As we enter the new year we wanted to share with you a short review of the highlights of last year, to show you what God has done and to allow you praise Him with us.

First, three of our five Manjui Bible teachers were officially recognized in May 2011 as pastors to lead the church.

Second, we were able to publish the books of 1, 2, & 3 John and Colossians for the Bible teachers and Manjui readers in October 2011.  This brings the total of New Testament books published to 24.

Third, we also finished all the comprehension checks on 2 Corinthians in December 2011.  This now leaves only a couple of checks to go for this difficult book.  We also have only the books of Hebrews and Revelations to translate in order to complete the New Testament in the Manjui language.

Forth, the Manjui church is definitely growing spiritually as the pastors have been teaching through Romans and Ephesians this past year.  We are asking you to praise God for what he is doing among these people.

In 2 Corinthians 1.3-6 Paul referred to God as “the God of all comfort.” We had thought that this concept would be hard to get across, but when we worked this through with our primary translation helper, we found that they were already using a one-word expression that covers this part of God’s nature very well.  Our helper said, “Oh yes, we would say God is a Tika’peiliski’.”  He told us that this word would be used for someone one who habitually feels mercy for others and pities them greatly and helps them.  He said that this describes God very well.  So here within the small group of Manjui believers, we know that they will really understand this part of God’s character when they read 2 Corinthians.  Isn’t it great that God also speaks Manjui? We serve a great God!   The rest of the passage here was then fairly easy to develop by saying the following, “…As God helps us with our “heavies,” so we are to help others in the same way.” We are looking forward now to seeing the believers teach this principle as they read this passage and apply it to their daily lives.

We also mentioned another difficult passage that is found in chapter 2, verses 14-16, where Paul used the figure of speech of the message about Christ being like a fragrance that spreads over the whole world.  We weren’t sure if we could use this figure of speech at all, since the Manjui don’t use perfume.  But we found that the illustration of a good odor wafting out wasn’t a foreign idea at all.  What would possibly come up in their imagination was the odor of cooking meat or the smell of flowers blooming, rather than perfume, but that is okay.  “This is really a good illustration of what God’s message does,” our translation helper told us.

Another passage where we expected some interesting discussion on is found in 2 Corinthians 4, verses 6-7.  We hadn’t mentioned this one earlier, but Paul used some good picture words to get across his ideas.  We were wondering here if we would be able to keep the picture words, or if we would have to just translate the ideas behind them.  In verse 6 Paul said that the glory and power of God and the message about Christ are a wonderful light that God has caused to shine in our hearts.  When our translation helper understood the concept, he was able to give us a fairly close idea with it being like “God turning on a light inside of us” when He caused us to know about Christ.

Then in verse 7 We also have the picture word of what God has done for us likened to a wonderful treasure that we have inside of us, but that we are just clay pots holding this treasure.  Our translation helper also gave some very clear explanations as well on these two illustrations.  We were able to retain the ideas as similes by saying, “All that God has caused us to know is like something very good, expensive, and valuable…” “…but we are just weak people who are like containers made of dirt with this wonderful thing inside of us.” We praise the Lord that we have some very good helpers and that the Holy Spirit helps them to understand some difficult passages as we work through them.  Please continue to pray for us as we will now be working through content and comprehension checking of this difficult book in the next couple of months.

Church Leaders Praying for the Youth

Not even one week went by and the nightly activities by those teens completely stopped.  The believers expected God to work out this problem and He did!  We are praising the Lord for this answer to prayer.

We missionaries drove out as a group on Saturday in four vehicles.  Along with us were our field chairman and his wife who had once worked with the Manjui, Jeff & Stacy with their children, Jamie & Char with their children, and another of our field leaders.  It was definitely an interesting trip as we came upon many places where the dirt roads were covered with water from recent rains.  We even encountered a couple of larger trucks stuck in the mud.  We were so glad to be traveling together in a group, as we were able to help each other through some of the deeper muddy stretches with tow chains.  Praise the Lord, we arrived fine before the sun set late Saturday afternoon.

