The First Fruits of Translation

The first fruits of the Enga Bible translation project are now in the hands of the Enga people. Until last month, the vast majority of Engans had very little access to the Word of God. What access they did have was most often in the form of short Scripture quotations in English or Tok Pisin heard during church services. I (Adam) am a fluent Tok Pisin speaker, but I can tell you that when I hear the Bible in Tok Pisin it goes in one ear and out the other. I understand the words, but they have no impact on my life. It is the same for the people of Enga. While many can understand Tok Pisin, it doesn’t touch them at the core of who they are. But after listening to the new Enga translation, people were saying, “When we read the Bible in Tok Pisin, we never read a whole chapter at a time. But we can listen to an entire book of the Enga Bible in one sitting without getting tired!”

Over the course of six days, we had nine events to promote and distribute the Gospel of Mark and the Abraham Story in Enga. In that time, people purchased approximately 220 Audibibles (solar-powered audio players) and 110 memory cards. We also installed the Enga Bible app and Enga Jesus Film for free on about 60 phones.

It was just as exciting to see all of the church denominations come together to celebrate the Bible in Enga, take ownership of the project, and commit to seeing the translation through to completion. At one event, church leaders stood up one-by-one and pledged to support the project financially. At the end of the night, their pledges totalled nearly K25,000 ($10,000). The Bible in Enga is taking hold of the Enga people.

To see a video of the distribution produced by Newbreak Church, please go to https://vimeo.com/110512024.

Adam explains the Enga Audibible while Asher looks at the crowds who have gathered to receive God's Word in Enga

Thank You Newbreak Church
We would like to thank Newbreak Church for your continued support of the Enga Bible translation project. Because of your help, we were able to sell the Enga Audibibles at a discounted price that people could afford. Thank you as well for your pledge to see the Enga Bible translation project through to completion. Your support blesses and encourages not only us but the people of Enga. You are truly planet shakers! We would also like to thank Pastor Darrel Larson, Matthew Nelson, and Eric Edmonds for coming all the way to Enga Province from Newbreak Church to participate in the dedication and distribution of the Gospel of Mark and the Abraham Story in Enga. You guys were an incredible blessing to the people of Enga and a wonderful encouragement to us as a family.

Pastor Darrel Larson with two Assemblies of God pastors.

Translation Progress
In addition to dedicating and distributing the Gospel of Mark and the Abraham Story, we also completed the naturalness check of the Gospel of Matthew and began drafting the Gospel of Luke. As you read this, the Enga translation team is continuing drafting of the Gospel of Luke. This is the first time that they have attempted drafting without me (Adam) present, so please pray for wisdom. This is a good step as the goal is to empower the Enga translators to take on more and more of the responsibilities of the translation work upon themselves. I will still be checking their work daily as they upload it to the internet from Wabag using their smart phones for internet access. Isn’t technology amazing!

What’s Next
In November, William Walewale and Frank Paiyak, two of the Enga translators, will be attending the Paratext training workshop. Paratext is the computer program that we use to enter, edit, and save the Enga Bible translation. This will be an additional step toward helping the translators work more and more independently. This will ultimately speed up the translation process and free me (Adam) up to spend more time on other parts of the process such as back translation into English, checking, recording, and production.

Thank you for all of your prayers, encouragement, and support. We hope that you share in the joy of seeing the first fruits of the Enga Bible translation project. Please know that you are making a difference among the people of Enga!

Enga Bible App

When we launch the book of Mark and Abraham Story in Enga the week of October 12, our primary focus will be distribution through solar-powered audio players called Audibibles. Most Engans (and Papua New Guineans for that matter) have never learned how to read in their own language, and often they are not interested in learning because reading is not a strong part of the culture. So if you hand an Engan a printed Bible in their own language, they will likely never read it. If you hand them an Audibible, however, they will listen to it over and over, as will most everybody else who lives in their village. In the oral cultures of Papua New Guinea, audio recordings are the best way to share God's Word. And when the battery runs out, they can just put the Audibible out in the sunlight to charge!

