Tag Archives: Somau Garia

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Racing Towards the Finish Line

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Building Up to the Production Phase

Translating the New Testament in Papua New Guinea is, for most, a lifetime endeavor. Angela and I started learning the language and culture of the Somau Garia people in the late 1990s. Life in the late nineties was analog, so language learning was done with a little notebook and a cheap Bic ink pen. Photos were developed from my 35mm Ricoh SLR camera. Evenings were spent reading to our children from printed books, like Lord of the Rings or The Chronicles of Narnia. Computer work was done at desktop computers in the city of Madang, at the Barton McElroy Translation Center.

Much has changed since then. Technology has provided better solar panels, batteries, and communications. Life is digital. The cell tower a mile, line of sight from our house on the slopes of Mount Somau allow us to access internet, email, etc. while in the village. Laptop computers last all day on a single charge. Software has made the task more efficient.

Production by the Numbers

After the pandemic we entered the most productive phase of translation we have known in 28 years. In 2022 – 2023 we brought Luke’s Gospel and his history, Acts of the Apostles, through all the checks necessary to print and circulate those books. Those two books comprise about 27% of the New Testament. During those years the Lord added many young people to our team, many of whom revived and pushed the literacy program forward, writing and producing Somau Garia reading materials and primers.

A portion of Acts Chapter 1 in Somau Garia …

In 2024 we brought 1 & 2 Thessalonians, 1 & 2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1,2, & 3 John (13 books comprised of 1039 verses comprising 13% of the New Testament) through the checks necessary to print and distribute those books.

By March, 2025, we had checked Matthew’s Gospel, comprised of 1071 verses or 13.46% of the New Testament through the checks necessary to print and distribute that book.

As I write this post, Romans is in process and is scheduled to be checked in June. John’s Gospel is on the schedule for late this year–a further 16.5% of the New Testament.

Giving Meaning to the Numbers

But Bible translation is not simply a matter of managing data and producing material. Bible translation is about building people through education in using the Scriptures. It is about showing them how to follow Jesus as his disciples. This ministry equips local leaders to use the Bible in their churches, communities, and families. Translation is concerned with transformation.

The further we move toward the finish line, the more we see this kind of godly, positive change happening. God the Father, through Jesus Christ, by the Holy Spirit, is raising up a generation of world changers, compelled by the love of Christ, to take God’s word to their people.

For example, two of the young men on the translation team were once, not all that long ago, feared for their violent, murderous behavior. These young men were children when Angela and my children were growing up in the village. Over the years, being exposed to God’s word in their heart language (the various portions made available bit by bit), they began to soften to the message of the gospel. Our head translator confronted them and then invited them to follow Jesus. They both surrendered to the light and life found in Jesus.

One of them is a firebrand preacher. He memorizes Scripture and passionately preaches. The other is meek and gentle and draws others through kindness and grace. Both are deeply committed to helping us finish the translation of the Somau Garia New Testament.

Please Pray With Us

Angela and I would appreciate your prayers as we move toward the completion of the Somau Garia New Testament. As you pray, please pray:

  • Pray that we will be wise and discerning in our oversight of the translation program
  • Pray that we will be well provisioned in the coming months:
    • Spiritually for
      • inner resources to both grow and remain spiritually vital throughout the intensity of the coming months
    • Physically for
      • healthy bodies, protection from sickness or injury
    • Psychologically for
      • flexibility through almost continual transition and travel
      • peace in each situation
    • Financially for
      • adapting to the inflation Americans have known over the last few years
      • travel expenses
      • the coming expenses involved in printing the Somau Garia New Testament (in 2027)
  • Thank God for loving us and providing for our deepest need: to have our sin dealt with and to be reconciled to Him.

Thank You

Angela and I appreciate you giving your valuable time to reading through this brief update. Thank you for taking the time. Thank you also for praying. It makes a difference.

Click here for a Photo Gallery of Uria Village
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Hello, Dear Reader. Perhaps you noted that there have not been any new posts for quite a while. It has been a hectic few years, to say the least. Back surgeries, the COVID pandemic, and a return to Papua New Guinea to resume translation of the Somau Garia New Testament have all squeezed our time and resources, leaving little for keeping the website current.

That said, it is time to take up the digital pen and begin scribbling again. It is an important season for recruiting prayer partners and to keep you abreast of each stage as we close in on completion of the New Testament. It is also a time to continually turn our attention to the Lord and his provision.

