unreached language groups Archives

“GOD DOESN’T SPEAK OUR LANGUAGE”

Our vision is to help people in 500 unreached language groups
become followers of Christ in a growing community of faith by the year 2025.

Recording songs in Ewo.

He came to her with a simple request, but the implications would be huge. Hera, leading our first School of Storying (SOS) in Cameroon just two months ago, tells the story:

“God told me to ask you something,” one of our translators told me. “For a long time, I’ve been bothered that we have no real worship songs in our language. When the missionaries came through our area, they taught us songs in French, and those are the songs we sing today. Our mentality is that God doesn’t speak our language. But I think we should be able to worship God in our own language, so I’ve translated some of the French songs. Would you record me singing them so that we can worship in our heart language?”

We crammed five people and a keyboard into our sweltering makeshift recording studio, a tiny 2×8 foot space. With sweat running down their faces, they raised their voices in praise to God in their heart language. I felt so privileged to be there to record. Eight songs later, the translator thanked me profusely. “You have no idea how appreciated these songs will be. They will change everything.”

Acting out the Pentecost story to help them remember.

I adore that my job is to give people the opportunity to realize that God speaks to them in their heart language – that they don’t have to have a fancy education to talk to God and learn about Him!

As the fifteen SOS participants diligently worked to develop Bible stories in the Ewo language, we witnessed the impact the stories were having on their own lives, too.

“Listening to all these stories really touched me,” one man, Moses, explained. “The stories came alive-as if they affect us still today. I’ve been waiting 30 years for a training like this. Now, after just three weeks, I have all these stories. I can’t tell you how much that means to me.” Another participant, Luke, exclaimed, “When I listen to these stories, I’m really struck that I’m part of this spiritual legacy of prophets and kings, taking God’s rescue plan to the world.”

Retelling His story.

We have had an incredible ministry here! More than 1800 people heard stories over three weeks, and 308 story groups were started in this area. They plan on starting another 88 groups over the next three months, on top of continuing the groups they’ve already started!
Thank you for praying this team! Your gifts and support are helping us take His stories to people who have never heard them.

-Hera, from Team Ewo

WHAT ARE YOU DOING THIS SUMMER?
If you are 18-24 years old, join us for a fun-filled 10-days camping and hiking in the Rocky Mountains as we reach out to other hikers by sharing
Bible stories to spark spiritual conversations. Learn how to tell your story, how to listen to another person’s story, and how to tell God’s
story.

It’s from July 25 – August 3, 2017. Get more information and apply at: storyrunners.org/summer-projects.

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“GOD DOESN’T SPEAK OUR LANGUAGE”

A Mom With A Mission

Meet Sharon—wife and busy mother of one high- schooler and one college student—from north central Texas. So how did ONE WEEK in Orlando, Florida become, as she says, “one of the greatest gifts in her life”?

Back up to October 2010. Involved in a local church in their area, Sharon and her husband were in search of new ways to minister within their congregation and beyond. After hearing about a 5-day training in oral Bible storying, the couple set aside a week, made arrangements for their kids back home, and headed to Florida. What they learned and brought home with them was life- changing.

“Within 3 months, our church had asked me to lead and teach a women’s group in Bible storying. In another 3 months, I found myself on a church- sponsored trip to the Middle East where we ministered to women in Jordan through storytelling.” Imagine the joy she had standing on the banks of the Jordan River, telling a diverse group of tourists the story of Jesus baptizing people in that very place! Later, she shared with Jordanian women from broken homes the story of Moses—of how God uses the broken to be His messengers of hope. “Then the following year, I traveled to Cambodia, partnering with long-time missionaries in training pastors and church leaders from Thailand, Cambodia and the Philippines,” Sharon says. She taught them how to use oral Bible storying, and as they practiced their newly-acquired skills in the afternoons, Sharon and her group went outside the city to camps where they ministered to children. “It was beautiful to hear the creation story delivered to the children in their own language, and then to see the children delighting in answering the questions after the story,” she recounts to us.

Since then, she’s journeyed to Ethiopia to teach more pastors and church leaders how to use storying in their churches and ministries. “I received an email last week from a youth pastor who was very excited about the training and how it was impacting his church,” Sharon tells us. “He said that storying has changed the way the pastors are preaching. They no longer lecture, but use stories about Jesus—and this is CHANGING LIVES.”

A Mom With A Mission

in Testimonies 0 comments

“The Lord gave me a voice…”

“I hardly opened my mouth to talk to anyone,” Corine* confessed. “Before coming to the School of Storying, I was quiet and reserved, and never knew how to talk to people about God.” But learning to tell stories has been life-changing for her! “It is like the Lord gave me a voice and filled my mouth with the words,” she says. “I can tell these stories boldly and with confidence.” Even her family and friends remarked about the difference, and Corine even found herself chosen to share a story at a nearby radio station!

* name changed for her security reasons

“The Lord gave me a voice…”

in Africa / Field Reports / School of Storying / Testimonies 0 comments

Spiritual Avalanche

“The harvest is truly plentiful.” Those words of Jesus have never come more alive to me than during our recent School
of Storying project in northern Benin. Over and over again we were impressed by the evidence that the people are so ready to respond to the gospel–as long as you approach them in a way that is appropriate to their culture. If you come to them as one of them, speaking their language, holding out simple truths, then it is amazing to see the movement that God ignites! Over the 5 weeks of our training, we saw 25 ongoing small groups started.

From the first day, the people in these villages were begging our participants to come and share more stories with them. “These stories are just so interesting!” one man told one of our participants. “I want you to come back and tell these stories to my whole village.” Our non-believers that are involved in the training were also enraptured by the Word of God. “If these stories are true, then I’m going to become a Christian. Pray for me,” one of them told me. We knew at that point that the Holy Spirit was doing some powerful work, and we weren’t wrong.

Pastor Didier

Over the course of a few weeks, we saw all 11 non-believers that were involved directly in our training decide to follow Christ! One of them explained to me, “Before I came here, I was always worrying. I was obsessed with thinking about all of my problems and all the terrible things in life. But now that Jesus has come into my life, I have so much peace!” I could see the change in their lives as they became children of God. For me, this training felt like we were riding on the edge of an unstoppable avalanche. We were attacked from all sides by Satan, but nothing he could do could even slow down the advancement of the mighty kingdom of God. I am so overwhelmed and humbled to have gotten to see it. – From one of the StoryRunners team members

Spiritual Avalanche

in Africa / Field Reports / School of Storying / Testimonies 1 comments