In addition to the Audibible, Enga will also be one of the first languages in Papua New Guinea and the world to have a smart phone app. The smart phone app highlights the text of the Scripture sentence-by-sentence as the audio recording plays. We have found that the same people who would never read a printed Bible will immediatley engage with the Enga Bible App and try to read along with the recording. (Engans love technology!) And those who have learned to read in English or Tok Pisin can fairly easily transfer those skills over to Enga with a little practice. So the Enga Bible app not only gives people the Word of God in their own language, but it also teaches them how to read.

Some of you may be thinking, "What good is a smart phone app for people who have no electricity?" Good question! The reality, however, is that even people who live in remote villages without electricity often have cell phones, and they find all sorts of creative ways to charge them. Smart phones are just now reaching the price range ($35) where the average Papua New Guinean can purchase them. We have gone to villages in Enga where there was no electricity only to be shocked to find the villagers taking video of us with their smart phones! While the Audibible is still going to be the most popular way of accessing Scriptures right now, the Enga Bible App is sure to take off in the near future, especially among Engans who live in town. The best part is that the app is free and can be transmitted for free from one person to another. It would not be at all surprising to share the Enga Bible App with one person and come back a week later and find that all of his friends and family now also had the app. Papua New Guineans are good at sharing media on their phones! Click here to see a video of how the Enga Bible App works.

We will also have printed versions of the book of Mark and the Abraham Story available in Enga printed side-by-side with the Contemporary English Version (by permission of course). So those Engans who do want to read the printed Word will also have access.

Please keep the upcoming launch of Mark and the Abraham Story in your prayers. We are hoping to distribute in four different locations from October 12 to October 16. Pray that many Engans will come and receive God's Word in their own language. Pray also for the team from Newbreak Church near San Diego that is coming to participate in the distribution. We look forward to sharing with you next month about how it all goes!

Shaking Hands with the Enemy

After the fifth robbery attempt on our Ukarumpa house in two years, Martha and I decided that it was finally time to start venturing into the village of Ku'ina and building relationships with the people there. The village literally adjoins our backyard, but visiting is not as easy as you might suspect. Due to various security incidences in the years prior to our arrival, a security fence encompasses Ukarumpa. While necessary for improved security, the fence also cuts us off from our local neighbors. So to actually walk to the village requires walking to the nearest gate in the fence, which is nowhere near our house.

When we first moved into our Ukarumpa house a couple of years ago, there were only a few houses in Ku'ina village, but now there are more than twenty, and new ones are being built everyday. As translators, we are often exhausted when we return from Enga Province, and, honestly, we just want to retreat for a while. However, we have realized that ignoring our neighbors whom we don't know, but can see through the fence, is not right.

So we decided to take the whole family out to Ku'ina and start introducing ourselves and building relationships. We realized that on Saturday mornings there is another gate much closer to our house that is open, and so we got together with some friends and went out to Ku'ina. We had a hunch that the people who have been robbing our house have been coming from Ku'ina, and so Martha and I decided ahead of time that if we saw any of our things, we wouldn't say anything. To be honest, there is very little that we could do about it anyway as prosecuting suspected thieves is not something that generally results in any serious consequences, but it would definitely sour our relationships with the people of Ku'ina.

As we walked through the gate and up the hill into Ku'ina we felt free. Why had it taken us so long to go out and greet our neighbors? What were we so afraid of all this time? We met a couple of ladies washing clothes by a small stream and said hello. They seemed a little bit uncomfortable to see us in their village, and we did not receive the warm welcome that we would have received in Enga. We walked on a little farther up to a basic church structure that is being built. There was an older lady ahead of us on the path who also seemed hesitant to meet us, but we caught up with her and began talking. We told her that we lived in the blue house on the opposing hill.

When we told the older lady where we lived, she seemed intent on leading us on the path in a certain direction. Soon we came to a house and the lady called out to a young man in their own language (Gadsup). The young man came forward to shake our hands, and I realized that he was wearing my watch. He was a very strong young man about the age of twenty…a person the locals would refer to as a 'boy'. As we shook hands he said his name was 'Yonki'. When we told him where we lived, he seemed to grow a bit nervous. I then noticed that he started hiding his wrist so that I couldn't see the watch. As we walked along the path together he took off the watch at his first opportunity. It seemed fairly clear that this was the young man who had smashed our bedroom window and rifled through our room just one month before.