My prayer is that the coming posts will be informative, motivational, and useful to you and your walk by faith. In order to help make your prayer more informed and specific, I’ll be writing a series of articles about how translation is done, what the aims are, and to what end we are laboring.

I look forward to dialoging with you along the way, hopefully inspiring you to love Jesus more deeply, to know more about how He is providing for the needs of Somau Garia speaking people, and inspiring you to act on what you have either learned or had reinforced.

Thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to stop by and spend a few moments here.

Blessings!

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As the pandemic continued to interrupt international travel and the months dragged on, Angela and I had some weighty decisions to make. When should we attempt passage to Papua New Guinea? What risks were involved in returning to a developing nation amidst a global pandemic? How could we help when we did return?

James says this of weighty decisions:

If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.

James 1:5, ESV

Ignore this exhortation at your own peril. We gave it due diligence. After prayer and discussion, we decided that our daughter should remain in the States and that Angela and I should return to Papua New Guinea.

We juggled translation responsibilities (including final exegetical checks of Acts via video-conferencing), preparation of the stacks of documents needed for travel during the pandemic, purchase of necessities for the move, and, of course, moving out of our house.

As our To-Do list dwindled, our excitement (and silent dread?) swelled. The silent dread was for all the good-byes, the inescapable change, adjustment, and the deep dive into the unknown. Our excitement? We were returning to friends, co-workers, and worthy work.

I will spare you the finer details of the trip. It was 50+ hours, involving five major airports and a few hours in a bush plane over jungles, oxbow lakes, and rugged mountains. Then there was the 14 days of quarantine at a mission base above 5,000 feet in the New Guinea Highlands.

View from the Kassam Pass into the Ramu Valley of Papua New Guinea
The view from the Kassam Pass into the Ramu Valley, at the junction of Eastern Highlands, Morobe, and Madang Provinces.

Crossing the Planet

Hopes and Plans for 2022

Proverbs 19:21 reads: “Many are the plans in a person’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.” The person seeking to follow in the footsteps of Jesus must pray, plan, and push on toward the upward call to which they’ve been called.

Henceforth, we’ve put some major way points on the calendar for 2022. We invite you to pray with us as we attempt to achieve these things in Jesus’ name.

  • Comprehension check of Luke’s Gospel
  • Comprehension check of Acts of the Apostles
  • Train translators and pastors on the translation of and pastoral application of Hebrews
  • Consultant check Luke and Acts
  • Train translators and pastors on the translation of and pastoral application of Revelation

Pray with Us

We invite you to pray with us regarding moving this proposed milestones ahead. As you pray, consider the reality that the completion of work on Luke and Acts constitutes 27% of the New Testament. By the end of 2022 it is possible that over a quarter (more) of the New Testament will be accessible to Somau Garia speakers!

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Close the Gap

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Uria Village, Madang, Papua New Guinea – Rainy Season, late 1990’s.  It was a season of tragedy. Among other things, the wife of one of our dear friends died in childbirth. The hike to the village where she was to be buried was three hours’ hike away, across a couple of ridgelines, and I (Todd) was sick with what I thought was malaria. Angela would stay home in Uria with the kids and I would attend the gathering.

storm clouds gathering

Storm clouds were gathering as I prepared to leave with my Somau Garia neighbors. I stared at the dark clouds and into the dark jungle and prayed. The bush treks around Uria are stony and slick, narrow and uneven. About an hour into the hike, I was feeling nauseated and dizzy and became disheartened by what I saw ahead.   Before me was huge gap in the path—six feet wide and a hundred feet deep. It was beginning to rain. I stopped in my tracks and considered what to do. It was either turn around and add hours to the journey or take a leap of faith, as it were, and keep going.

Angela and I are in the process of resourcing the translation of the Somau Garia New Testament. We have been hiking this path for a few years now. We’ve just come around a corner and are staring at a gap in the path—just wide enough to be scary, just short enough to be doable.

Fortunately, we don’t travel alone. When I was hiking the path to the funeral, one of my friends leapt across ahead of me in order to “catch” me on the other side. In resourcing the translation of the Somau Garia New Testament, we need ministry partners who will either repair the path or leap across and “catch” us.

During the remainder of 2014, we are asking the Lord to close the gap between the current commitments that have been made toward resourcing the translation of the Somau Garia New Testament and what is still needed.

Would you consider being one of those God is calling to close the gap?

If you are interested in joining the prayer and provision team click here to join the provision team or click here to email us with your name and email address to join the prayer team.

