Translating God’s word is a big responsibility. As such accountability to others is very important. Our Bible translation procedure builds in accountability to make sure I’m not the only person who gets to decide that what I have translated is an accurate translation.
We’ve been blessed to be able to take some good time off to spend as a team and a family this last week. As always it’s never a complete break as things inevitably come up.
Four months ago, I “finished language study.” Finishing language study required three years of full-time effort. What a challenge it was! I’ve come a long way from pointing at different root vegetables, asking “What is it?” and then promptly forgetting that new word 🙂 I may have reached the level Read more…
The Bible is a very complex text to translate. As I draft new passages I routinely come across vocabulary challenges.
The latest challenge is also a grammar challenge:
As preparation for the Kovol literacy class, we need to produce practice reading materials. The number 1 reason literacy graduates don’t cement their skills and make literacy a part of their lives is lack of practice. Some estimate that students require at least 600 hours of reading practice, without which graduates may slip back into illiteracy.
This week we’ve had the Kovol people helping us in a big way. They cut bamboo in the jungle, carried it to our house and then walled in parts of our houses. The Hansen family had recently had an extension built onto their house and my little office under our house hadn’t had an exterior wall put on yet.
It’s been an exciting week for us. We’ve been without coworkers in Kovol since July and we are delighted that the Hansen family have returned to join us! Actually, Philip has joined us with Natalie and the kids still in Goroka for now. We need to wait an extra week to see Natalie and the new twins, and Oscar have his playmates back.
“Stomach pain hit us” is the translation of the title. You don’t catch a stomach bug, it hits you; and if you think about it that makes more sense. When you want to catch something you have to try, but sickness usually finds you on its own 🙂
Comprehension checking is exciting! I get to read God’s word to people who haven’t heard it before and make sure they understand it.
Once a year the missionaries of our central area meet for conference consisting of tribal reports, fun and Bible teaching. The central area consists of the highlands of PNG and the Madang area where Kovol is, so that’s the one we attend. PNG is a large country and so we also have Western and Eastern areas, and they have their own conferences.