NTM - New Tribes Mission | Planting Tribal Churches

Agutaynen holding the Agutaynen New Testament

Agutaynens who are helping with the recording

Soon they will be able to hear God's Word

In 2005, the written Agutaynen New Testament was dedicated by Wycliffe/SIL in several Agutaynen communities.  There was much rejoicing as Agutaynens could now hold God’s Word in their hands, and read it for themselves.  This has been a tremendous blessing, both to the missionaries who are teaching God’s Word, and to the Agutaynens who can read it.  However, there are some limitations that we are finding for people to be able to read.  Due to poor eyesight, lack of lighting, and lack of practice reading their own language, there are many Agutaynens in our village who struggle to read their Bibles.  For these reasons, we are excited about the work that Faith Comes by Hearing is doing.  Once the New Testament is recorded into an audio format, Agutaynens in many communities will be able to hear God’s Word in their own language!  We pray that God’s Word would not just be held in their hands, not just heard through their ears, but would penetrate their hearts!

Currently, the recording part of the project is at about 42% completion.  They are a little behind schedule with their goal of finishing the recording by the end of May.  Please continue to pray for all those involved:  for energy and diligence as they read and listen for mistakes, for electricity to stay consistent to allow work to continue without interruption, and for God to be glorified through this work.  After the Bible is recorded, it will be several months before the final product will be available.

Agutaynen lady auditioning for a role

Portion of the Agutaynen New Testament

Other Agutaynens auditioning

The above title might look like gibberish, Greek or maybe even Agutaynen to some.  But it is the word “Bible” inserted into the word “audio” (every other letter).  Today the Agutaynen Bible is being put into audio.  Faith Comes by Hearing just began the project of putting the Agutaynen Bible into an “audio drama”.  God has given us the privilege of being part of this project.  A few weeks ago, we asked several Agutaynens in our village to audition.  Twent-five Agutaynens are needed to play individual roles.  For example, Remel may be the voice of Jesus; Edwin, the narrator; Princess, the voice of one of the young women of the Bible.  And so on.  Our partner, Manfred, and Stephen have been given the role of “project assistant”.  What does a “project assistant” do?

1. Be an interpreter between the Agutaynens and Faith Comes by Hearing.  FCBH does not know the Agutaynen language and will communicate via the English language.  We then need to interpret their instructions to the Agutaynens.
2. Check for verbal mistakes, like if the Agutaynen says “nagto” when he was supposed to say “pagto”.  We need to stop the Agutaynen and have him reread the line again correctly.  As in many other languages, if you change just one letter in a word, the word itself changes.
3. Encourage the Agutaynens to keep up the good work.  This is not easy work and they can become easily discouraged by mistakes.

We greatly appreciate your prayers during the month of May.  Faith Comes by Hearing hopes to have the recording finished by May 31.  In order to do this, recording is taking place over 60 hours a week.  This week coming, April 30 – May 5, Stephen will leave our village at 6:30am and come home around 6:30pm.  This will be difficult, not only for Stephen, but also for the whole family.  Stephen will leave each morning as our kids are getting out of bed and he will get home in time to tuck them back into bed.  As you can imagine, this means Ginger gets the kids all day, with no help from her husband.  Stephen will just get a few precious minutes with the kids before they are off to bed each night.  Please pray for the Agutaynens who will be reading the Bible.  Pray that their lives will be changed for His glory.  Pray that this project will come to completion; that many will literally hear the Word of God in their own language.  Thank you for being part of this project through your prayers and support.

Yesterday was the 1-year anniversary of the death of Ginger’s Agutaynen friend. Many of you may remember us mentioning her when we were in the States last spring. Our hearts were heavy a year ago, knowing that she was clinging to the old ways. Today, our hearts are heavy not for her, but for her family. The last eight nights, her family has been praying for her sins to be forgiven. Yesterday, her family lit candles at her gravesite. At moments like this, the Truth hurts. However, that Truth is what her family needs. Please pray with us that they will have a desire to hear the Truth and put their faith in Christ alone, while they still can.

Stephen's first teaching opportunity on March 11.

Around this world, from Germany to Australia, from the Philippines to the States, people have been praying for Stephen and his studies of the Agutaynen language.  After many years, God has answered those prayers and has brought Stephen to the point of now being able to share God’s wonderful Word with the Agutaynens.

Rebekah with her Agutaynen friends at a Tuesday night Bible teaching.

