“I served the Burmese government with joy and obedience for 31 years,” he explained, but he did not want to stop serving. His next step was to go to college! His brother, UBS Translation Consultant Dr Stephen Hre Kio, said to him at the time, “After going on a pension no-one goes to Bible college – except you!” Bawi Hu became the first retired person to gain a Bachelor of Religious Education degree at the Chin Christian College in Chin State.

Since 1995, Bawi Hu has been the Director of the Adult Literacy Project run by the Chin Association for Christian Communication (CACC). Eleven associations come under the umbrella of the CACC, comprising a total of about 250,000 Christians. However, there are about 1.5 million people of several ethnic groups who call themselves Chin. Burmese is the national language.

In Myanmar, the teaching of tribal languages is not permitted in State schools, but churches are free to promote the use of Chin languages and literature. Bawi Hu has therefore produced an introductory literacy textbook, and has also translated many of the Bible Society’s graded New Reader Scriptures into the Hakka language. They have also been translated into Falam.

And in many as soon as the Sunday morning service concludes, a blackboard is set up and literacy classes begin. At one large church, overflow classes were even held in neighbouring homes. Skilled teachers, some of them retired, lead the classes in a professional yet friendly manner.

“About 50 per cent of the people are illiterate, so we hold programs for adults and children,” explained Pastor Daniel Kyaw Lim. “The Chin literacy program in this area is very successful.” Churches are finding that New Reader Scriptures are also useful for religious instruction and Sunday School classes.

Rev Edward H Piang is the President of the Zomi Chin Baptist Convention and Director of the New Readers Literacy program for Falam Christian communities, sponsored by the Bible Society in Australia. “Becoming literate helps in finding work, but more than anything it helps us retain our identity,” he said. “We want to help our people see there is nothing to be ashamed of in speaking a tribal language.”

“In the field of easy reading material, we work hand in hand with the Bible Society of Myanmar,” noted Mr Thang Tin Sum, Adult Literacy Director for the Myanmar Council of Churches. “We work among many dialects, especially the hill-tribe people. We need many more easy-reader books.

“When we supply the follow-up easy reading materials, people slowly learn about Jesus. Many people become Christians through literacy. Literacy is an effective method for evangelism, and the impact on agriculture, farming, basic health education and other community programs is also good.”

Bawi Hu’s “retirement” is proving to be a time of extraordinary activity. He is still serving the people of his beloved country, but now his purpose for doing so is a different one: to teach members of the church to read so that they can learn about our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. (WR 343/9 - 9.99) [PHOTOS]

On many occasions afterwards, whenever I spoke about the work of the Bible Society, I told audiences about the Matu pastor’s question – and prayed that translation work would begin. On the last day of my most recent visit to Myanmar, two members of the five-member Matu translation team came from Matupi to Bible House, Yangon (formerly Rangoon), to have their work checked by UBS Translation Consultant Dr Stephen Hre Kio.

I had the immense privilege of meeting the diminutive Rev Ngai Tim, now 67, who was the first person to put the Matu language into writing. He has been in ministry for 47 years, using a Bible which is not in his own language. It is estimated that at least 3,500 people have become Christians as a result of Ngai Tim’s ministry.

“In 1992 I decided to go to Matupi instead of the team coming here,” Stephen remembers. “It took me seven days by car, stalling on steep hills, avoiding the holes in the road, and having to put a fire under the engine in extremely cold weather on the high mountains.”

There have been many obstacles, but the Matu New Testament will be published this year. Translation work has taken eight years, and the Old Testament may take three times as long. But Ngai Tim says, “I will not be happy to leave this life until the whole Matu Bible is finished.” (WR 343/10 - 9.99) [PHOTOS]

The Rev Than Htun Myat, the local General Secretary, and his family live on the top floor, and offices on the third floor are rented to a dentist and an X-ray service. This means that people going upstairs are regularly drawn into the Bible shop on the ground floor.