During the service on the following Sunday morning, we listened as the missionaries and three of the Manjui pastors who were present each gave a short testimony or a message from God’s Word.  After hearing various testimonies of what God has done over the years, we all gathered around these three faithful men and their wives to lay our hands on them and to pray for them.  It was a very encouraging time of rejoicing and a terrific testimony of God’s faithfulness for what He has done over the years among the Manjui people of Paraguay.   Praise God with us for all He has accomplished!

Below are more pictures of the occasion, with a special thanks to those who took the pictures:

In 2 Cor. 1.3-6 – Paul talked about God “comforting” us and we in turn would “comfort” others because of what God does for us.  In English we fairly well understand this concept but we don’t have the idea yet well defined in Manjui, possibly because of their culture.  In the Manjui world view before becoming believers, their idea was, “I” am the center of my world.  Why would I want to help anyone else to be happy, to feel good, when it’s all about “me?” The idea of caring for, and of helping another brother is foreign and needs to be taught.  What better place than from this passage, after we have this one translated correctly.

In 2 Cor. 2.14-16 – Paul used the figure of speech of the message of the Gospel being a “fragrance,” a sweet smell that spreads throughout the world.  Then he carries this idea further with the believers being an “aroma” as well.  In English we can understand these metaphors somewhat, but what about when we try and explain them in the Manjui language?

In 2 Cor. 3.2-3 – Paul used the figure of speech of the Corinthian believers as being a “letter of recommendation” for others to read.  We as English speakers know what a letter of reference or one of recommendation would look like because many of us have had to write one for someone entering a new work or college.  Most of us also know what a resume is for a person trying to introduce themselves in a business world.  So, for us this may be somewhat simple to understand.  But what about a people who recently come out from living in the jungle and still hunt for deer and pig, and had never even seen paper until we came along as foreigners?  This one is going to take a bit of explaining.

Also in 2 Cor. 3.3 Paul extended the idea of this letter by saying that it was written in their hearts.  Again, we have a difficulty here because the Manjui only see their heart as a blood pump.  Part of this is already solved however.  The Manjui use the idea of a person’s “insides” to explain where their emotions are.  But to say that the Corinthian believers were “written there” is going to take quite a bit of explanation.  I can’t wait to sit down with my translation helper on this one.

In 2 Cor. 3.12-16 Paul used a figure of speech of a “veil” to explain what still covered the hearts of unbelievers so they could not understand truth.  Though this one may not be as hard by explaining the meaning of the metaphor, we will have to give a lot of background information in the passage to make it clear.

So, please pray with us as we accurately communicate each idiom, each figure of speech, and each idea in this book.  God will help us as we come up with some good ways to say these things in Manjui.

How many of you get to hunt for lizards on your weekend?   Oh yes, we let them go after catching them. Grandma really had fun holding them for us while we were looking for more.

Thank you so much for your prayers as we continue to translate God’s Word into the language of the Manjui people.

Pray for us as we work on the checking of this very important book of the New Testament.

Praise:

• That God has given us some really good translation helpers among the Manjui people.
• That all the comprehension checks have been finished on 2 Corinthians.
• For the blessing that our kids and grandkids continue to be in our lives.
• That our strength and health continue to be good.  God enables us to carry out our daily ministries with His strength.

Pray:

• Pray as Gordie begins working on the book of Hebrews and translating it.
• Pray that the Manjui translation helpers will understand the difficult concepts in this book during the drafting and checking between now and May.
• Continue to pray for the Manjui Christian young people as they are growing up in a world that is rapidly changing.  They are severely tempted with so many things that their parents never had in the jungle.  One real temptation is the availability of alcoholic beverages.
• For continued traveling safety as we make many trips out to the Manjui community to check the translation.
• That we would always be an encouragement and a blessing to those we come in contact with.