Our partner, Manfred, has graciously asked Stephen to team-teach with him the evangelistic lessons known as Creation to Christ.  Manfred started these lessons months ago (as a reteach) and is already in the New Testament lessons.  Starting this Tuesday, March 27, Stephen will be teaching these lessons and Manfred will be conducting the review of the previous lesson.  Now we call on you all, once again, to be praying.  This Tuesday, Stephen will be teaching the lesson of the Rich man and Lazarus (Luke 16).  Please pray that God will change lives for His own glory.

Part of the language evaluation is a walk through the village. This gives the consultants a live, interactive conversation between Stephen and the Agutaynens. This helps the consultants to see Stephen's language ability and his relationships with the Agutaynens.

These two Agutaynens endured 6 hours during the evaluation. They would listen to a story from Stephen and then they needed to translate the story back to the consultants in the national language, Tagalog. By doing this, the consultants would know if Stephen was making errors or not. This was done over and over again.

For many of us, certain days hold special meanings.  For example, the day our children are born.  Or the day we were married.  Well there is another day to add to that list: March 6, 2012.  This day will go down in history as one of the greatest days in our lives.  After thousands of hours of language study, and after countless prayers (by you and by us), God has brought Stephen to the point of being able to teach the Agutaynens His wonderful message in their own language.  This last week, two language consultants came to give Stephen a language evaluation and to see how they could encourage him in his continued language study in months to come.  However, the consultant’s final report states that Stephen is “ready to begin teaching”!  Those last few words are still hard for us to comprehend.  At this moment, we rejoice in God and ask you to praise Him, too.  As this update is being typed, Stephen is already preparing his first message in the Agutaynen language.  We hope that this news brings joy to your hearts, and renews your desire to be in prayer for our family, our team, and for the Agutaynens.  One of the consultants warned us that Satan is going to test us and our family in ways we have never experienced before.  Even though this will happen, we know that we are on the winning side, and we have already seen God part the waters of the Red Sea for us.

Jonathan and Luke with their Agutaynen friends

A few days ago, Jonathan came walking into my office.  At that moment, I, Stephen, had my earphones on and was reviewing some Agutaynen phrases.  Jonathan asked if he could listen with me and he had “fun” pushing the “play” button.  However, after just a few minutes, the fun was over.  Jonathan handed the earphone back to me and said, “It’s kind of boring.”  In four short words, Jonathan expressed the glamour of learning another language.  Yes, aspects of learning the Agutaynen language are boring and difficult.  Some days are frustrating as I struggle to clearly communicate with the Agutaynens.  However, these difficulties are far outweighed by the relationships we have with the Agutaynens and knowing that some of these Agutaynens are now our brothers and sisters in the Lord.  Please be praying for me as I continue to study the Agutaynen language with the desire to teach and disciple the Agutaynens for God’s glory.  Please be praying for the language evaluation I will be having in just a few days, March 2-5.  Hopefully the men giving the evaluation will be able to give me specific direction for my further language study.  In the next few days, if you think, say, or hear the word “boring”, please pray for us and for the Agutaynens.

Pumpkin doesn't come in a can in the Philippines

Many ladies may decide whether to try a meal or not to try it based upon the “preparation time”. For you non-cookers, “preparation time” is the time it takes to prepare the dinner prior to throwing it into the oven. So, this would be cutting the vegetables and adding the spices and so on. In the States, many recipes indicate that the “preparation time” is just a few minutes as you just need to open this can and open that can and mix them together. Most women wouldn’t even consider cooking a meal that said the “preparation time” was 2 days. For Ginger, hardly any of her recipes would qualify as “quick meals”: i.e. Pumpkin Scones, Pumpkin Soup, Chicken Enchiladas, Feta Salad, and many more. This past week Ginger decided to make our family Chicken Enchiladas.