“We praise God for granting us the wonderful opportunity to carry out the various tasks of the Bible Society,” said Rev Than Htun Myat (usually called Sonny). “In 1998 we supplied churches and other organisations with almost 18,000 Bibles, 10,000 New Testaments, 47,000 Scripture Portions, 21,631 New Reader Portions and Selections, and 29,000 Scripture Selections.” While smaller items are printed locally, Bibles are printed in South Korea, India or Hong Kong.

The manager of the Bible Shop, Khin Ohn Myint (whose nickname is Bu Boo), has worked at the Bible Society for 24 years. “Sometimes people come in and ask about the life of Christ,” Bu Boo says, “so we explain and then suggest they read various books. Others, including Buddhist monks, buy the Good News Bible in English because it helps them with their English studies. Our Scripture comics in the Burmese language are always popular. I think there is more interest in Christianity at the moment.”

About 15 per cent of the Scripture stock is given away free of charge; the balance is heavily subsidised. (WR 343/11 - 9.99) [PHOTOS]

His place in history has not been forgotten, and in 1995 Queen Elizabeth invited Dr Vum to Buckingham Palace for the VJ Day celebrations.

Of the 10,000 Siyin-speaking people scattered throughout Myanmar, most are Christians. However, there is no Siyin Bible, so the Burmese, English or Tiddim Bible is being used. Translation of the New Testament, Psalms and Proverbs into Siyin has now been completed.

“The work we are doing is far more than just translating the Bible,” says Dr Stephen Hre Kio. “This will not only be the first Bible in the Chin:Siyin language, it will also set the literary standard for this language for many years to come.”

When Dr Vum, who currently reads the English Bible, read some of the Siyin translation, he exclaimed, “It is the best language in the world! When we get to heaven I think we will all be speaking Siyin! It’s even better than King James!” (WR 343/12 - 9.99)

Director ‘Amazed’ at Effect of  ‘Faith Comes By Hearing’  in India and Sri Lanka

SWINDON, England — Morgan Jackson, International Director of Hosanna’s ‘Faith Comes By Hearing’ program, recently explained that he could never have believed the effect this Scripture cassette ministry would have when it started. On a visit to the Bible Society officers here, he shared some of his experiences in India and Sri Lanka.

 “In India, it is absolutely amazing because the churches not only play the tapes in the church, but they play them on loudspeakers for the whole village to hear!” he explained. “Every morning the village church will start the tapes at 5 a.m., and as the villagers – many Hindus – are getting ready to go to work in the fields, they listen to the Scripture for 45 minutes.
 

“Now you’d think that they wouldn’t like this, but the fact is if the pastor misses a day, these Hindu people come up and say, ‘Pastor! What’s wrong? This morning I am having my tea, there is no Word of God?’ And so many of these are coming to Christ.

“I went to one community, a tribal people, and discovered that these people had listened to the New Testament and 20 of them had come to Christ. They had been completely transformed.

“Well, after listening to the tapes, their lives were completely transformed. The husbands and wives were telling me they now had peace, they no longer beat each other, how they had given up all of the idols, how they weren’t begging any more. “They are still not rich, but they are working as rat-catchers or as field workers, and so they are working with their hands to make a living.

“I asked them, ‘What are you doing with your children now?’ and they were saying, ‘Oh, now we are teaching them the Word of God, and the main thing is we are teaching them to be respectful and to stop cussing. You know we always used bad language, so the little kids were raised up with no respect and using horrible language.’ “So here are 20 people who are hopeless, angry, fighting, no hope, drunk – now completely transformed by the Word of God.”

So then he would come again next week, and sometimes it would take six or eight weeks for them to come to a point where they would be willing to accept Christ. “When they accept Christ and are baptised, they take a new name,” Mr Jackson explained. “They have jewellery and things which represent other gods – their name is usually in the name of a god – so they change their name, take the jewellery off, and cut the thread that is part of Hinduism. To do that brings about tremendous pressure from the rest of their caste or tribal group, and yet multitudes of them are doing that.”

