They Came for Husbands...

During our ministry time at JAARS in North Carolina we met many interesting people, including Jo Shetler, a Bible translator who worked in the Philippines.

Jo and her translation partner Ann first went to the Balangao people of the Philippines in 1962 to live with them, learn their language, and translate the Scriptures. The Balangao live among the ancient rice terraces in the mountains of central Luzon. In those days, Jo described the location as “about four centuries north of Manila.”

When she and her partner first arrived there, the people would constantly ask, “Why have you come?” It was inconceivable to them that these single women would leave their families and come so far to live in their village.

Jo and Ann would answer, “We’ve come to put God’s Word in a book for you.”

“Right, but why have you come?” they would say.

“To give you God’s Word in a book so you can read it and understand what God wants to tell you.”

“Sure, but why have you come?”

After a while the people stopped asking. The ladies learned much later the Balangaos had come to their own conclusion on why they had come… to find husbands!

It took 20 years to translate the New Testament. And in those 20 years, deep relationships were formed and the most amazing miracles happened, not least of which was the radical conversion of hundreds and thousands of Balangao and surrounding tribes.

A Thr-r-rilling Story...

True confession: I can’t remember a time when I could trill my r’s, even as a child. And I'm pretty sure I never trilled them to imitate motor sounds, either. I became painfully aware of this inability during junior high Spanish class. Hard as I tried, my unruly tongue would not behave and my rr's came out more ‘thrilled’ than trilled. My teacher had me practice them by repeatedly saying the word for railroad, ferrocarril. It had 2 of those suckers! I have not been fond of railroads since.

I began to think the of the rr sound as my Spanish ‘shibboleth’ (see Judges 12:6). Sadly, had I been an Ephraimite and required to say the word ferrocarril, that would have been the end. I would not have made it over the Jordan.

Español dr-r-read...
I can confirm that yes, God has a sense of humor—why else would He send us to missionary service in Guatemala, where they habla Español? The Wycliffe folks there of course wanted us to come up to speed with Spanish before starting our service because they didn't want us to be handicapped by an inability to function in the national language. Drat and dread. I thought about replying with, "That's okay. I'll just keep speaking English, you know—my mother tongue!" Wisdom prevailed, however, and off we went to language school. We lived with a Guatemalan family, and their kids seemed bemused by my 'rr' attempts. It just didn't seem fair that Jeanette and the kids could trill so well. Our youngest child became very fond of making those [irritating] trilling motor sounds. My language instructor had me practice by saying the word ferrocarril over and over and over. By now I really disliked railroads.

Of Dogs and Fruit
In spite of LOTS of advice from well-meaning friends (including Bible translators and linguists), I hit the rr 'wall'. I even tried tongue-flapping exercises  (NOTE TO SELF: Do not practice these in public!). But no matter what I tried, I just could not stop from turning dogs into fruit.

Mayans to the r-r-rescue...
I discovered something while living in Guatemala: Mayans live there and many wear cowboy hats. I'm not sure where that came from, but when they speak Spanish it's common for them to substitute a ‘shr’ kind of sound (as in the word ‘shrewd’) for the trill. (It has something to do with pronunciation in their native Mayan languages.) I found I could do that sound pretty well [though I note it sounds more like a car wash than an imitation motor sound]. So I learned to get by speaking rr words with a Mayan 'shr' accent. Shrewd, eh? For some reason no one ever confused me with a real Mayan.

Epilogue
In spite of my inability to correctly pronounce the RR sound, we were able to lead normal and productive lives throughout our nearly 8 years of service in Guatemala. I spoke Spanish every day, and managed a computer department with Guatemalan employees. God used our skills to put His Word into the mother tongue for several Mayan languages and helped the translators with processing primers, dictionaries, New Testaments, and even the first complete Bible for a Mayan language! The best part: there will be people in heaven because of the work that was done there. I'm pretty sure some of them won't be able to trill their r's, either.

Final thought: I wonder how the say 'railroad' in heaven?

June-August Happenings

Greetings from the Pacific NW!

Wycliffe launched a new website in June and I was able to help out with the Mobilization / Recruiting parts of the site. It's a major change, and bugs are still being ironed out. We're still working on transferring content from the recruiting sites I developed to the new main site, and discovering and fixing bugs. I like the new site, though--check it out at www.wycliffe.org.

As I write this we are in prime huckleberry season in the Northwest, and Jeanette's thoughts have definitely turned to the mountains where they grow (and seem to hide!) We were able to get away to camp for a few days in late July to the Yaak River area in NW Montana, and had a wonderful time of enjoying God's creation and being together in it with Maya the dog. It was her first time camping, and she had never seen moving water before. I think lakes are more her style. We camped at a nice little spot near Yaak Falls. Yes, we found some huckleberries!

Nature Camping in Montana

A major storm had blown through just before our arrival, and many of the forest roads were blocked by fallen trees. We explored up to Northwest Peak the following day along a major forest road, and in many places had to squeeze through openings just barely the width of our car. Glad we weren't there when it happened.

The same storm came through Spokane and delayed our departure as we found out the next day that a large tree had come down in the pasture and struck Beth's gelding, Dante. We are thankful it was a glancing blow--just soft tissue damage and no broken bones. The first night after that was touch and go for Dante, and Beth spent the night in the stall to administer pain meds and just be there for him. (She is very attached to him.) He's been recovering well since then and is still a bit sore and lame, but that seems to be improving with time.

In June, Beth's mare delivered a long-awaited foal who is officially named 'Journey North' (but we call her 'Snugs'). She's so cute, and very friendly. It will be hard to see her go when she is weaned.

