His words in our language

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to express a verse like John 3:16 in another language? How about Paul’s epistle to the Romans? The Tobo language is a challenging language with its own unique set of words and phrases and ways of expressing things. In order for the meaning of Paul’s letter to get through to the Tobo people in a way they can understand, we have to know how to put words and sentences in the right order (which is often almost exactly backwards from how we do it in English) and not only do this, but also keep the essence of everything that Paul wrote as we communicate it in the Tobo translation of Romans. And of course we aren’t talking about translating a manual for putting together a bicycle or model airplane, but the written message of God himself to all people. Sound like a daunting task? Absolutely! One of our good friends has confessed to us that he would be terrified at the thought of taking on the responsibility of Bible translation. We too are extremely aware of our inadequacies for this work. Many great men of the faith have felt the enormous weight of the task. Consider the following quote from Martin Luther:

“I have undertaken to translate the Bible into German. This was a good thing for me, otherwise I might have died in the mistaken notion that I was a learned man.”

So we see the difficulty of the task and are sobered by it. This is good. But does this mean we shy away from it? To that I would say, many Bibleless people in the world are counting on someone willing to throw themselves and their inadequacy on the Lord and look to him for help as they take on this task so that these people too can read and understand what God dearly wants them to know. The book of Romans is an especially important message for people, as it tells us how we can be made right in His sight and enjoy everlasting fellowship with Him, not to mention how we as believers can live our daily lives in the power of the Spirit and growing in that even as we look forward to future glory with Him (yes, even in the midst of our often mundane and even painful lives here on this earth). This rings every bit as true for the American mom running ragged from shopping to school to soccer practice as it does for the Tobo mom toiling by hand on a steep mountainside harvesting sweet potatoes to help feed her family. The truths of Romans are just as relevant for the busy Christian businessman in the US tied up in meetings or in rush-hour traffic as it is for the busy Tobo Christian man outside of his village chopping firewood in a cold, steady rain and building log fences for his pigs.

So we are very thankful for the wonderful men and women God has provided to help us in this great work of Bible translation. The introduction to epistles translation workshop proved to be a valuable time of gleaning from the wisdom and experience of translators from PNG, Indonesia, and the Philippines. We spent most of our time during the 2-week workshop studying and working through the first 6 chapters of Romans and discussing how to communicate the truths in other languages so that God’s Word will truly communicate to the people in these their heart languages.

Many of us translators who converged on this workshop brought 1 or 2 of our local translation helpers along with us from the villages across PNG that we call home. A real highlight of our time occurred on the very first evening where a missionary friend and I went down to visit with these men around the fire outside where they were housed. My Tobo translation helpers Tingon and Kips were very excited to tell me that “We all just finished giving our testimonies. Every single one of us has believed in Yesu!!” They were so happy and the talk went on for several more hours. I had virtually nothing to say, just drinking in the enthusiastic comments in the common trade language of Melanesian Pidgin about the Lord’s work and the great things He has done. What an encouragement to those guys to see that no, they are not alone. They have brothers in Christ, some of whom are facing similar opposition from their friends and family and communities for their newfound faith. We are looking forward to returning to the village and sharing about this wonderful time of fellowship. Thanks be to God!

Kips with orange shirt, Tingon with plaid shirt

After the workshop ended, Tingon sat in as Kips and I evaluated the first 3 chapters of Romans in the Tobo language with consultant Wayne Baker. We were so thrilled to see that Kips was able to repeat back the content truly and consistently with the meaning of these Scriptures, and even some of the longer paragraph sections were no problem for him to pick out the main themes and supporting details of Paul’s arguments in these passages. The check went very smoothly, and we praise God for helping us see the good fruit of months of hard work and help from a number of people both on our missionary team and our brothers and sisters in the village. This is a huge encouragement as we press on in translating this incredible epistle.

I would encourage each of you the next time you grab your Bible to stop and breathe a quick prayer of thanks to God for giving that most precious of gifts to you—His words in your language!! And then also add a quick prayer for the Tobo people who are still waiting to get more of that gift.

Thanks so much for praying for us and for these our (and your) brothers and sisters in Toboland. We thank God for you!

Chad, Janeene, Elijah, & Zekey

in Madang town

Hi from beautiful (and hot) Madang!

Elijah’s first question once we arrived was, “Are we going to be staying at the ant house?” Actually, we did end up moving to the other half of the duplex where those pesky ants were during our last visit here. We are happy to report that we’ve seen relatively few of them this time around and so our stay has been less stressful and more “ant-i-climatic” than before! J

These few weeks we are between our annual conference and a translation workshop, and so in the meantime we are taking a break and enjoying some good times together as a family. Janeene and Zekey have both been sick and feeling kind of miserable with some sort of cold-type virus, so that hasn’t been too much fun, but otherwise we are doing well and taking the opportunity to get in some fun and fellowship with friends here that we don’t usually see more than twice a year.

Chad has done some shopping in town, swimming and jumping on the trampoline with Elijah (though swimming on the trampoline has been challenging J), and trying to play nursemaid and chief cook (poor family!) and bottle washer. But before you feel too sorry for him, he’s planning to go scuba diving among the gorgeous coral reefs offshore this weekend. It’s rough out there, but someone has do it!

Janeene has been resting and trying to kick her illness and has still managed to get in some time internet shopping as she’s been up to it, and some of her friends have had some visits with her as well. It looks like she’s starting to feel a tad better now, but still unable to join Chad on the dive. L

Elijah has been eating up every moment out here, tagging along with the older kids, eating ice cream, grabbing frogs and chasing lizards, swimming and running around, riding his little bike with training wheels and yes, would just as soon set up a camp on top of the trampoline to stay there 24-7 if he had his way!! He is just bubbling over with excitement and energy and is never at a loss for words to describe how much fun he is having and wants to keep having.

Zekey has been crawling everywhere for some time now (and that at a very fast pace), but just this last week decided to start pulling himself up to stand propped up by low-lying furniture. This is often punctuated by loud peals of hearty laughter and funny faces, so I guess this makes him a “standup comedian” now. Naptime and bedtime is now preceded by an endless period of popping up and peeking over his crib walls to jabber at his brother or whoever else will lend him an ear. His vocabulary consists of such words as “da-da”, “gecko”, “koko” (the Tobo word for baby), and “ha” (which is supposed to be “hi”). Alas, repeated attempts to coax him into saying the most important word “ma-ma” have continued to fail. Much to Janeene’s chagrin, the little stinker will just smile and say “va-va”, “tha-tha”, and virtually every other consonant found in human language except “m”!

So what’s next for us? On Monday, we meet up with 2 of Chad’s translation helpers, Tingon and Kips. The 6 of us will then fly up to Goroka. Janeene and the boys will stay at our mission base with some friends, while Chad and the guys go attend a two-week epistle translation workshop. Please pray for us during this workshop, especially for Janeene and the boys who will be apart from Chad.

After that workshop, we will get Romans 1-3 checked by a consultant, then all fly back to the village to resume our ministry there of discipleship and translation. It has been a real joy to spend time with our Tobo brothers and sisters, and we look forward to getting back to Lengbati again.

Thanks for your love and prayers and your sacrificial gifts! We could not be here were it not for you, so thanks for your part in God’s great work here!

Chad, Janeene, Elijah, and Zekey