During November we’re focusing on finding our strength in God. Please see the Prayer page to read our strategic prayer request for this month and pray with us.

By Delaina Spence

Developing EP and E1 curricula is a lot of work, and so is adapting those curricula for use in a particular language. Teachers from different language groups come to Madang for usually a few weeks at a time and put in long days translating children’s reading books into their language, illustrating the stories if there aren’t already pictures, and editing and correcting the draft versions that are printed there in the PBT Publications Office. However, before books can even be translated, the teachers need to decide what order to introduce the letters of their language’s alphabet, pick themes to go along with those letters, and find or create books that match those themes.

These long work sessions can be challenging for the Papua New Guinean men and women who come to work on literacy, and it is a great sacrifice for them to be away from their families and their responsibilities in the village for weeks at a time.

Whenever a language group comes to town, at least one missionary will work with them, entering their work into the computer, printing books, answering questions, helping to keep track of which books are finished and which ones still need to be translated, edited, or illustrated. In 2013 I had the privilege of helping a few of these language teams during their work sessions in town. One of the best and most important parts of the work day is beginning with prayer. We all gather together in the upstairs conference room to call on God for strength to accomplish the work, to give the teachers clear thinking, to bless their work and help it to bring about lasting change in the lives of the children who will use that material to learn to read in their own language.

Too often we think of relying on God for strength only when it becomes obvious that our own strength is not enough, but being in the habit of asking God for His strength even to do the tedious tasks of life acknowledges that He is the true source of everything. “For in him we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28), and “every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights” (James 1:17). Please pray God’s strength for the teachers during their work sessions in town, as well as for Diane, Eunice, and others who are working hard to finish creating and editing the EP and E1 curricula.

Delaina is trained to serve as a Bible translator.