The YWAM History of Bible Translation
1967
Legacy Word #4 – The Woman in the Red Dress
“I was with a YWAM convoy traveling through Mexico to Central America. We had stopped in a dusty Mexican town to repair a flat tire. While some worked on that, the rest of us delivered a Gospel of John to every home, then held an open-air preaching service.
After our meeting a woman in a faded red dress came up to me. My Spanish wasn’t very good, but I understood her to say, ‘There’s no place in my town to get a Bible, and there aren’t any in the towns around here. Do you have a Bible in my language?’
I managed to find a Spanish Bible for her. She grasped it to her chest. ‘¡Muchisimas gracias, señor!’
As we drove away, the woman’s question continued to haunt me. ‘Do you have a Bible in my language?’ Then, a picture suddenly came before my eyes–I believe it was what the Bible calls a ‘vision.’ I saw a big truck–not a semi, but more like a large moving van.
Painted on the side was, ‘Sólo los deshonestos temen la verdad. Santa Biblia, gratis.’ I didn’t know Spanish well enough to think in the language, so seeing these sentences was a complete surprise. I translated them slowly in my mind. They meant: ‘Only the dishonest fear the truth. Free Bibles.’ What an exciting thought! The phrase ‘Only the dishonest fear the truth’ was completely new to me, and it rang in my mind. It was especially pertinent at the time, as communists were spreading their cause across Latin America. As the vision continued, I saw young people standing in the back of the truck handing Bibles into eager hands as fast as they could.”
–Loren Cunningham
YWAM Founder
1982
YWAM Brazil Begins Translation Work
YWAM Brazil starts training traditional Bible translators. The team pictured translated the Gospel of Mark into the Ribeirinho dialect of Portuguese. Since then, a few teams in Brazil and other parts of the world have been working faithfully with Bible Translation, but these were isolate cases. The prevailing thought at the time in the mission was, “Translation is not for YWAM. We do distribution.”
2000
Partnerships Form for Bible Translation
By God’s providence, a group of ministry leaders gathers in Amsterdam to discus how to reach all the remaining Unreached People Groups of the world. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJ9D9g025CU, https://table71.org/faqs/) It is the first time all the major mission organizations meet together for the purpose of finishing the Great Commission in unity.
2001
First Oral Translation
Suzuki and Marcia start translating the Bible orally for the Suruwaha tribe. At that time, there was no one translating the Bible orally, and we faced a lot of criticism by other Bible translation agencies, So, several months in, they decided to stop the process.
2003
“A Bible in Every Home by 2020”
Loren declares a vision, “A Bible in every home by 2020” at the University of the Nations workshop in Singapore. In 2015, Loren, David, and Darlene traveled to meet with ten Christian leaders in ten days – including the Coptic Pope, Pope Francis, and the Arch Bishop of Canterbury – to share the vision of everyone having a Bible in their own language.
2006
End Bible Poverty Now (EBPN) Is Founded
End Bible Poverty Now (EBPN) is founded with an emphasis on Bible distribution. Translation work was still “not for YWAMers; only for the specialists.” (https://endbiblepovertynow.com/translation/)
2015
Loren Cunningham Turns 80
During the celebration in Kona, Hawaii, Marcia and Youngshin give Loren a giant birthday greeting card with a pledge to translate one book of the Bible into a language during that year. He cried, as it was likely the first time that someone made a public declaration that YWAMers would do Bible Translation.
2015
Bible Translation Workshops
Marcia Suzuki starts a series of Bible translation workshops in Kona, with the help of Gail Presnall, a formar Wycliffe Bible translator, now staff in Kona. In the same year, we sent the first team from Kona to a Bible Translation workshop in Papua New Guinea. The team worked with mother tongue speakers of four different languages.
2016
Bible Translation Master’s
Marcia presents a proposal of a Masters of Art in Bible Translation at the Pacific Wa’a meeting in Kona. Bryan Harmelink hears the proposal and asks if he could visit the Suzuki’s for a few days. After three days of meeting, the group decides to start offering a Mali BT (Masters of Applied Linguistics in Bible Translation) through YWAM’s University of the Nations.
2017
Orality and Oral Bible Translation (OBT)
During the first Master’s of Applied Linguistics and Bible Translation (MALi BT), Bryan and the cohort decide to focus on orality and Oral Bible Translation (OBT).
2017
Render Software
During Mali BT, Loren hears about Render software and invites a group (including Marcia, Suzuki, and Youngshin Kim) to travel with him to meet with the staff of Faith Comes By Hearing (FCBH) in Albuquerque. There, Loren realizes that Render will not do all the work. Loren and David Hamilton ask Marcia to create a course train YWAM translators to use Render. (This picture shows Robin (center) who wrote a thesis defending oral bible translation and created the Render translation software.)
2017
The First OBT School
Marcia invites Emerson Menegasse to create the OBT course and lead it in Flagstaff, Arizona. Youngshin is invited as staff and student. A few weeks before the course starts Emerson needs to leave to Nepal, and Youngshin is asked to lead. She accepts, and the first OBT school is conducted.
2019
The First OBT Practicum
As part of Mali BT, the first OBT practicum is translating the book of Ruth into the Hopi nation’s (Native American) mother tongue.
2020
Caleb Survey Project
Sylvia Kay takes a short course with SIL and creates the Caleb Survey Project.
2020
OBT 1000 Project
In one of Caleb Survey’s online meeting Loren talks about his vision to translate the Bible into 1000 languages. Youngshin takes up the challenge and puts together OBT1000. (https://www.wycliffe.net/ywam-has-people-and-a-big-vision/)
2020
Online MALi BT
The second MALi BT cohort was started, but due to Covid, this time classes were only available online.
2021
The Mega OBT
The Mega OBT is a school held simultaneously around the world in Kona, Switzerland, Papua New Guinea, Nigeria, and South Africa.
2021
Every Tribe Every Nation
YWAM was invited to the OBT strategy table at Every Tribe Every Nation.
2021
The First MALi CT Cohort
MALi BT students are invited to attend the first Oral Bible Translation Masters of Applied Linguistics Consultancy Training (MALi CT) with the goal to train Quality Assessment Mentors.
2022
OBT Trainers Workshop
The first OBT Trainers Workshop was held in Los Angeles.
2022
Launch of “Pray OMT”
Loren officially launches Pray OMT in Kona. This website is meant to connect prayer partners with Oral Mother Tongue communities which have yet to receive written or oral Scriptures in their heart language.