I had been extremely angry after that incident. I had visions of the people coming back and me bashing their heads in with a baseball bat or spraying them with pepper spray. I almost wanted them to come back so I could get revenge. I knew that such intense anger and desire for revenge was not right, but it was honestly how I felt. When I saw this young man's face, however, I realized that he was no hardened criminal. He was just a young man getting into mischief like so many young men in America. I'm sure that he viewed Ukarumpa as a place where people seem to have a lot more than he does and thought that it wasn't fair that all those missionaries should have electricity, clean water, well-built houses, and computers and many other things that most Papua New Guineans don't have. In addition, I don't imagine he felt that much guilt about cutting through the fence at night, smashing our window, and taking whatever he wanted. You see, in Papua New Guinea, there is not a strong sense that stealing from people outside of your extended family is wrong, especially if you don't get caught. The shame is in getting caught because it brings shame upon your whole village.

We continued our tour of the village, shaking many hands. Most of the young men we met seemed very hesitant to talk with us, probably because they felt ashamed about what they had been doing to our house. (I suspect Yonki had help.) Not surprisingly, Yonki did not stick around long. We made our way back down the hillside and met Manisa, the chief of the village. We introduced ourselves to him and sat and talked for a while, telling him that we didn't feel right about living so close but not knowing each other. As we returned to Ukarumpa, we invited about 15 children from the village to come back with us to our house to play. They stayed for about two hours and had a wonderful time.

After I got home, I realized that I was no longer angry. After seeing Yonki's face, God laid it on my heart to pray for this young man. But not only that, God had prompted me to return to Ku'ina to share the gospel with Yonki and give him the Tok Pisin New Testament on a solar-powered audio player. Unfortunately, when I returned the next Saturday, Yonki (which I found out is probably not his real name) was not there. So please pray that God will provide an opportunity for me to see this young man again, share the gospel with him, pray with him, and give him the Tok Pisin New Testament. Please also pray that God will touch his heart, convict of his wrongdoing, and open the door for him to receive salvation. And continue to pray for us as we build relationships with the people of Ku'ina.

Corruption and Persecution

Two of the Enga translators along with 300 other pastors were recently barred from their denomination’s annual convention because of the actions of a corrupt bishop clinging to his power.

While we were translating the Gospel of Matthew in June, two of our translators, Maniosa Yakasa and Frank Paiyak, excused themselves for a few days to attend their denomination’s annual convention. The term of the corrupt bishop had come to an end, and it was time to elect a new bishop. In the past, when this corrupt bishop’s term had expired, he barred all of the pastors who didn’t support him from attending the convention and brought people in from the streets to vote for him. This time, however, the rest of the church was determined not to sit idly by while he yet again cheated the system.

So Maniosa and Frank joined together with more than 300 pastors from all over Enga Province to demand entrance into the convention so that they could vote for a new bishop. They arrived early in the morning only to find that the bishop had locked them out and hired police from another town who brought machine guns and machetes to keep the pastors from attending their own convention. When a couple of the pastors broke through the fence, they were severely beaten and had to be rescued by the others who were still outside the fence. In the process thirty-nine men were injured and some had to go to the hospital. Frank suffered a minor wound on his leg when he was hit with a stone. Nevertheless, Godly men like Frank and Maniosa do not allow corruption and persecution in the church to affect their faith in God. Their persistence in the face of trials is an encouragement to us as we face our own trials. Please continue to pray that God will remove the corrupt bishop and install a leader who is committed to serving the Lord.



Translation Progress
Earlier this month we completed our first draft of the book of Matthew. We never expected that our translation work would be progressing so quickly. Last fall I (Adam) remembered hoping that we would be able to finish our first draft of the book of Mark by this time. I never thought that we would complete both Mark and Matthew (not to mention the Abraham story)! In August and September we will record Mark and the Abraham story and prepare them for distribution in print and audio format. Then we will launch the books in October.

