Bob Creson

I am always ‘moved’ by the message of the cross: God invades our space, moves into our neighborhood, identifies with us, including out guilt and shane, declares us righteous—a gospel of inclusion. 

“He drew a circle that shut me out-

Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.

But love and I had the wit to win:

We drew a circle and took him In!”

From the poem ” Outwitted

Edwin Markham

Thank you, Jesus for grafting us into your family…

Guest blog  by Carol Schatz

 When a young man named Demas showed up for an oral Bible storytelling workshop in Sandaun Province, Papua New Guinea, he seemed a little rough around the edges. But then so did the tiny, unkempt village he came from a day’s hike and canoe ride away.  He didn’t know much about the Bible, but he was willing to learn, and he was willing to ask for prayer for the struggles in his life.

At the workshop Demas studied Bible stories from Genesis. Working with five others who spoke his mother tongue, Mamhoaf, he translated the stories and learned to tell them effectively. All Scripture leads to Christ, and as the days went by, his understanding of the Good News began to grow. One evening toward the end of the course, he asked Jesus into his life.
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The Luang people live on a small island far out in the seas of Southeast Asia and remember what it was like when the Bible was a closed book to them. And they remember when the New Testament was translated and the Book was finally opened. Continue reading →

Dallas and I had a very brief visit last week from a longtime friend (our friendship dates back to high school, college to present day). He’s writing a book and, for some reason, wanted to talk with us about our walk toward a career focused on overcoming the injustice of Bible poverty—that’s another blog for another time.

Revisiting a period of our lives from 30+ years ago was surprisingly refreshing (who doesn’t like talking about themselves!). After he left, Dallas and I reflected on the comfort of those relationships we made in those early years, and that we still treasure.

The walk through these memories and decisions we made that still shape our lives today, while refreshing, served also as a reminder of a sometimes tumultuous period of our lives. Continue reading →

In America today we have a dilemma. We are living with the painful contradiction between our ideals as Americans that stand juxtaposed against the deep injustices and inequalities that the nation is stuck in. Our ideals—the essential dignity of the individual human being, the fundamental equality of all men, women and children who have inalienable rights to freedom, justice, and a fair opportunity—represent to us the essential meaning of the nation’s early struggle for independence. Our ideals are rooted in the Declaration of Independence, the Preamble of the Constitution, the Bill of Rights. Striving to achieve these ideals is our tradition. Continue reading →

QUECHUA CLUSTER PROJECT
MARGOS, HUAMALIES, HUAYLAS, NORTH CONCHUCOS, AND SOUTH CONCUCHOS LANGUAGES; PERU (970,000)*

Differences between languages in a cluster project can sometimes result in humorous mistakes. Acts 9:25 records Paul being lowered down a city wall in a basket. Some Quechua translations in the project add a word meaning “in order to escape.”

During a translation check, a representative of one of the languages pointed out that this word, in his language, could indicated that Paul was in the basket “to give birth!” Continue reading →

Dr. Barry Black set an inspirational and optimistic tone in his address (read ‘sermon’) this morning at the 24th Annual Pappy Kennedy Prayer Breakfast in Orlando on Martin Luther King Day. Continue reading →

The video clip at the end of this piece, while only tangentially related to this post, informs the title. The events of the past two weeks, particularly outside the USA (France, Belgium, Nigeria), have left most of us, including the people at MAD Magazine, wondering and worried…where is the solid ground? I don’t knowing if things are worse than they’ve ever been, but who can deny that tragic things are happening that make no sense and leave most of feeling insecure and fearful. Continue reading →

Photo Courtesy Bob Creson, Nugunu Visit, January 2012

Wycliffe translation consultant, Keith Patman, had not expected to see the word for “plum” right in the middle of 1 Peter 3:3, but there it was! The back translation into English read, “Wives, don’t try to be pretty like a market plum, by braiding your hair and putting on gold jewelry and beautiful clothes.”

Concerned for clear, natural and accurate translation, Keith asked the Gunu translation team, “Why did you use that?” Continue reading →