God gave me an opportunity in 2013 to share the Good News with a man from South America. The man was eager to learn about "this Jesus" of mine. I told him what I could in a broken language, but I missed the chance to give him a Bible in his own language.
It's been almost five years since I had that opportunity, and about a month ago, I was given another chance to practice my obedience and offer another man access to The Word of God.
On Superbowl Sunday (February 5, 2017) Josh took our four children to a Superbowl party and I stayed home. I set about deleting all of my Facebook friends before deactivating my account, but I decided after deleting all my friends that I would keep the account open because Perry Stone has a special Facebook group for his "Partner Strike Force" members. I didn't want to miss the special video updates and monthly giveaways he did to this exclusive group, so I kept the account open.
While going through Perry Stone's Facebook page answering people's random questions about a new New Testament commentary Stone had just released... How much did it cost? Where could it be ordered?... I saw a question in the middle of all the raves of Perry's Bible that said, "I'm in uganda, east africa. How can i get a copy of holy bible?"
I sent a public reply directing the man to Bibles to Africa, but I also sent him a private message telling him that I would be happy to send him a Bible if he told me his address and what language he would prefer his Bible in.
Well, he was excited. He told me his language was Ma'di. When I looked this up, only 0.004324% of the world's population spoke this language, and I worried I had gotten myself into a pickle.
The research began to find a Ma'di Bible. I found out that the New Testament had been translated in 1977, but that the only print copy that I could find was in a library. One website literally read, "The Bible is translated into this language, but we do not know where you can obtain it."
The Lord directed me to www.Bible.is. This website had an online version of the Ma'di Bible! I agonized about what verse I should send a man who may never have seen a verse of scripture before, and I decided on 1 John 4:7-8, and I asked him if the following was written in the Ma'di language.
1 Yoana 4:7-8
"7Ma adrunzi ma lelendro ri, kole olekiru ndro, a’dusi le enga Rubanga dri. Ma’di ’ba cidru le’di ndro rii ani ’bara Rubanga dri ’i, vua oni Rubanga ote. 8Ma’di ’ba le’di ku rii ka Rubanga ni kpe, a’dusi Rubanga ni le."
His reply almost brought tears to my eyes.
"Wow! Exactly manzo okpwosi Alicia that is my language."
After doing a little more research, I found out that only 0.0025% of the world's population actually speaks the Ma'di Manzo Okpwosi language. The Lord had led me to this man's EXACT language... not the Ma'di variation of it that is spoken across the river. God be praised.
I asked permission to get the digital copy printed and then got to work on copying and pasting the online version chapter by chapter into a Word document that could be edited and formatted for print.
Because of the hours involved in formatting the Bible I went ahead and asked Steve, the man from Uganda, how many copies he would like to have. He asked for 30, and I was thrilled!
But I didn't want to stop there. I found a Facebook group called Ma'di OO, and I sent the coordinator a private message explaining that I was printing Bibles in the Ma'di language and asked her to see if there would be an interest within her private group for these. After a week she placed an order for 110. The orders came from all over the world.
Today I received the printed proof of this Bible. I think I still have some work to do on the margins, because they are just too close to the center fold on the inside, but, other than that, it looks really good.
I contacted a man that I did mission work in Africa with when I was 17. I know that the mission organization he works with just started operating in Southern Sudan and Northern Uganda at the end of 2016, the very area this language is spoken. I haven't heard back from him yet, but I really hope that I will be able to serve his team by providing New Testament Bibles for that mission too.
Oh, and let me finish this story by telling you about two prayers I prayed. One was about a decade ago, and the second was about six years ago.
During the first prayer, I expressed to God my desire to work in the mission field of translating Bibles. I wanted to take an active role in spreading the gospel so that every nation, tribe, and language could hear the good news, so that Jesus would be closer to establishing his kingdom on earth. I did not see any way to be used in this area at that time as I just didn't know any obscure language, and I really didn't even know how to become part of a ministry like this.
The second prayer came after watching the Invisible Children movie. I was ready to up and move to Uganda to help these children who were being forced into such violence, but really, what good would that do? That would have just gotten me killed. My prayer was simply, let me help at least one child who has become a victim of the LRA's demonic agenda; let me share with them the only thing that will set them free- the Bible. Like my first prayer, I didn't see how this prayer could ever be answered.
But, thank God, through his grace, mercy, and kindness, he saw fit to answer the prayers of a housewife in middle America, even after I had determined there was no way for them to be answered.
I trust God to deliver one of "my Bibles" into the hands of one of the precious men or women who was a child ten years ago serving in or running from the LRA.
All praise goes to the Lord for orchestrating this beautiful story. I thank God for the lesson he taught me through the Spanish Bible so that he would be able to use me five years later to provide, not one, but 140 Bibles to his waiting children. I am humbled to be used in this way.
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| Translation: HOLY BIBLE New Testament |
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| Table of Contents |
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| Mark 15 & 16 Margins are too close in the center |
