Rachel Chapman a servant of the Living God A little bit of Nahuatl
This is a story I’ve been working on the last couple of days. Test your knowledge of Nahuatl (or see if you can decipher the Spanish mixed in!) Be the first person to tell me what the story is about and I’ll send you a prize!! Just click the “CONTACT” tab above or leave a comment. Restrictions apply – family and coworkers are not eligible!
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This is the place where the story starts....
Nel unitakati analko pa se lugar itoh Tehas. Umpa yoh kinán nih. Kwah tonalko tona i tawaki. Kwah sewa, kichih sewa. Hame pareho, hame lomas. Aveces kiawíh. Umpa así tormentas con ganas. Inmalaka heheka kiahkokí kinmayawí miya nihkalme. Umpa chantíl noiwan siwa, noiwan taka, nonanita.
Kwah nitakati, notatsi moneshtilitikáh patanistiyá pin nihavioneta. I de ukán, timokambiaró pa usé lugar itoh Panamá kwah nel nipiyá nahwi años i noiwan siwa kátika tepichito. Umpa insaka wehweyote i kwil verde porque kiahwíh mochi días. Siempre kichih tona. Umpa serka tichantiláh kaha playa. Tiawilá miya veces a la playa. Siempre tishgustaró tiaski pin playa i titaneloláh pin mar. Igwal timopashaloltiláh pin bisi. Aveces tiawiláh pin monte titamawisoláh. Aveces pin nihtienda pa usé pweblo. Umpa nichantiyá nipiyá de nahwi años hasta kwah nikátika de prepa.
I de ukán nimokwé usé pa analko usé lugar itoh Michigan. Umpa kwil tahpa. Sewakátika i wetsiyá nieve. Nimoneshtili inBiblia, inDios, de useki táhtol pin universidad. I de ukán nihnekiyá nikasaró pero intaka amo kinekiyá. I de ukán nimokambiaró pa kaha Chihuahua. I nimoneshtili inkastiya. I de ukán uníh pa nitaishmá pin sierra. I de ukán nikinishmati Tomás i Teresa i nishtenewiláh miya de Las Moras de nihgentis. Kwakín nipensaro niwalas nichantí pa Las Moras. I ya, niku nias unichih nokal i nichantití agusto. Ya utám.
Tags: language & culture study
Wapurú
One day, Beni, one of the women of the village stopped by for a little visit with her girls. We always enjoy their visits as they are very expressive and funny. We always learn new words with them and they stretch our knowledge of the language in trying to understand them and talk with them.
As they were leaving, Katie gave the girls a red and white round peppermint. The oldest one popped it into her mouth and said, “It tastes like wapurú!” I grabbed my notebook and wrote, “wapurú.”
I thought, “This is great! I was going to learn how to describe tastes and smells. Here’s a word!”
So, in Nahuat, I asked, “What is wapurú?” The girl answered, “Who knows!”
So, I asked, “Is it a fruit?” The girl said, “Who knows!”
Then I said, “Is it sweet?” The girl said, “Who knows!”
Getting nowhere with the daughter, I asked the mother. She could not explain anything about what wapurú was, either. So, I made a note to check it with my language helper the following day.
The next time I met with my language helper, I started by reviewing words or phrases that I had heard but hadn’t understood. At the end of the list was “wapurú.”
I said, “Katie gave a candy to a girl yesterday and she said it tasted like ‘wapurú.’ What is that?”
She said, with slightly better pronunciation than the previous day’s visitors, “Vapurub?”
No more explanation needed!
Who knew? Peppermints taste like VapoRub!
Tastes like peppermints!!
Tags: Fun, language & culture study
Well update
Over a year ago, we presented the idea of a well to the community for approval and permission. They wholeheartedly approved as water is a big necessity here.
Then, we told people about the need and God raised over $20,000 for the project in just a few months.
At the same time, we contacted another mission agency to the north who drills wells. After a bit of dialogue, that fell through.
So, we contacted a private driller on the coast close to us. We met him through a friend. Once we had all the money, we contacted him again to work out details and dates for drilling. When he didn’t respond, my co-worker stopped by his office a few weeks ago and found out that he was no longer working at that job.
So, now with rainy season just a few weeks away, we are communicating with a third driller. They are an organization farther south in Mexico that works with the government to drill wells in small communities who need clean water. But, there’s not time before the rains begin and before the roads become impassable to complete the necessary paperwork and get all the equipment up there to drill.
So, at this point, we’re hoping to work it out to drill sometime after the rains end. Maybe during the winter! Please pray with us about this need!
Hauling water
Tags: community development, prayer, well
Milo
Milo with his niece
We met Milo in November, when he had moved back into the mountains to his family’s house after working in construction and other jobs for several years in other parts of the country.
