I start the final class of my Literacy training this month.
The last couple of years have been a wonderful experience for me. I've learned a lot about language and how it works, and I've met some wonderful people here in Dallas, including my wife. Even so, I am super excited to start my Literacy Megacourse this semester and complete my training.
When I first decided to do missions long term, literacy wasn't really where I thought I would be focused. Most missionaries that I've talked to over the years had been Church Planters, and with them as an example, I figured that was where I would end up. Yet it seemed that every area I visited had me focused on some sort of educational topic. I worked with English students in Peru and Bolivia, and helped with some classes on Sanitation and Health while I was in Africa. By the time I joined up with Pioneer Bible Translators, I had decided that missions, for me, was about helping people to have the ability to learn about God on their own, in their own language. At first, that meant giving them the Bible, but somewhere along the line I realized that giving them a book wasn't enough. I had to teach them to read it. That need was one that I felt that I decided to fill.
I don't know what all to expect from my class this Spring. Nor do I know what my job on the field will look like, exactly. What I do know is that in doing literacy I will enable people to access God's Word in a way that they have never been able to before. I will show God's love to people by helping them to access information that can change, and even save their lives, through learning about sanitation, or medicines, or even farming and water purification.
I don't know every way in which God will use me to help the people of Papua New Guinea. But even so, I'm looking forward to Literacy.
