Jerry & Joyce McDaniels opening God's Word through literacy welcome Baby Amelia!
Grandma Joyce and little Amelia
She’s here! Amelia Grace McDaniels was born on August 16. She is absolutely beautiful and already adored by big sisters Molly and Claire! We praise God for this miracle with David & Mari. Papa Jerry & Grandma Joyce can’t get enough time holding their newest little love!
Our family actually increased by 2 this week! The adoption of Ryan & Pam’s little David (age 2 yrs) was also completed. David Bravery Parsons makes them a family of six!
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Tags: Family
Kuna missionaries
Anelio & Silverixia
We have such a great respect for so many of our Kuna brothers and sisters in Panama! Anelio & Silverixia are a young couple that were sent out as missionaries by their church to a village upriver. You may remember that in 2009, while returning to the village where they minister, they lost their 3 year old son in the flooded river. God has used their faithfulness in spite of many hardships to win many to Christ.
A church has been established in the village. Every Saturday Anelio has also been traveling upriver with some of the new believers to the next Kuna village to teach “God’s Book.”
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Tags: changed lives, church planting, God's Word, Kuna, literacy, prayer, read, training, village
may God’s name be made great in our pain
Edelfonso & Jerry
Hello from Panama! The checking of the Kuna literacy materials has gone very well. The Lord’s timing is so perfect! The Kuna Bible translation team has recently made some significant changes in the spelling of certain words and hyphenation. Since the literacy program’s main focus is to equip people to read the Kuna Bible, we want to make sure it completely follows the spelling and punctuation used in the Bible. Had we finalized the literacy books sooner, they would not have been correct. So we just have to smile at God’s amazing timing.
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Tags: changed lives, God's Word, Kuna, literacy, prayer, tribal, write
don’t forget the recipes!
reading the Word
The countdown has begun! Next week Joyce & I travel back “home” to Panama. So much has happened in the lives of our Kuna friends since we last saw them – the flooding and devastation, intense pressure on the believers to return to the traditional ways and forsake the Bible, a dear friend’s death, the Old Testament translation nearing completion! It will be so good to have time together to rejoice and grieve. Plus we have a lot of work to do!
The Kuna literacy program is ready for its final check and then printing. This means there are 6 primers, each with detailed daily lesson plans for the teachers, student writing practice, worksheets, extra reading practice booklets.
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Tags: God's Word, Kuna, literacy, prayer, read, travel, village, write
how does grammar fit into literacy?
We trust this finds you well and enjoying Spring! There’s just something about being able to open up the windows and let in the sunshine. Our jasmine is blooming on the fence and it smells incredible. (And for you poor souls who are still up in the cold, hang on it shouldn’t be much longer!)
We’ve been explaining our ministry focus on literacy and some of the key elements that keep us busy. In our last post we looked at the importance of missionaries finding a good orthography and how alphabets are not simply “one size fits all.”
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Tags: changed lives, literacy, read, write
alphabets – not one size fits all!
PNG man taking notes on Bible lesson
Imagine God allowed you to move into one of the 2,500 still unreached people groups of the world. You have progressed well in learning the unwritten tribal language and understanding your new friends’ culture. So where do you go from here? How do you move into Bible translation, evangelism and discipleship?
The first step is to determine an excellent orthography (alphabet). Did you ever stop to think that alphabets are not “one size fits all?” Every language has different sounds, put together in their own unique way (because our amazing God left His touch on the languages when He confused them at the tower of Babel). So every language needs its own special alphabet and grammar.
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flood update
We wanted to give an update on the devastation from the flooding of many Kuna villages in Panama. A big “thank you” to all who responded in such a generous way, contributing to the flood relief fund.
To give you a glimpse of the caliber of our Kuna friends, we recently heard from one of the small churches. They were concerned for the 7 widows with children in their village and another 5 in the village upriver who completely lost their crops in the flood. Not all of these ladies are part of the church, but the believers felt God would want them to care for these widows in both villages. Isn’t that what true religion is all about – putting actions to our faith (James 1:27)?
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Tags: changed lives, Kuna, prayer, village
Kuna flood relief
…a practical way for you to help
sisters in Christ
Recently Panama experienced some of the heaviest rains and flooding on record. Many Kuna villages were affected, including the village where we lived and served for many years. The believers report that 41 homes suffered damage and most of the villagers’ gardens were washed away. This was the food for their daily life as well as cash crops for next year. All the coffee plants were washed away, the corn, rice, fruit trees, and avocados. Much of the platano was lost (and this is the main staple of their diet). Many faithful Kuna brothers and sisters are faced with nearly a total loss.
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Tags: changed lives, Kuna, prayer, tribal, village
He’s not old…he’s vintage!
he's not old...he's vintage!
Jerry is now a certifiable antique person. Yep, he has turned 50! The kids helped me pull off a surprise birthday party with about 60 friends and family members. Check out pictures of how bad we were to him on our photo page under the family album.
Everyone asks, “When’s your next trip?” We are glad to report that we actually have several months without travels! We’ve taken on some huge projects and are thankful for some time at our desks to organize, write, and make materials available to the missionaries and consultants working in literacy. Trips are lining up for Panama and Africa later this year. We appreciate your prayers for wisdom and clarity as we work.
Dangerous Curves Ahead
the understatement of the day - dangerous curves ahead
Thank you so much for standing with us in prayer while we were in Bolivia! We had a wonderful time getting to know the missionary candidates who are preparing for service. They learned about literacy’s importance in church planting and discipleship and practiced writing primers and teaching them.
look Mom - no railing
After class was done we traveled to the other side of Bolivia to the Simba work to encourage the team with their literacy ministry. (For pictures of our harrowing trip along winding mountain roads, click on the Photos tab and then on: our last trip).
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Tags: changed lives, church planting, God's Word, literacy, prayer, read, travel, tribal, write