Thank you for prayerfully considering your part in making the Word of God available in the Somau Garia language.

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Breaking Through the Barriers–Day 9

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Breaking Through the Barriers Graphic Day 9

 

“There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.” –1 John 4:18

The long history of false gods and bodange to shamanic religion has created a fatalistic fear in Somau Garia (and many other Melanesian) culture. There is an ever-present fear of reprisal for breaking taboos. Examples of reprisal: being waylaid and consumed by demon monsters en route to the place of the dead, sudden death while sleeping, sickness, or ruined crops. Ask God to break through the barrier of fear to establish the reality of his love for the Somau Garia people.

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Breaking Through the Barriers–Day 7

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Breaking Through the Barriers Graphic Day 7

“For they themselves report concerning us the kind of reception we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God . . .” –1 Thessalonians 1:9

Somau Garia culture is populated by numerous “bush gods” who hold many devotees to this day. Fear reigns supreme in many peoples’ lives. Ask God to break through barriers of old bondanges and allegiances to false gods. Pray that through coming into a life-transforming relationship with Jesus, fear will flee and our friends will walk in freedom and joy.

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Breaking Through the Barriers–Day 6

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Breaking Through the Barriers Graphic Day 6

“The word of God is living and active . . . discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.”–Hebrews 4:12

Garia Mark for Web

The Gospel According to Mark (see above) has been available in the Somau Garia language since 2007. Ask God to break through the ignorance of his word, his character, his power, his salvation by means of this slender little book. Ask God to break through the barriers of illiteracy  and inaccessibility to his word that these precious men, women, and children might know Him who died for them.

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Hope Amidst Chaos

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God, from ancient times, has done unusual, unexpected, and sometimes unwelcome things in order to draw the attention of mankind to the fact that is is the one and only God and that He is at work in the affairs of mankind.

Isaiah 41:19 – 20 reads:

I will put in the desert the cedar and the acacia, the myrtle and the olive. I will set pines in the wasteland, the fir and the cypress together, so that people may see and consider and understand, that the hand of the Lord has done this, that the Holy One of Israel has created it.”

Cypress is something that we have a lot of here in Florida. When Isaiah writes that God will set the fir and the cypress together in the wasteland, he is indicating that God is about to do something spectacular. Cypress is the quintessential tree of the vast swamps of Florida (OK, they call them hammocks down here, but that is for a different discussion). The cypress is the buttress-rooted tree that requires vast amounts of water to stay alive and grow–not something you find in the middle of the desert.

A blue heron among the cypress trees.

A blue heron among the cypress trees.

Easter Sunday 2007 the Gospel According to Mark in the Somau Garia language (Xoiteupo Asinaku Kuna Makie Xayawoki) was dedicated to the Lord and distributed. This book has been in circulation for seven years. Our family has been away almost as long. The desert has come in those seven years.

A major player on the Somau Garia team became gravely ill a few years ago with a medical condition that left him weakened and virtually crippled. There was a resurgence of animistic practice among some of the villages. Satan unleashed his forces, lashing out at those who would be changed by the Word of God in the heart language.

Yet God delights in planting cypress in the desert. He is a good Father who listens to the prayers of his children and leads them in the way of blessing. Last year the very team member left weakened by crippling disease continued to work on drafting books of the New Testament in the hope of help from the mission community. He dropped by the Pioneer Bible Translators office in Madang and asked, “Did you see the Owen family when you were in the U.S.?” The response dripped with the oil of the Holy Spirit. “No. I don’t think that they will be back. But, go back to your village and pray and see what God will do.” This friend did that very thing.

God did something completely unexpected. About the same time, I set aside a day for prayer and reflection, not knowing anything of what was happening on the other side of the Pacific. I was finished with the day and packing up my things to go home when, as clear as day, God impressed upon my spirit, “It is time to return to PNG and finish what you started.”

It has been an arduous journey, yet God continues to work. The wheels are coming off of the bus of this world and yet God is still concerned with the poor and forgotten. He still loves and cares for those whom the world despises. Here in the middle of the tempest of 21st century life, God moves, God loves, God plants cypress trees in the desert.

What an opportunity lies before all of us.

Our prayer and our hope is to be on the field again by October 2014. God is working. God is raising up partners. God is answering prayers. He loves to surprise us, “that the people might see . . . that the hand of the Lord has done this . . .” Wow!

