 |
| Christmas in the Cameroon |
The Christmas story took on new significance for joey and Dean during their 2006 visit to Cameroon in West Africa. They were spending the holidays with Dean’s sister and brother-in-law who were posted there in support of Wycliffe Bible translation.
Two days after Christmas we loaded the Land Rover with supplies, left the capital of Yaounde and set off for a small village in central Cameroon. There we would attend the dedication of the first translation of the New Testament in the Kwanja language group. This translation was the life work of a Swiss husband and wife team of linguists. The community gathered: The translator’s family and friends from Switzerland, officials from Lutheran Bible Translators who had sponsored the work, linguists and support staff from all over West Africa, and the people from the village and surrounding area. All in all, perhaps as many as 1500 people gathered together.
The joy of the villagers as they received the word of God was overwhelming. The villagers showed everyone great hospitality and shared freely with what little they had. The celebration was to last three full days.
Today we tend for granted the opening of God’s word, casually turning to the Christmas story to read the familiar words of Matthew and Luke’s account of the coming of Emmanuel, "God with us." We were reminded of John’s words, "The Light has come into the world, and the darkness has not overcome it." We were privileged to be a small part of the coming of light into a small African village. Christmas will never be the same.
Dean and joey Diers
No comments:
Post a Comment