He started coming over now and then in the evenings to visit. One night he asked, “Do you guys know God’s Word?”
We said, “Yes.” He said that he would like to study the Bible and know more about God.
So, a few weeks ago, my co-worker, Pete began to teach Milo the Bible starting in Genesis 1:1 with who God is.
Milo is an indigenous man, but his parents spoke to him in Spanish growing up. And, since he has spent time working among mestizos, his Spanish is pretty good.
Please pray for him that he might clearly understand God’s Truth. Please pray that nothing would hinder him from coming to meet with Pete and study the Bible.
From Katie: Do you do that?
Andrea gave Katie a few tamales one day after a visit
I meet at least twice a week with my language helper, a lady named Andrea. She teaches me the Nahuatl language and answers a lot of my questions about how things work in this community. Every time she explains something to me about her culture she asks, “And you guys? Is it the same for you? Do you do that?” Many times I answer yes. Yes, we have dances in our culture. Yes, sometimes boys and girls start liking each other in school and then get married. Yes, babies grow in our bellies, too. Sometimes, however, the answer is more complicated.
A few weeks ago, Andrea was explaining to me about the local gods of the mountains. She said that they are “clean” while the people around here are sinners. Because of that, the spirits can help you if you make them a promise or bring them gifts. If you bring them corn and fish and peaches after a good harvest, for example, they will make sure you have rain for the next season. She went on to explain things in more depth and then asked me her standard question: “And you guys…do you do that?” I told her that some people in my land thought like that, but that I didn’t. I said that soon I was going to sit down and tell her what I thought in her own language, just like she had told me. But first I had to study. A lot.
Andrea, like many of the Nahuatl, do not communicate well in Spanish. I know that she cannot understand the gospel well in Spanish and so I am trusting God’s timing as I continue to learn.
Please pray that our team will be diligent students while we work at learning how to communicate the Word to the Nahuatl.
Pray that the Nahuatl will begin to have questions and doubts about their beliefs that can only be met by the truth of the Bible.
From Katie: Not straight talking…
As we continue to spend hours daily studying the Nahuatl language, it is fun to see things start to take shape and make sense. Several months ago I had written down “amomelahtaketsaliste” as meaning “a lie.” We knew that the verb, to talk, is “taketsa” and “amo” means not. Then, a few weeks ago, while studying some adjectives, we came across the word “melah,” or straight.
Suddenly, it became clear: a lie to the Nahuatl is “not straight talking.” A perfect example of this kind of conversation comes from a young girl in another village. She gets on the radio and spreads fear and confusion about what it takes to please God. She tells the Nahuatl that they must dress in a different kind of clothes, perform certain dances so that it will rain, or stop using modern technology. If the people fail to comply, they are warned about wild animals that will eat them or bad things that will happen to their family members. We know that Satan has the Nahuatl trapped by his warped and twisted thinking. We also know that we have the “straight talk.”
Please pray for God’s protection on the Nahuatl people until they have his truth.
Nahuatl family - father, mother, and most of their kids
Tags: church planting, language & culture study, nahuatl people, prayer
Do you want to weave again?
Weaving the strap for the bag
One of my Nahuatl friends knows how to weave well. A while ago, she wove several bags for us from yarn that we had provided her. She did a good job and I had been meaning to ask her if she wanted to weave another bag.
So, when she stopped by the house one day, I quickly checked how to say the verb “to weave” again as I had just recently learned it. With the verb in my head, I created the sentence, “Do you want to weave again?”
She looked at me a little funny and said, “What did you say?”
I said again, confidently, “Do you want to weave again?”
She looked at me again and said, “Like…. What did you say?”
I thought, “Oh no, I’m not communicating.” So, I said, “What I just said, what did it mean?”
She replied in Spanish, “You said, ‘Do you want to lay’ you know, like a chicken lays an egg.”
Everyone in the room laughed and I learned to proper way to say, “Do you want to weave again?”
Tags: Fun, language & culture study
Clean water is on its’ way!
God has provided 100% of our goal for drilling a well! Through many different people and churches in the last 6 months, we have received gifts that total over 20,000 USD!
Soon, we will have running water, instead of spending hours each week hauling water.
We have scheduled a hydrologist to travel into our village to make a scientific study of where we’ll drill, how far we need to drill, and what material we will be drilling through. The driller will also accompany him, and hopefully at that time we can schedule a date in May for the drilling to begin!
Soon, clean drinking water will be available in Las Moras.
We thank GOD and we thank YOU who have sacrificially given so that there is a reliable source of clean water in the village.
Tags: clean water, praises, village life, well
A New Day
“May you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep His love is.
May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.
Now all glory to God, who is able, through His mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think.
Glory to Him in the church and in Christ Jesus through all generations forever and ever! Amen.”
Ephesians 3:18-21
