Category: Newsletter

Stacey and I (Dave) have continued the three-week cycle in and out of the village. While the translation project remains our primary focus, whenever we are in the village we continue in evangelism, discipleship, and literacy. One world view issue that keeps coming up regards how we treat the weak and the poor. Here is Stacey’s account of an experience that she recently had in the village: ”It breaks my heart to say that those who are unable to have children, or the handicapped, or the unmarried are often called witches, their possessions are stolen, and they are treated as…

Greetings friends from Yaoundé, Cameroon. The Hare family arrived back in Cameroon back in mid-July. We spent a couple of weeks out in the village, but we have now settled-in to a house in Yaoundé, the capital (pronounced yown-dey). In case you don’t know, we moved to the capital for our kids to attend an international school called Rain Forest International School (RFIS). RFIS is desperately in need of teachers, by the way. If you, or anyone you know, might be interested in teaching here (even if it is just for one school year), check out this link. Because we…

We are excited to return to Cameroon next month–we fly out mid-July! As we reflect on this past year, we have much to thank the Lord for. And as we look ahead to this next term in Cameroon, we have binders full of plans, hearts full of dreams, and yet remain ever aware of our need for the Lord…[more]

What kinds of things keep you up at night? I (Stacey) can tell you the kinds of questions that keep me awake, such as: How can we help new Kwakum believers have hope in a culture is so filled with death, fighting, and misery? What do we do about a new believer who is living in immorality and yet can’t feasibly separate from her boyfriend without causing World War 3 with him and his family? And what about their children? What do we do with the new believers who get caught up in violent fits of rage and chase people…

We wanted to give you an update of what is going on with us in the States and also what has been going on in Cameroon. In the US We have been tremendously encouraged by the mature believers all over the US and all by all the common grace that is here. Yes, it has been an adjustment, but adjusting to new environments is nothing new. We traveled throughout the US this summer and to date have done over fifteen presentations about our ministry in Cameroon, one of which was even written up in a local newspaper. We have been…

The Hare family will soon be in the US. We are going to spend June 2022 – June 2023 headquartered in Louisville, KY. However, we will also be touring throughout the US in order to see you! Accomplished this term This has been a busy term! We have now been in the village for this term for almost 4 full years. In that time we… …developed a writing system which is now accepted and used by the language community, …wrote literacy primers and teacher’s manuals in order to teach the Kwakum how to read and write their language, …trained Kwakum…

In my (Stacey’s) experience, there is nothing more depressing than Kwakum funerals. Why are they depressing? Many reasons. First of all, they occur frequently, often due to preventable causes. Secondly, they are long; around six days of wailing and sleeping in the dirt. Third, they are riddled with traditions that do not honor God. For instance, attendees often try to divine the person responsible for the death of the individual (because they believe that most if not all deaths are caused by witchcraft) and this leads to false accusations, screaming, and violence. There are also traditions forced upon the bereaved…

Years ago, while just beginning to learn about Kwakum culture, we asked a language partner for the worst thing he could imagine his son doing. His response was very telling. He said the worst thing he could imagine for his son was for him to get caught stealing. It was very interesting to me that he did not say “for my son to steal” but “for my son to get caught stealing.” This gave me an insight into the pressure of shame in the Kwakum culture. There is even a song that we sing sometimes in church that basically uses shame to…

This has been a crazy year, and it has been a while since we updated you. I am glad to let you know that we have seen some great progress!  In the area of Bible translation, you probably know that we have decided to work on Old Testament Bible Storying. We started working on some stories at the end of last year. Then, we went through the process of translator selection, choosing seven men and one woman to work on the project. We had a training time, working through topics such as: basic translation principles, how to deal with unknown…

“Understanding Scripture in a language other than the heart language in which we think and experience emotion is like trying to eat soup with a fork. You can get a little taste, but you cannot get nourished.” – Cameron Townsend These past couple months, we have been training a group 8 Kwakum people in principles of translation and we have seen them go from getting a ‘taste of a Word of God’ into being nourished by it. Let me give you an example. I (Stacey) was teaching on how we can translate concepts that are unknown to the Kwakum people…