Pray for Safety
During our last stay in Wabag we had two separate break-in attempts at our house in Ukarumpa. During the first attempt, a man tore off the screen on our front window that faces the main road. Fortunately, one of our neighbors was walking his dog and saw the man, so he called security and the man ran off. We were not as fortunate with the second attempt. Our bedroom glass window was smashed and somebody came into our house and rifled through our room. Fortunately, we keep our valuables locked in a safe when we are in Wabag and so not much of value was taken. Nevertheless we will be upgrading our alarm system and purchasing laminates for the windows that prevent them from being smashed. Please pray for our safety and security. These incidents take their toll on us emotionally and are very discouraging. After the second incident, I told the Enga translators what happened and shared John 16:33, “In this world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” I have a greater understanding now about the desire Engans have for revenge, but I am committed to releasing that desire into God’s hands and placing my trust in Him.

Pray for Transitions
Every June is a difficult time for missionaries in Papua New Guinea as many people leave on furlough. This year many of our close friends have left. It has been especially difficult for Jacob, as he has had to say goodbye to his best friend Nate. To make matters worse, when Nate’s family returns to Papua New Guinea, we ourselves will be going on furlough. Jacob has been bursting in tears at random times as he tries to deal with the pain of saying goodbye. Please pray for God to comfort and strengthen him.

Calling For Back Up

We've watched the scene a thousand times. The one where the cop or the detective goes into a dangerous situation alone, and you are sitting there on the couch yelling, "Call for back up!"

It drives me (Martha) crazy to watch those scenes. It always ends with trouble. Why do they always think they can go in alone?

There is really only one answer.

Pure arrogance.

As missionaries, I think sometimes, without meaning to, we do the same thing. We refuse to call for back up…and we go in alone.



We have arrived in Enga for another five-week stay. I have been very apprehensive about this trip. Our last stay was just plain hard.

Two days before we left I pulled a muscle in my neck. It was better in the morning so I thought nothing of it. On the plane ride I began to feel the pain, but of course I kept ignoring it. The first week there was awful. I kept injuring my neck over and over and I was in a lot of pain. I thought about asking friends for prayer, but it seemed silly. It wasn't big enough to warrant a prayer request. I felt like an idiot. "Um, hi. My neck hurts. Can you pray about that?" Nope, not me. I searched on the internet for answers instead.

But it just…got…worse. And if you know me, you know that I didn't just have pain in my neck. You know that I pictured the pain never going away, never sleeping well again, never being able to pick up my son again. You know that I created a monster in my brain that told me I would suffer for the rest of my life because I turned my neck the wrong way!

Why is it so hard to ask for help? Why do we always think we have it covered?

After a week of misery I finally caved. I humbled myself and sent the email that asked for prayer. And you know what? I immediately felt better. No, the pain didn't go away right then. But I felt better. I had let it go.

All of a sudden it hit me. There is something about the asking. Yes, the actual prayer is powerful, but the asking is powerful too. When you ask for prayer, you are finally admitting, you cannot do it alone. When you ask, you begin to move out of God's way, and allow Him to work. There is just something about the asking.

Our last trip to Enga was hard for all sorts of reasons. All I kept thinking during those weeks was, we went in alone. We didn't call in for back up. We never asked for prayer coverage.

If this whole Bible translation thing is going to happen, we need prayer coverage, because the enemy wants us to quit.

"For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms."
- Ephesians 6:12

Consider this our official call for back up. Here are our prayer requests.

1. Pray for protection over our family spiritually and physically. Pray for Jacob who struggles here more than the other two kids. He just said goodbye to his best friend who is going on furlough. Please pray that he would be obedient to his parents and kind to his brother and sister. Pray that all three children would thrive here, play creatively, and grow close as sibling. Pray that Adam and I would have special, quality time here with the kids.

2. The translation team is working on making corrections and refining the book of Mark before recording in August. They will then continue working on the book of Matthew. Pray for protection over the translation team and their families. Pray for unity and clarity as they work together to find the right words to translate accurately.

Names of the translators: Martin Harty, Frank Paiyak, Maniosa Yakasa, William Walewale, John Singi, Nete Talian, and Reuben Yonasa.

