'God is somebody who cares about my language': Bible translation changing lives

In northern Brazil, Scripture is beginning to be shared in a language that millions of people speak. Ed Weaver with Spoken Worldwide says these language speakers are often overlooked and humiliated by others in their country. They are marginalized, underserved, and lacking the Word of God.

An oral Bible translation team recently visited a remote village of the people group. They wanted to learn about village life and meet some of the local people.

Weaver says, "They knocked on this one guy’s door. And the guy let them in. His name is Jackson. And they came into the house, and there were empty liquor bottles everywhere."

They shared with Jackson an oral Bible recording of the Christmas story in Luke chapter two. As he listened, he was overwhelmed with emotion.

"It was the first time he’d ever heard his language in any kind of recording," says Weaver. "His response was cursing and saying, ‘Oh, this is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever heard.’"

He was excited to hear more, and the team promised to return with other recordings of God’s Word. When they were leaving on a river ferry, they saw Jackson come down to the shore on a motorbike. He excitedly waved and shouted thanks to the team. They hope that he may be a person of peace on future visits who will help to share the Scripture recordings with more people in the village.

Weaver says, "Here’s somebody that, you know, is not a believer, never had heard the gospel, and now all of a sudden he says, ‘Okay, this God is somebody who cares about me, cares about my language. I want to learn more about this God."

The team is currently working to finish the translation of the Gospel of John.

"We’re fans of oral Bible translation, because we believe that we’re getting to the people who have been truly forgotten."

Weaver says, "There are at least 1500 languages that haven’t even been started yet. And these are truly the last and the least of these, and those are the people that it’s clear God wants His word to go to them."

"Whether you want to be part of the prayer team, whether you want to be part of our donor crew, anyway that you can help, we need that help," says Weaver.

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This story originally appeared at Mission Network News and is republished here with permission.