I spent last week in the rural area south of Tulear. This is not the “forest” I normally go to, but the place where my supervisors’ work in concentrated. It was a great trip!
I went with Grant, my supervisor, Tom, our story-crafting consultant from South Africa, our two journeyguys Doug and Nathan, and two young men from one of our churches here in Tulear, Mahafetsy and Noelle. During the trip, we had the chance to visit six villages. Noelle and Mahafetsy shared many of the stories we’ve been working on, and we were able to learn new vocabulary and cultural information, as well as watch villagers grow in new understandings of concepts from God’s Word!
It had been a year since I had been to this rural area. I was very thankful for how my dialect-speaking has improved in the last year! The first time I went south, I had just moved to Tulear and begun learning the differences between Official Malagasy (which I used in Tana), and the variations of the southern dialects used in the southwest. My teammates on the trip are phenomenal speakers, and I enjoyed learning both language and culture from them during the week.
Having Noelle and Mahafetsy with us was an incredible blessing as well. For the last year, both of these young men have been a part of my story-crafting groups in Tulear. We’ve been working together with other believers to craft Bible stories in two of the southern dialects. As we went out into villages where these dialects are spoken, I had the privilege of watching them share their work with unbelievers and new believers. Now, we have new suggestions and vocabulary for how to make our stories better, and they’ve gained valuable experience in evangelism and discipleship!
A couple of the villages I had been to before, and so it was exciting to see old friends again and catch up a little. For other villages, I have only been hearing about what God is doing, and it was such a blessing to see these places with my own eyes! My supervisors have truly seen answers to prayer for their work here over the last 2 ½ years, and it’s just so exciting to anticipate all God will do through our growing team in the future!
In a lot of ways, the trip was deeply affirming. I really believe that God is using stories from His Word to touch the hearts of the people of the southwest, bringing them to salvation and transforming their lives. Every week, as I prepare stories, work through them with my groups, record them, revise them, re-record them, over and over—the goal is always the same: to have sets of clear, simple Biblical stories, and groups of accurate, passionate story-tellers, ready to be used however God desires. This week, He allowed me to see that in spite of all my doubts and worries over the last year, He is indeed achieving this goal in His own time and way. None of this has ever been dependent on me, and this week I was able to SEE that “my Father is always working” (John 5:17). I am SOO blessed to be a part of His work!
*Thanks to Grant, Nathan, and Noelle for most of these pictures :)
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