitting down and reading a dictionary?  Dictionaries aren’t usually considered especially exciting reading material.  But while I was traveling recently, the guys I often work with had worked a bit without me, and one of the things they had done was go through a list of potential new words for the dictionary and approve the ones that were good and were to be added.  When I got back they gave me a list of 47 words to add to the dictionary, along with their definitions.  And as I read through that list of dictionary words, I was almost brought to tears.  Ok, so that may be an exaggeration, but my heart leaped within me, thinking about how this very mundane task of adding words to a dictionary is so close to being holy.  Reading through this list, so many of them stuck out as beautiful words that will, Lord willing, be gracing the pages of Scripture.  And what a privilege to hold in my hands words that will eventually, Lord willing, have deep and holy meanings to these people who have just written them as words in a dictionary.  Look at some of these words with me and think through passages from the Scriptures that you know with them in it; then just be amazed with me at how knowing these words will help the Scriptures come alive in My Language.  Holy words, indeed.

1. kpɔfɔ – type of slingshot made out of woven fibers, with two strings joined to the two ends of the woven fiber.

4. ʼhĩĩ – ask for someone to pay you back the money (or something else) that they owe you.

6. ʼbiɛsɛ̃ – work against the good of a person or a group of people, either voluntarily or involuntarily.

9. ʼsũũtiɛ – ask someone to take your place in a fight.

22. huulɔ – someone or something that is dead.

32. ĩĩge – roosterʼs crow.

37. vɛɛ cuesɔ – sky/heaven.

39. ʼsĩɛ̃ge – sing the praises of someone.

41. ɲããciɛrɔ – promise.

42. ʼkɛɛge – scatter, spread out, disperse.

46. wuruko – feeding trough of certain animals like dogs or cattle.

47. Ocɔ – Lord, creator.