3. Pray for Adam. He bears the weight of this translation project. Pray that he has energy, and that he would not grow weary or discouraged. Pray that we will be given wisdom in how to lead the translation team.

4. Please pray that we will continue to develop good relationships with the people here and that the kids and I will learn more Enga during this stay.

5. Please pray that the corrupt bishop of one of the main denominations in Enga would be removed from power. Pray that the church would be unified in making this decision.

6. Pray that God would give us wisdom about where to build our house in Enga.

7. Pray for peace in Enga and an end to tribal fighting.

Seek First the Kingdom

I didn't know how to respond when I read the email. I was just sitting there in a state of shock. I didn't even want to tell Martha what it said. I just wanted her to read it for herself so that I could see her reaction. Her jaw literal dropped as she read these words…

Adam...My wife and I have been blessed by you and your family's ministry to the Enga people. God has put it into our heart to pay for your home [in Enga]…we are willing to give you up to $40,000 to build your home.

We couldn't believe what we were reading! The decision to build a house in Enga was one that we had really struggled with. I (Adam) had wanted to explore other options such as renting, but it quickly become clear that nobody was going to let us rent a house just during our stays in Enga and that the cost of paying rent year-round was too high to be worth it. We had already lived in three different houses in Enga, and we knew that constant movement like that would burn us out. We also came to realize that not having a place we could call our own would add a lot of undue stress and negatively impact our ability to stay committed to this work for the long haul. As we prayed about the situation, it really seemed like God was leading us to build a house of our own so that we could have a stable and affordable place to say whenever we were in Enga.

So we decided to build a house even though we had no idea where we would get the money to do so. But we felt like God was leading us, and so we stepped out in faith and began speaking with the construction department about developing some plans. I also included a brief paragraph about our plans in one of our recent newsletters. We weren't asking for any donations at that point, but just for prayers that God would lead us and guide us in the process of finding the right location and figuring out the steps we needed to take to build a home.

Soon thereafter I received an email from one of our supporters asking us questions about building the home. How much would it cost? Were there people who could help us build it? Would we be able to get the materials in Papua New Guinea? I responded to all of his questions and gave him a ballpark figure of what we anticipated a house would cost.

A couple of weeks later, we received the email that made Martha's jaw drop! We couldn't believe that two of our supporters were willing to pay for the entire house! I mean we believed that God would provide, but we never anticipated that He would provide so quickly and so generously! We could barely find the words to express our deep gratitude and appreciation for such a generous donation. But we praised God not only for his faithfulness and provision but for his confirmation that he was indeed leading and guiding us.

While we will keep the names of our two supporters anonymous, we do wish to thank them publicly for believing that God has called us to this work and trusting that we will faithfully do what God has called us to do. May God bless you both! We don't have the words to truly express our appreciation, but we do know that God is pleased by your own obedience to do what he has called you to do and that a great reward awaits you in heaven!

God's provision of funds to build a home are just further proof of the truth of Matthew 6:33, which has lead and guided us from the beginning of our journey to become Bible translators:

"But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you."

English Course
Martha recently taught a five-day English course designed to help Papua New Guineans get extra practic in English before the annual Translators' Training Course (TTC). Although most Papua New Guineans are taught in English when they attend school, their English is often quite rusty after long periods of nonuse. So Martha's job was to help them get used to speaking and hearing English again as they prepared to begin TTC. It was a great chance for Martha to be involved in helping Papua New Guineans in the work of translating the Bible into their own languages.


Martha's Health
Earlier this year, Martha had her annual heart check-up, and we are very pleased to tell you that the strength of her heart has improved! Shortly after her heart attack in January 2010, her ejection fraction (which measures how much blood your heart pumps each time it beats) was 35%, which signifies heart failure. Before departing for Papua New Guinea, her ejection fraction climbed to about 50%, which is still lower than normal but not in the heart failure range. Earlier this year, however, Martha's ejection fraction was measured at 60%, which is well within the normal range. So we praise God for strengthening Martha's heart! God is good!

