jeudi 30 avril 2015

Weekend away

We spent last weekend down in Bembéréke, visiting friends. We had thought we'd escape the heat a bit down there - it isn't far but the micro-climate is very different in the hills - but while it was cooler, it was also extremely humid.

We went walking up the hill behind the hospital, something we'd never done before on other visits. We live in an extremely flat part of this generally very flat country, so it was wonderful to do some climbing! Just the sensation of being high up and looking out over the town was quite a novelty! (But oh, in 90% humidity we were dripping like sponges!)





mercredi 22 avril 2015

Sermon illustration, anyone?

In Cotonou there is a beach restaurant where we often go to have a drink or an icecream, enjoying the sound of the crashing waves. Being on the edge of the sea, the proprietors had built a huge concrete wall, planted deeply into the beach, presumably hoping this would protect them from the constant wearing-away of the beach by the waves. Here is the wall with a little Simon standing next to it in 2011:



When we were last in Cotonou we went to the restaurant one afternoon, and were startled to find that 20 or 30 metres-length of their seating area had simply disappeared, along with the huge wall. The beach looked exactly the same, yet it must have advanced a good way in just five months.

A little way down the beach, next to a wrecked ship, part of the ruins of the wall can still be seen. I pointed out to our kids what a good illustration this is of the parable in Matthew 7. Building on sand can look impressive ... but it isn't safe!


vendredi 17 avril 2015

The Word of God is going out!

When you're working in a translation office every day, working on the details of the Biblical text, it is sometimes hard to remember that God's Word is actively at work "out there". But our team has recently begun what we call "village testing", taking texts which we have translated out to Monkolé villages, where people are asked to listen and to comment on how well they understand and how the translation could be improved.

I don't go out with the team as we don't want people to come just because they see a white person, and it is better that it be the Monkolés on the team asking other Monkolés about the best way to express things in natural Monkolé. This is the best time of year to find people in the villages, as there is no fieldwork to be done at the moment, so my two colleagues have been going out once a week for the last few weeks.

It has been great to see that in every village they have visited, they have found people very willing to sit and listen for long periods of time and to give their comments on the text. In one village three people even enjoyed the book of Jonah so much that they asked to have their own copies of it to read again.

This stage of the work is obviously a help to us in making sure that our text is easily understood and natural-sounding, but it is also sometimes referred to as "pre-evangelism". I like to think of it as a kind of teaser campaign! Whatever you call it, it is inspiring to know that God's Word isn't just staying in our office, but is getting out to people who have never heard its message before.


mercredi 15 avril 2015

Uninspired by translation!

Seen on a toy being sold in Cotonou.

Something tells me this was translated ... badly! Either that or they simply strung a few English words together...



jeudi 9 avril 2015

Easter sunrise service

Every Easter Sunday our local church holds a sunrise service on a nearby hill, known in the church as "Galilee". This in reference to the verse in which an angel tells the women who've found Jesus' tomb empty, "Then go quickly and tell his disciples: ‘He has risen from the dead and is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him.’" (Matt. 28:7)

Marc has been to this service before, but I never had, and this year Simon and I decided to get up early (the service starts soon after 5am) to go to it. The night had been a heavy, hot and sticky one, so it was quite a relief to stop fighting for sleep and to get up and go out into the relatively cool night (still about 30°C!). There was a bit of a wind, which was lovely, and the moonlight was so bright that we walked the first bit of our way without torches. After that we were on a path through the fields though, and I thought it would be better to have torches to scare away snakes. As we made our way up towards the hill, we did hear a rustling sound nearby, and I swung my torch round to see the coils of a snake not far from the path. I momentarily regretted my decision to come, and to bring Simon with me, but we'd got that far, so we weren't going back again!


We could see a light on the hill, and the smaller lights of people making their way to the hill on foot or by motorbike. After a while our path crossed that of some young people walking up from the village, and we were glad to let them lead the way (and scare off any more snakes!).


It was very pleasant on top of the hill, and if it hadn't been for my lurking fear of snakes (or my fear of lurking snakes) I would have been tempted to suggest that during hot season we should always hold church services up there early in the morning, instead of packing into a small church building once the sun is beating down!


It was good to be with brothers and sisters, though I was a little disappointed that the service wasn't more concentrated on the Easter message! There was a disturbance not far from us during the service, people exclaiming, and leaping up, and a young man hitting something with a stick. I thought they'd killed a snake, but learned later that they'd seen a snake, which had got away, and had killed a gecko (said to be dangerous - perhaps they are different from European geckos?).


The sunrise was also a bit of a disappointment, being a typical hot season sunrise where the light just starts to become apparent through the haze. But I was glad to mark a special day by doing something a little different.


I haven't yet mastered night photos, but here is the blurry moon (and the blurry red light on a mobile phone tower in the village):




Once the sun was up, here are some of the people at the service:



Here is everyone leaving the hill again after the service (a few of the village roofs are visible in the background):



And this shows you how small this hill is, despite being the highest hill around: