For the first time since the COVID pandemic started, our Training Center in Ukarumpa is able to offer Bible translation courses again.  One language group is called Keakalo, and they have five men here studying Bible translation in the Translator’s Training Course (TTC).  Back at home in PNG’s Central Province, they have a team of 40 translators who are passionate about seeing the entire Bible translated into their mother tongue.

As we shared dinner together last week, one of these men shared that Bible translation has changed his life. For forty years he was an elder who often taught or preached in church.  He was very sure that He knew God and knew enough about Him to teach others.  He was very passionate about his language being strong, and he advocated for literacy and education for the young children in their community.  When a Bible translator friend of his died, he decided to help in this ministry as well.  Through his coursework and studying the Bible, he started to realize that his knowledge of God was incomplete.  He felt that he hadn’t been living or teaching God’s way, because his only access to God was through a foreign language.  He told us that now when he reads the Bible in his own language, that’s when the Word truly becomes flesh.  Since 2019, when he attended his first Bible translation course,  his studies and knowledge have transformed him.  He thought he knew God in the previous 40 years of ministry, but now his understanding is far deeper, through his interaction with the Word in his mother tongue.

Next month, Aaron will be going out to Sivauna village with our friend Steven to teach this same Bible translation course to our team of 14 Mamusi translators. He has been spending some time down at the Training Center observing and asking questions, to be better prepared to lead it himself. We’re so grateful for the training staff here and that we don’t have to re-invent our own curriculum. Please pray for several Bible translation teams training here in Ukarumpa, and for Aaron and Steven as they continue to prepare to teach in the village.