Papua New Guinea (MNN) — Providing the Gospel in people's heart language is essential in seeing people turn to Christ. But many people around the world can't read. That's why Faith Comes By Hearing exists: to provide God's Word in audio.
Sheryl just returned from a trip to Papua New Guinea and the Philippines where she visited translation teams there. She says it's great having God's Word in written form, but it doesn't do any good if people can't read it. "In remote areas, you've got obviously great illiteracy problems. They can't read [the Bible]. They have to hear it in order to have God's Word there."
That's why Faith Comes By Hearing has a goal to record God's Word in 2,000 languages around the world. "We have 512 recordings to date, so we are really moving toward our goal of 2,000. We're not there yet, but each year we're adding more recording teams and we're getting closer."
PNG is a challenging country. "You've got so many remote areas and challenges that the recording teams face with tribal warfare," says Sheryl. "These people still live as if they were still in the stone-age, and there is tribal fighting."
Sheryl says it hasn't been easy for one of their teams. "We've got a team recording in a remote area where there is fighting going on. There's been a few people killed already — not in our recording team, but that's all around us."
People and money are needed to accomplish the work. Sheryl says Christians in Europe and North America need to be involved. "This is just the continuation of Judea, Samaria and the uttermost parts of the earth. We have to help. These poor countries don't have the resources financially, or physically/materially at all. We've got to be able to help carry that Word beyond our own borders."
While some of the national recording team members have never seen an e-mail or other technology, God is using them to have a great impact for Christ. Pray that God will use you and other Christians to help translate God's Word into the heart language of many in PNG, Philippines and other places around the world.