Translation Progress
In May we completed the consultant check for the book of Mark. Three men from Enga came to Ukarumpa for this important part of the translation process. One man would read a couple verses of the text and then the other two would tell the consultant in Tok Pisin what they heard. It was a tedious process, but well worth the effort as we improved many minor shortcomings of the text. While the story came through loud and clear in Enga, it was interesting to see how much trouble the men had translating it back into Tok Pisin. Over and over again the men would tell me in Enga, "I know what this word means, but I don't know how to say it in Tok Pisin." It was just further proof of how important it is for people to hear God's Word in their own language, and how difficult it is to really grasp or communicate the Bible in a second language.


Thank You
We want to thank you for your continued prayers and support! We couldn't do what God has called us to do, without each one of you doing what God has called you to do. Your prayers are powerful. As we come closer and closer to releasing our first published Scripture portions in October, we do feel spiritually attacked, and so please pray for God to protect our family and give us His peace that surpasses all understanding.

Peace Amidst Trials

During our last five-week stay in Wabag, we were again reminded of just how much the Enga people need God’s Word in their own language.

The town square across from the police station was filled with students one morning shortly after our most recent arrival in Wabag. I had received word the night before that the Secondary School Coordinator for Enga Province had been murdered in a dispute about who should be the principal of one of the local high schools. The school was immediately closed and the students came to town seeking answers from the government. When they didn’t get the answers they wanted, they started a small scale riot in town, burning down a vehicle that belonged to another school and throwing rocks at the Enga Provincial Government building. I (Adam) was working with our translation team in the Enga Cultural Center just down the hill from the center of town. We heard the popping sound of tear gas guns being fired as the police dispersed the crowd. We smelled the gas as we peeked outside to see people pouring down the hill out of the town center. The employees locked the gate and we continued our work after about a twenty-minute break. Public disorder like this is far too common in Wabag.



One of the Enga translators, Pastor John Singi, told me that he would not be coming into town to work until the situation grew less tense. But after two weeks of not hearing from him, I sent him a text message to check on him. I was shocked when his daughter texted me back to say that he had been robbed, abducted, and beaten, and that he was now in critical condition in the hospital. When I went to visit him, I found out that members of his own tribe had done this to him after falsely accusing him of stealing 8,000 kina ($3,200). They had also tried to make him drink acid, which would have killed him. Fortunately, he batted the acid away with his hand. Unfortunately, the acid landed on his stomach, where it caused several large sores. When I visited him, I could see God’s peace upon him despite the horrible ordeal he had endured. His attackers were unable to rob him of his joy. As a Christian, Pastor John is committed to pursuing peaceful and legal means to seek justice, which is remarkable in this culture of payback and retribution.

In yet another incident, the bishop of the Gutnius Lutheran Church, who had been properly excommunicated by the church because of issues of corruption, was allowed to remain in power when a court overruled the church’s constitution and bylaws. Although disappointed with the decision, we were not surprised by it since one of the judges is the corrupt bishop’s relative. As a result of the decision, our lead translator, Maniosa Yakasa, is legally banned from ministering in the Gutnius Lutheran Church since he was one of the main advocates for the corrupt bishop’s removal. Nevertheless, Maniosa is unfazed by the court’s decision and will continue working on the Enga Bible translation and ministering as God has called him.

A side effect of the court’s decision is that it complicates our plans to build a house at the Lutheran Seminary in the village of Birip since it is technically on the grounds of the Gutnius Lutheran Church. However, years ago the local land owners (the ones who really have the power) forbid the bishop from stepping foot on the seminary campus. We are confident that they will stand behind us and support us if we build a house on the seminary campus. Birip is one of the safest and best places for our family, and so we are continuing with our plans to build there despite the corrupt bishop. Nevertheless, we would appreciate your prayers regarding this matter.

As we share these events with you we realize that many of you might be tempted to worry about our safety. Even though the people of Enga are often violent toward each other, please be assured that they show the utmost kindness and respect toward us. We ourselves are quite safe, so please do not worry about us. At the same time, please pray for Pastor John Singi and for peace among the Enga people. And praise God that, despite the chaos, we are continuing to translate His Word into Enga without delay!