What an amazing joy there is in participating in what God is doing in this generation!

How Best to Partner:

  • We are in need of monthly ministry partners. You can click here to go to our Donate page to find instructions on how to get involved financially.
  • We are in need of special donations to cover expenses like airfare, set up costs, and the purchase of a four-wheel drive.
  • We are in need of intercessory prayer partners to take the needs of the Somau Garia people and our family before the throne of God. You can download a 31 day prayer guide by clicking here.

Please feel to drop us a note by clicking here with any questions, comments, etc. We’d love to get better acquainted.

 

 

 

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Please Pray–May 20, 2014

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There is movement in heavenly places, as there has been for some time in regards to making the New Testament accessible to the Somau Garia people of Papua New Guinea. There has been more visible evidence of that movement in our lives lately. Momentum is building and things are starting to move forward at a healthy pace here. It is more important than ever that we bring prayer to bear on this season of ministry–as we ramp up to moving overseas.

Sunrise, first day of the week, Atlantic Ocean, Florida coast, rejoicing in the Lord.

Sunrise, first day of the week, Atlantic Ocean, Florida coast, rejoicing in the Lord.

  • Pray that God will continue to make us aware of churches or groups of people that He wants to join us in this historic opportunity to make the New Testament accessible to the Somau Gare people.
  • Pray that we will exercise wisdom and discernment in knowing how best to convey the blessing, opportunity, and benefit to the Kingdom of God in seeing this through.
  • Pray that there will be no hindrance to getting on the field this year.
  • Thank God for allowing us to see the movement in the heavenly places and to be encouraged by it.
  • Thank God for moving in the hearts of men and women, in churches and families to provide for this vital need.
  • Thank God for showing us the full extent of his love in both the death of Jesus–and his resurrection.
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Please Pray–April 29, 2014

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Please Pray April 29 2014 Header

Imagine being stranded on a desert island in the middle of the south seas. You find two crates ashore. One contains three years’ worth of MRE’s (Meal-Ready to Eat: self-heating, preserved complete meals). The other crate contains only Bibles.

You have nothing to do but make your hut, build a signal fire, and wait for a rescue. You rip open an MRE, activate the little heater in it, and find some shade. You’ve never read the Bible before, though you’ve heard of it. You figure that it is good to simply start reading what appears to be the main text. Page 1. “In the beginning . . .”

The story grips you and you hang with it day after day, sipping coconuts, reading the Old Testament. Malachi ends the section marked “Old Testament.”

Do you think you’d have any idea that 1) the Lord would send a rescuer to his people? 2) that the rescuer would not be a political rescuer, but one who would rescue people from death itself? 3) that this rescuer would restore the relationship clearly broken between Adam and all his descendents and Jehovah?

If not, then check out this verse recorded by the prophet Isaiah:

On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wine, of rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well refined. And he will swallow up on this mountain the covering that is cast over all peoples, the veil that is spread over all nations. He will swallow up death forever; and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces, and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken.  – Isaiah 25:7-8, ESV

The imagery used here reveals generosity, compassion, commitment, and ability to right our wrongs and restore to perfection what was broken by our sin and rebellion. He even goes so far as to get involved personally–swallowing up death. Death! What smothers all of mankind our Father is able to remove! Hallelujah! Furthermore, He has spoken to us by His Word and His Word is final. Death is removed, its sting no longer potent.

How fitting that God should turn our eyes to this passage in relation to missional prayer. In the Old Testament, God promised to swallow death up and wipe away every tear. Amen! In the New Testament, we see the fulfillment of that promise in Jesus, the Final Word. Notice:

Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away. –Revelation 21:3-4, ESV

Please pray with us with this aspect of God’s character firmly in our spirits.

  • Ask God to open the eyes of the Somau Garia speakers who do not know him to the reality that He alone can take away their fear of death and the realm of the dead that so many fear.
  • Ask God to open the doors for the completion of the translation of the New Testament in the Somau Garia language. The Gospel According to Mark is in use, the rest of the NT remains to be translated.
  • Ask God to provide for our return to PNG in His time, in His power, for His purpose.
  • Thank God for people who are hard at work drafting and preparing further books for translation.
  • Thank God for mission partners who currently support this ministry.
  • Praise God for his compassion, for using his power to reconcile, heal, comfort, and establish his followers with life.

Many thanks to those of you who are moving with us into the trenches, standing in the gap, making intercession for a people whom God loves and desires to redeem.

Blessings!