67% and new momentum

This is very exciting! Look at how God is providing! He has brought some new ministry partners onto our team, and he has stirred the hearts of some long-time partners to increase their support. We appreciate each and every one of you.

If you would like to join our team as a prayer and financial partner, check out our Wycliffe website here:
www.wycliffe.org/partner/2EBEFB

Is it the Dead Sea or the Salt Sea?

We're in the final stages of preparing the book of Matthew for publication in the Jita language! Now we're working on the map. The translators said that a map would really help our readers to understand the context of the book. I certainly agree. First, we had to choose a map template. Our only templates are for the entire New Testament so they list EVERY location mentioned in the gospels. We only want the locations specifically mentioned in Matthew. Therefore, I had to go through the whole book of Matthew and list out all of the places, and then go through the Jita translation to find their corresponding Jita spellings.

When that was finished, we then had to decide how we want to label the Dead Sea and the Mediterranean Sea. Neither of them are mentioned in the book of Matthew, but we thought it might be helpful as points of reference. The Mediterranean Sea is called "The Great Sea" or "The Western Sea" in the Old Testament and the Dead Sea is called "The Salt Sea" or "The Eastern Sea." Which names should we use? We ended up choosing the more common names for the sake of our readers.

Back to 61%, and rising

Hello friends! We're so thankful to God for all of the ways that he has blessed us. We're thankful for the many friends and churches who are partnering with us in bringing God's Word to the Jita people. We're also thankful that we can continue doing the work from America. Unfortunately, the cost of living in America is significantly higher than in Tanzania. As a result, our support level has dropped to 61%. Please pray that God would bring us back up to full support quickly. We need to be at 100% of our support so that we can focus our full-time energy on the translation work.

What can you do to help?
1. Pray that our faithful, all-powerful Father will move in the hearts of people and lead them to join our team as prayer and financial partners.

2. Join the team! If God is stirring in your heart, we invite you to join the team. You can sign up here:
Ben and Jeannette's Wycliffe page

3. Tell others about us. Talk to your friends and pastors and church missions committees about us. We can give you information to share with them.

Thank you!

Spell-checking the book of Matthew

Did you know that the book of Matthew in the Jita language contains 23,015 words? I'm currently spell-checking every...single...word.
Thankfully, our translation software has many tools to help with the process, but it still takes a lot of careful concentration. For example, while spell-checking Matthew 26:34 where Jesus tells Peter that Peter will deny him three times, I found these four words all translated as "you will deny me."

waanyigaanire
waanyiigaanire
wanyigaanire
wanyiigaanire
Which spelling is correct?

If we break down the word into its smallest units of meaning we find:
wa-a-ny-igaan-ire = waanyigaanire

Please pray for us as we finish these final steps in the book of Matthew so that it can be published!

What is a centurion? and other translation complexities

 Jesus and the Centurion by Paolo Veronese, 1571

Here's a little taste of the complexities of Bible translation. We'll start with a simple verse like Matthew 8:5. "When he had entered Capernaum, a centurion came forward to him, appealing to him." Sounds easy, right?

Here are some of the questions that I would ask while checking the Jita translation of that verse.

1. Who is "he" referring to? The closest referent is the leper from verse 4. But "he" actually refers to Jesus. Is this clear in the Jita translation?

2. What is Capernaum? A person, a country, a building? It's actually an inhabited settlement. But is it a town, a city, or a village? Should we include a map in our translation?

3. How do we spell Capernaum in natural Jita? The Jita language has no letter "c" by itself. And Jita has rules about every syllable having one consonant and one vowel (sometimes a long vowel). Finally, every Jita word ends with a vowel. Therefore, we get [Kaperinaawumu].

4. What is a centurion? It's a Roman military officer commanding about one hundred men who ranks under a tribune. This concept is totally foreign to Jita language and culture. How do we communicate the intended meaning? We could transliterate the Greek hekatontarkes. But that's not very helpful. We could use the entire long definition. But that breaks the flow of the passage. Maybe we should use a short phrase that captures the meaning. If we do that, should we also include a footnote with more explanation? Should we include an entry in the Glossary?

5. Some Bible versions put the words "appealing to him" in verse 6. What should we do?

6. I think the most interesting phrase is "came forward to him." The Jita language captures this meaning with one word, [^naamujaa-ko]. Literally it means, "and then he went to him there." The little ^ symbol in front of the word is a tone marker. Without the tone marker, the meaning would be "I went to him there this morning."

...and many, many more questions.

In the end, here's the verse in Jita,
Omwanya gunu Yeesu :eengiiye mu‑musi gwa Kaperinaawumu, omwangarisi umwi wa abhasirikare bha Echiruumi ˆnaamujaa‑ko.

Pray that the Jita people will read and understand this story about Jesus and the centurion. Pray that they would trust Jesus as the one who has power over sickness and power to grant salvation to everyone who has faith in him...even the Jita people!

Jesus Messiah for Jita kids

We just finished translating a gospel comic book for kids called Jesus Messiah!  When we tested the translation in Jita villages, the children loved looking at the pictures and hearing the story of Jesus in their own language. I love the subtitle that the translators chose for this book, "The Man who Changes People's Hearts." Now we're praying that Jesus would change the hearts of many Jita children as they see and hear the gospel in this book. We're also praying that this book will help Jita children become more familiar with reading the Jita language so that they are ready to read the New Testament when we print it in a couple years.

Helping the Zinza team

The Zinza chose the picture of Paul with hair while the Jita chose the picture of bald Paul!

Praise the Lord that now the Zinza people have access to more Scripture!!

Do you remember when Ben helped the Jita team publish their translation of 1-2 Thessalonians, 1-2 Timothy, and Titus last year? We're so thankful that the Jita people can read and enjoy those beautiful portions of God's Word. Because of that recent experience, Ben was asked to help the Zinza team publish the same books. The Zinza people live in Tanzania, not too far from the Jita people.

The process of printing a portion of Scripture requires a ton of detail work and organization. Ben was communicating with the translators, the translation advisor, the linguistic consultant, the typesetter, the printer, the budget-holder, and the proof-reader.

Finally, the books were printed and delivered to the Zinza people. They had a special dedication service to celebrate the occasion.

And no celebration is complete without a little dancing.

Pray that the Zinza people will be comforted, convicted, and strengthened in their faith as they read God's Word in their own language.