A Day to Remember

This morning Nancy and I visited the offices of Advancing Native Missions in rural Virginia. Speaking of remembering, that is a name for you to remember. Some of you will recall that two years ago we started a Colorado non-profit called Native Brothers to raise support for indigenous ministries in Central Asia. See http://nativebrothers.org.

Last spring one of our board members announced that he had found on the internet a ministry that looked very much like what we wanted Native Brothers to be when it grew up. We checked it out on line and it did seem like we had copied a page out of their vision. We initiated phone and e-mail contact with them and it seemed uncanny how much they resembled what we wanted NB to become. Today was our first opportunity to visit their offices in person and to fully confirm that Native Brothers had been pre-incarnated as Advancing Native Missions sixteen years ago. See http://adnamis.org.

We were received with great warmth by two of the founders of ANM and got to visit with one of their board members as well as several of their local staff. They were happy to introduce us to numerous ministries led by native brothers and sisters whom they support in some of the most resistant parts of the world.

In talking about one particular country, they mentioned a person whom I personally knew and with whom I had worked almost twenty years ago. That brought up a memory for me and I told the story of how at that time, I had argued the necessity of a modern translation of the scriptures in the national language of that country so that believers from that country could use it to participate in drafting translations in minority languages. That strategy seemed necessary since foreign Christians had no liberty to work in that country.

I told them how the organization I had worked with at the time had a long-standing policy of not participating in translations into the national languages, believing that such a task fell to the national Bible society. I argued that the national Bible society had been shut down.

The national pastor with whom this strategy had been hatched also found a fight on his hands. Established Christian ministries from his country argued that it was a waste of resources since there was a translation in the national language, though admitting that it had significant shortcomings that were unfortunate. But he and I fought well for what we believed was right. And the last I knew, many years ago, I thought the necessary resources had been brought together for a start on a new translation. But I never had heard, being called away to other fights, what had become of that effort.

“Can you tell me,” I asked of ANM leaders this morning, “what became of that strategy? I have lost contact with the team that was to start that project.”

In answer, the gentleman went to his desk and brought me three copies of the newly published New Testament. “The Psalms and Proverbs are now finished as well,” he said. “And next year they have great hope that the whole Bible will be finished.” Then he called my long-lost partner in Bible translation and handed me his cell phone for a long-distance reunion.

If you know me at all, you know that I sat there in disbelief with tears of joy flowing down into my beard. Now that was a day to remember!

PS. There is every likelihood that ANM and Native Brothers will be partnering together to provide resources for many ministries led by local believers.