Sarah Barnes is in the process of joining Wycliffe in Canada and will go into a role recruiting a mobilising more people to get involved in the translation movement. You can read more about her on her blog – she’s still got a way to go raising her support before she can start properly so you can see how that’s going too.

One page worth taking an extended look at, is the collection of videos she’s put together illustrating all the different aspects covered by the work of Wycliffe Bible Translators.

Photograph from Ruth Hubbard's blog http://ruthhubbard.wordpress.com/2010/05/25/gloria-a-dios/

Ruth Hubbard is Vice-President of Communications for Wycliffe Bible Translators in the US. Recently she was in Guatemala, where Cameron Townsend – the founder of Wycliffe Bible Translators – first recognised the need for Bible translation.

In a recent blog post Ruth reflected on how things have changed.

• When Cameron Townsend started work he thought that there were about 1,000 languages in the world. It turns out that there are around 7,000.
• In Guatemala it’s possible to see the results of the early days of Bible translation. Not only are there Christians as a result of the Bibles that were produced in the minority languages, but, these Christians are involved in leadership within the church.

Uncle Cam (that’s what some call him) had a vision that was both expansive and limited. He saw a day when people from every language community would have access to God’s Word and therefore could decide for themselves whether to enter into a relationship with Him or reject that invitation. That vision is in the process of being fulfilled. Today there are just over 2,000 language communities with no access to Scripture who need it, and around 2,000 with a translation in progress.

You can read the whole piece on Ruth’s blog Hubbard’s Cupboard

It just got me wondering, what do we take for granted today that within 80 years will have changed completely?

Bible translation in Mozambique from Wycliffe International on Vimeo.

Elvis Presley’s Bible part of the Museum of the Book

May 11th – 14th I spent the week with colleagues at the Christian Resources Exhibition at Sandown Park.

This is a giant trade show for all things church related, so there’s everything from pews and vestments to insurance companies and builders. Some things are wonderful, others are quite strange, it really depends on what mood you are in.

We were taking part in the Biblefresh exhibition so we went equipped with a number of Bibles from different parts of the world.

We shared the room with a number of Biblefresh partners as well as the Museum of the Book. Based somewhere in East London, the Museum of the

Book is a collection of different Bibles, either owned by the famous/infamous or historically significant. At CRE there was a copy of the Coronation Bible, an early Wycliffe Bible and Elvis Presley’s Bible, the cover of which he’d signed and listed various dates in his family history.

It was a treat to be in the same room as this exhibition. Especially as people who would stop to look at the exhibits would also stop to take a look at the various language Bibles we had out on display, giving us the chance to chat.

This isn’t a political blog post, although, you don’t have to think too hard to come up with some items for prayer that centre around national or international politics. Some days you have to wonder why we ‘humanity’ seem to insist on believing that we have all the answers ourselves. Instead, this is about one of the busiest weeks in the life of Wycliffe Bible Translators in the UK.

This is the first week of the From Eden to Eternity Tour. It all kicks off tomorrow in Exeter and then runs for another 26 days around England and Wales. Please continue to pray for the cast and crew who will be travelling thousands of miles by road and sleeping in a new bed almost every night of the tour.

Tomorrow is also the start of the International Christian Resources Exhibition. I’m running the Wycliffe stand for the week, with support from different colleagues for each day. It’s also the week where the Biblefresh book will be launched.

Finally, tomorrow colleagues from the European Training Programme are involved in the final stages of approval for a new Masters degree. Months of hard work and planning rest on the outcomes of tomorrow’s meetings.

As you can probably guess, this is a very important, stressful and challenging time for a number of people. Please remember them all in your prayers.

Examples of the impact of translation work can be found in the new Words For Life, Wycliffe’s UK magazine.

Dave Pearson’s article, Transformed Hearts, Transformed Lives is an excellent example of how material produced in the mother tongue of a community can make a spiritual and material impact. In it he writes…

Wycliffe’s language development work produces transformed lives through the translated Word and through translated development information. People grow better crops and live better lives. They care for their environment and they care for their neighbours. They learn about justification by faith and oral rehydration solution. Wycliffe’s work brings both spiritual and material blessing.

You can read the whole magazine online as a pdf, or order future copies through the website.

Wycliffe is a huge organisation with thousands of people working around the world on a whole host of different projects. Yes, we all long to see people with the Bible in their own language so that they can hear about God’s love for this world themselves, but the parts that go to make up that whole are numerous.

So it’s always good when I can hear from an independent source about their view of Wycliffe. In this case it was Stafford Carson, Moderator for the Presbyterian Church in Northern Ireland. He recently visited the Wycliffe offices in Belfast, Northern Ireland, and this is what he said afterwards…

My visit to the Belfast offices of the Wycliffe Bible Translators revealed that there are many people, from many nations, who are fully committed to the task of translating the Bible into the mother tongue of millions of people in our world.  Their strap line is “The Bible: the Story everybody needs”, and they are enthusiastic about bringing that story to everyone.

…and later…

What made my visit to Wycliffe Bible Translators so energising and interesting was the way the Wycliffe members understand the Bible as story. The Bible is full of stories.

It’s worth reading his whole post, which you can do here, because it illustrates so well what we are in the business of doing.

Today though it’s just the M40 that’s making a noise as all flights have been grounded because of the volcanic ash that’s floating around in the atmosphere.

If you want to know the affect that volcanic ash in the atmosphere can have on aircraft, the following YouTube video from Air Crash Investigation should be able to help. Don’t worry, nobody dies!

Although this is making things here nice and peaceful, you could spare a thought for those people supposed to be here at the weekend as part of the Engage orientation. Unfortunately, Stephanie Angus, who is organising things, was supposed to be flying in from Belfast.

While the conversation started with him being very amiable and ready to ‘do me a deal’, it didn’t end so well as he suggested that the price he was offering me space at was less that someone would spend on a good night out. At that I pointed out that I worked as a volunteer without a salary and that I dream of spending that kind of money on a night out! I think he understood that it was the end of the conversation.

Now the truth is the deal he was offering was superb, but it wouldn’t have produced any meaningful results for us so I didn’t see the point of advertising. Especially as he was asking for an item on language education which is a specialised market. Maybe if he was offering the space for a general piece about Wycliffe Bible Translators it would have been more tempting.

Truth is, I feel pretty sorry for people tasked with selling space in local papers. When I have the choice to do something generic to a wide audience, or targeted at people who are likely to be interested in what we have to offer I’m going to take the second option almost 100% of the time. Unfortunately, the local press just can’t offer that.