Ginger with her home-made feta cheese, a three day process

Actually, she had to plan for this weeks ago so the right ingredients were on our supply order. Ginger had a recipe that went as follows: – 1 can refried beans – 10 flour tortillas – 1 can of condensed cream of chicken – 1 cup of sour cream – 3 cups of cheese – 1 can enchilada sauce – And so on. – PREPARATION TIME: 15 MINUTES

Ginger's world famous chicken enchiladas

Now this is what actually took place for Ginger to make this dinner: – Make sure the following items are on the supply order: dried beans, cream of chicken soup – Soak beans overnight, simmer them all morning, then blend the beans in a blender – Make tortilla shells from scratch – Make sour cream by adding 1 tablespoon of vinegar to 1 cup of cream – Make enchilada sauce from scratch – PREPARATION TIME: 15 MINUTES & 2 DAYS

Was all that “preparation time” worth it? Everyone in her family says, “YES.” For Ginger, she just laughs when a recipe says: “Preparation time: 15 minutes.” She knows better than that. Next time you open a can of soup or a can of anything, please pray for Ginger and all it takes to put dinner on the table.

Rebekah up against the wall

Abigail on the slide

This past week, Rebekah found herself literally up against the wall and several inches off the ground.  As seen in this picture, her friends duct-taped her to the wall.  Rebekah wasn’t the only one having a little bit of fun.  Abigail enjoyed the slide and the very cool (meaning cold) pool.  Luke just liked seeing his friends again.  And Jonathan was excited about being with his big siblings in their class.  All the kids enjoyed staying up late and playing Duck Pin Bowling.  Where in the world were we?  Well, we were still in the Philippines attending our NTM conference.  As you already know, this was a great time for our kids.  It was a good time for us, too.  We were able to fellowship with our co-workers and to get some encouragement from God’s Word.  We are thankful for this time each year when a church team comes from the States (or other sending country) and ministers to us and to our children.  God is so good!

Jonathan in the pool

Luke Duck Pin Bowling

Dash

We have recently entered the world of pet ownership. We have had multiple reasons in the past for not owning pets, many of which still apply. However, when we returned to our house in the village after our year in the States, our house now had resident dogs – a mother and her two puppies. So, rather unwillingly, we parents agreed to partial ownership of these dogs. The dogs are truly owned by our Agutaynen neighbor, so it is a shared partnership. Really, the best way to own dogs here in this village – our kids get to love them, we get to give them table scraps, and we don’t need to worry about the dogs when we are away from the village.

Rebekah holding Dash

Somehow, over the course of the past few months, these dogs have managed to work their way into our hearts – even into the hearts of us parents. We went so far in this world of pet ownership that we also purchased two turtles and four fish!

Abigail with Survivor

This last month has brought us to the difficult part of pet ownership. In these last few weeks, three fish, one turtle, and one of the puppies, Dash, have died. Of course, the most difficult loss has been that of the puppy.

This has been a good reminder to us of the incredible capacity God has given each of us to love. How thankful we are for His love for us! In this season of Christmas, when we remember the birth of His Son, we are reminded that God sent His only Son to die for us! Truly, amazing love and an amazing gift! Thank you for praying with us as we endeavor to point our Agutaynen friends and neighbors to the Savior of the world!

Agutaynen girl drying rice on the basketball court

One of the national sports of the Philippines is basketball.  For this reason, just about every village in the Philippines has a basketball court.  However, the main purpose of a basketball court is not to play basketball, but to dry rice.  The village we live in is no exception.

Rebekah playing basketball

This year, one of Rebekah’s school classes is PE (Physical Education).  So far, Rebekah has chosen to play basketball for her PE, rain or shine.  Stephen gets the privilege of being the PE teacher.  So, every morning at 6am, Rebekah and Stephen hit the court.  By having this class so early, we (1) hopefully don’t sweat too much in the mid 70/80 temperature and (2) Agutaynens don’t usually put their rice out until about 9am.

This week, Rebekah and Stephen went out to the court.  This particular morning was a little unusual as other Agutaynen kids were out playing, too.  Well, they were playing on one side of the court, so Rebekah and Stephen took the other side.  Before we started to play, Stephen removed a cracked-open coconut from the court.  A minute later, one of the Agutaynen teens walked over and told Stephen: “agbantayan mo” which translated means “you be on the guard”.

The coconut tree that hangs over the basketball hoop

After saying this, he pointed up to the coconut tree which hung over the basket we were using.  Stephen noticed that there were at least 20 ripe coconuts just waiting to fall down.  Where in the States would you need to guard yourself from falling coconuts while playing basketball?  Well,  Rebekah and Stephen had a good morning and made it home without injury.

We hope the Agutaynen believers will heed to the same warning: “be on guard”.  Please pray for these believers as they are not watching out for falling coconuts, but attacks from the devil.  May they stand firm and testify of God’s wonderful work in their own lives.