“When they’re out working in the fields, ploughing, they are talking, and after six weeks or so, when they accept Christ, it is actually a family decision. It creates less pressure because you don’t have one person standing alone – you literally have a whole family group: grandmother, grandfather, and maybe only one or two of them have rejected – all coming to Christ. And so it makes it easier for them to stand, but they do get some pressure.

“The wonderful thing is we’ve had a team of people who have visited over eight hundred villages in the last two years, trying to bring the Word of God to those villages, and we have only had two villages where the people chased them out, threw rocks at them and threatened their lives. “All the other villages were eager to receive them and eager to hear the Word of God. The doors to India are open. So although there are a few radicals, and we hear the stories of them, the majority of Indians are willing and open to hear the Gospel.” (WR 343/15 - 9.99)

When Morgan began his taxi journey, he engaged the driver in conversation. Suddenly, the driver asked him in broken English, “Are you a Christian?”

Morgan said yes, then saw the driver going through a bag on his lap. He pulled something out, reached over, and on a black string was a tiny cross with a picture of Jesus. He handed it to Morgan and asked, “What is this? What does it mean?”

The driver agreed and said his brother had given him the cross. He explained that his brother had become a Christian six years ago. Before, he said, “he was using drugs, he was a wild man, evil, and all of a sudden he began to know this Jesus and read the Bible. Now he won’t even smoke cigarettes, nothing. He is completely changed.

Moved, Morgan explained that it was no accident when God sent the driver to the Bible Society and that there was a white man sitting in his car so that he could ask questions about Jesus. “Yes, my brother was always reading this Bible and he talked about it but I don’t have one, and I don’t understand,” the driver added.

Morgan told him he could go to the Bible Society the next day and ask for a man there who would help him and explain everything, and give him a New Testament.

“So I said, ‘His only fear was that you, his dearest brother, wouldn’t know Jesus Christ, and that’s what he wanted before he died.’ He replied, ‘Yes, that’s right,’ and I said, ‘God has answered his prayer hasn’t he?’ He said yes. So, we’ll see – another soul, another family coming to Jesus Christ through the Word of God and through the Bible Society.” (WR 343/16 - 9.99)

A meeting of Supreme Court Justices was opened with the reading of the Scriptures, acknowledging that this judicial branch of the Government needs the guidance of Scripture.

“It is important to interpret the law against the background of our belief in God,” said former Philippine Vice President Emmanuel N. Pelaez, now Ambassador to the United States.

The Society, which this year celebrates 100 years of formal Bible distribution in the Philippines with the Centennial theme of ‘God’s Word: Hope for Justice and Peace,’ presented Bibles to each member of the Supreme Court.

Among those present at the distribution to the Supreme Court, which is led by Chief Justice Hilario G. Davide Jr., were former Supreme Court Justice and PBS Board Member Justice Jose Y Feria, and Bible Society staff. (WR 343/17 - 9.99)

Rejeki, in the Central Sulawesi Province of Indonesia, was the location for the launch of the New Testament – a joint project involving the Church of the Salvation Army and a number of translations agencies, including the Indonesian Bible Society (IBS).

The Rev E P Sembiring of the Indonesian Bible Society said that those people with a deep yearning for God’s Word would never become bored of reading this love letter, because they would realise that it is a source of life for all.

And it was on the theme of “Find God, so that you will live” that the New Testament was launched to the accompaniment of a traditional Ledo bamboo orchestra.

Mr Sembiring described the New Testament as the sun, its users as sunflowers, and explained how, from dawn to sunset, the flower always faced the sun. This illustrated how the life of a believer should always be dependent on God’s Word – which, as described in 2 Timothy 3:16, gives instruction for right living, so that every person who believes in God may be fully qualified and equipped to do every kind of good deed.  (WR 343/18 - 9.99) [PHOTOS]