Bible translators are working to make it possible to not only “go ye into all the world with the Gospel,” but to “go ye” with a Bible penned in the country’s native language.
Bible translators like The Seed Company report great strides with translation efforts in 2010. The Seed Company’s strategy is to come alongside a country’s natives to help them with the work of accurately translating the Word of God.
“The Seed Company was privileged to participate in an amazing acceleration of Bible translation work around the world this past year,†says Larry Jones, senior vice president for Field programs for the company, told Mission Network News (MNN). “Ninety-three new people groups were engaged, and we got them started on the process of having Scripture in their own language.”
Jones told MNN that the company also enlisted 26 more people from Africa, Asia and Latin America as Bible translation consultants, putting them on a development path to be professional contributors to the Bible translation cause.
The Seed Company cites more than 400 active Bible translation projects around the world. The group hopes to have similar growth this year. Jones says there are certain areas that need support.
“Nigeria in Central Africa is one of the key areas,” Jones told MNN. “Indonesia and the Pacific Islands, including Papua New Guine, that’s the huge concentration of remaining need for Bible translation. And the third one is in India and the Himalayan region in South Asia.”
Will we see a translation started in each of the remaining 2,000 languages? As Jones sees it, 2,000 is really not all that many in terms of an absolute number when you consider the size of the church globally.
“So, is it possible that we’ll see this in our life-time? I think it’s very possible,” Jones told MNN. “We’re also seeing tremendous innovations in technology that enable us to apply Bible translation disciplines. It’s making it possible for us to accelerate this even more.”
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