[Newsletter] Why we do what we do

The young man, named Ko has been an orphan since he was 8 years old. When his parents died, he went to live with his aunt who had him work for his stay in lieu of going to school. Ko has shown interest in learning more about the Lord but confided in Dave that there was one thing holding him back: he cannot read and thus not read the Bible. When Dave told him that we wanted to build a Kwakum (AKA Bakoum)* literacy/translation center, he lit up and couldn’t wait to start learning. We have hired him to help build the center and he works sun-up to sundown making bricks. We also hope to start teaching him the Bible orally.

His girlfriend, Mami (pronounced “Mommy”), recently lost her father who was allegedly murdered by her step-mom. She works with me (Stacey) daily learning to read Kwakum. I also am teaching through a French children’s story book Bible in Kwakum, explaining to her the character of God through Bible stories. The other day, in the story of Abraham sacrificing his son to Isaac, when I asked her what she learned, she said that she learned that God loved Abraham because Abraham loved Him first. I said, “No, God loved Abraham first and called him out of idolatrous family. Abraham in return loved God.” We then read the verse “We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19) while I explained that first we are receivers of God’s love and then it is reciprocated to him and to others. Her mind was blown as she had previously assumed that we had to earn God’s love. She does not understand the Gospel yet (we are still in Genesis), but she cannot get enough of the Word of God…. read the rest HERE.