Back from NC

We traveled to NC in May to attend son Paul's graduation from UNCC, receiving his PhD in BioMedical Engineering. After the graduation we rented a cabin at the beach and had some nice family time.We were blessed to have our whole family together for Mother's Day!

 From the beach we traveled back to Durham and helped them clean and pack in a whirlwind preparation for their move to Toronto where Paul will begin his post-doc research. We returned to Spokane on Saturday, May 17, and Paul and Ansley started driving to Toronto the next day with their 2 cats and as much as they could fit in the car.

 

Since then they have been settling and adjusting. We Skyped with them last week and got a mini-tour of their apartment. One of the things they love is that they can walk just about everywhere--to the store, restaurant, church, parks, and Paul walks just 3 blocks to catch a shuttle to his new research facility. Ansley continues to work for her company and transition to a remote assignment. Aren't computers wonderful? (Okay, maybe most of the time? How about some of the time? ...)

Back in Spokane, I (Chris) have been working as part of a team on the new Wycliffe website which just went live this last week. We're integrating content for Recruitment and Mobilization and planning how to go forward with more content and changes. We've also been very busy with the Perspectives course. We just helped teach a coordinator's workshop, and we are tentatively planning for 2 classes here in Spokane in 2015. I don't have much of a problem staying busy, though figuring out which thing to do next is always an issue.

This is my first update for 2014, uh, maybe just in time for Valentine’s Day(?)  January was a busy month for us with the startup of the Spokane Perspectives course, and a 2-week trip I made to Orlando for Wycliffe mobilization meetings. Because of limited budgets, we mobilizers don’t get together very often, but it was a fantastic time—deeply spiritual, emphasizing our dependence on God for what we’re doing, with lots of sharing and practical ideas. I was invited to help with the worship and so I brought my mandolin along (it has a lot of miles on it!). The week after the conference I was due back in Orlando for meetings with Wycliffe’s Marketing folks. Since I had a long weekend ahead I flew up to North Carolina to spend time with son Paul and his wife Ansley.
 
As of January 15, Paul is a newly-minted PhD in the field of BioMedical Engineering. Good news—he says we can still call him Paul. (I tell people he’s the kind of doctor that doesn’t help people!) He successfully defended his dissertation and is now looking at post-doc (internship) opportunities. People have been congratulating me, but hey, he did all the work! Way to go, Paul & Ansley!
On my return to Orlando I attended a center meeting where they introduced the newest Wycliffe members, who had just arrived for training and orientation. Surprise! Over at the next table was a familiar-looking young lady. I first met Laurel when she was only 5 years old; she was a fellow missionary kid and classmate of Beth. Now as a pediatrician and a mom with 3 kids, she and her husband are headed to Thailand to work in vernacular media for Scripture and language projects. And yet another surprise—another young couple, Andrew and Elizabeth, had attended our Spokane Perspectives class in 2008. Andrew came up to say we were a big reason why they are there now a part of Wycliffe! (And we thought we were just helping with the Perspectives class.)

I'm driving, I'm driving!

When we were serving with Wycliffe in Guatemala we often looked for fun things to do on weekends, like getting out and exploring the country, and doing dangerous things like eating food from street vendors (i.e., "Don’t tell mom!", or DTM for short). Another thing in the “DTM” category happened when I would take the kids for “driving lessons” to a place that had lots of wide open space and empty streets. With the kids sitting on my lap and me operating the brakes and gas pedal, my hands would hover over theirs on the steering wheel as we drove along at the breakneck speed of 10 miles per hour. Beth (always more expressive/ dramatic) would scream in delight, “I’m driving, I’m driving!!!!”
As I reflect on that fun time, I see how it applies to our Wycliffe ministry, especially since we returned to Spokane. We have interacted with many people at missions conferences, local schools, missions events, Perspectives classes, and even through the Internet. Some have joined Wycliffe in to work in translation, literacy, IT, and other fields to help the Bible translation effort, and others have gone on to other missions and ministries. That's very rewarding, and it would be tempting to look at the results and think, ‘Wow, look what we did!’. But in a way that would be like Beth screaming, “I’m driving, I’m driving!”. Yes we have played a part in their lives (and it was fun!), but we really had a small part, and we see the much bigger part God played. His hands covered ours on the steering wheel, and His foot on the brakes and gas pedal in the lives of these precious people. (Note: Jeanette tends to look at each of them now as ‘our’ kids!). It’s fun to follow them in their ministry careers now and see what God is doing through them.

Prayer items

• Race to 2025 event is coming up in March -- we need more people to register for the event in order for it to take place
• Navigating job changes for Chris, interacting with new teams and lots to learn
• Finances needed for trip to NC in May for Paul's graduation

So, what is our job? Our job is to be a channel, one through which God works to accomplish His purposes in His time. You are really a big part of that channel, too, through your partnership and prayers. Think of it: there are people now serving in missions because of you! We are very thankful for you, and we pray that 2014 will be a year of blessings and joy for you and your family.
Blessings,

Chris & Jeanette.

A new role for Chris!

This past year Chris had fun and filled a need by creating some interim websites to help with Wycliffe's mobilization effort (see explorewycliffe.org, managersformissions.com, and missiontec.com). The site content will eventually be incorporated into a new and coming Wycliffe website, but until that time his sites are up and running and helping people to explore missions and their fit with Bible translation.

He also ventured into the 'marketing' area by exploring how Google Adwords could help Wycliffe find qualified people for critical positions, and had some great success with ads seeking Christian math and science teachers to serve overseas teaching missionary kids.

His new role is being a 'bridge' between Wycliffe's mobilization and marketing groups, where he will be using his technical skills to help engage more people to become aware of Bible translation opportunities and discover how they can use their skills to become part of the team. Sounds like even more fun!