Today I had a conversation about foreign missions with the car dealership driver, who was bringing me back to pick up my car which had been serviced. It began as a travel conversation, which led me to mention my two trips to Papua New Guinea to visit my sister, who is a missionary with Wycliffe. (My sister and her husband led a translation team, translating many books of the Bible into the Bola language of PNG. The completion of this work is being dedicated and celebrated this month!)
The driver, a Vietnam Veteran, seemed genuinely impressed by my sister and brother-in-law’s accomplishment, and asked, “Are the people in Papua New Guinea literate enough to be able to read the results of their work?” I explained that a component of Bible translation often involves some literacy effort, and it varies by people group and person. Then I went on to explain how mission organizations are talking a lot about orality these days. I mentioned that some efforts, such as Wycliffe’s OneStory are focusing on getting the stories of God’s Word accurately introduced, orally, to people groups who: 1) don’t have the Bible in their first language, and 2) are primarily part of an oral society.
The driver got excited about this, saying, “Yes that really makes a lot of sense!” (I don’t know if he’s a follower of Christ or not; it was a brief, five-mile ride.) He quickly grasped how the stories would be told and shared – and likely, much quicker than they might be read. I went on to explain that getting the written Bible into people’s first language, is still very important, but this particular method begins with planting and spreading the stories by word-of-mouth first.
God seems to be showing me more and more, the effect stories have on people. The stories in His Word, of course...but also the story He's writing with my life. For example, at a wedding this past weekend, the guests at my table heard me say I had been to Africa. I did not feel in the mood to tell my whole story about what brought me over there, or the details of my call to write, so I was answering their questions politely, but with very brief answers, thinking they probably didn’t want more than that anyway.
However, the couple across from me kept prodding... They wanted details, and pretty soon I was telling the entire long version and we almost missed the buffet line! They listened, engrossed, to how God brought the trip about, and to my description of the various “coincidences” that were part of a higher plan, leading me to Cameroon, where my grandparents had lived and worked.
And here’s what keeps surprising me. I thought this whole thing – this blog, the call to write, the trip to Africa, etc. – was about my grandparents’ stories. And it is, for sure, to some important degree. Yet the intersection of my story with my grandparents’ stories seems to have a powerful effect on the people I talk with. The woman across from me, even though I had just met her, was literally moved to tears as she listened to how God had worked in my life to bring all of this about. With glistening eyes she exclaimed, “Ann, your story about all of this could be a book!”
I wonder why God chose to place Cameroon on my heart these past 14 months? And why He sent my grandparents to that country in the first place? And furthermore, I even wonder why is He having you read this right now?
God doesn’t waste anything. He has purposes. He tells stories. He transforms lives. I told Him in December 2009 that I wanted my life to tell a better story. One that He could use to bring glory to His name… So it seems He’s giving me such a story. I’ll continue to write and tell my grandparents' stories, and my story, to whoever will listen - in a dealership van, at a wedding, in this blog...and perhaps even in a book sometime. For my story is not really my own. It’s a story of God’s plan to give me a future and a hope through Jesus Christ, my Lord.
