Surrendering to God

00:02
Joan Weber
And so I surrendered it to God. After that. I said, God, you gave it to me. You can have it back. 

00:17
Rich Rudowske
Welcome to the essentially translatable podcast brought to you by Lutheran Bible translators. I’m rich Rudowski. 

00:22
Emily Wilson
I’m Emily Wilson. 

00:23
Rich Rudowske
We’re so glad you’re listening day. Be sure to give this episode a good rating or leave us a comment on the platform that you’re using to listen to this podcast. If you’re listening on lbt.org, you can leave us feedback by sending an email to info@lbt.org you can also find us. 

00:39
Emily Wilson
And subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartRadio, or on audible. 

00:45
Rich Rudowske
Today’s episode focuses on the west african nation of Cameroon, where Lutheran Bible translators has been at work for many years in partnership with LBT Canada, the Lutheran Church of Cameroon, and various other ministries involved in Bible translation and distribution. 

00:59
Emily Wilson
Our conversation is with Martin and Joan Weber, who recently retired from full time residential missionary service in Cameroon. We got the chance to catch up with them from their new home in Iowa to reflect on their amazing experiences serving in God’s mission among the Kwanja language community. 

01:21
Rich Rudowske
We are here this morning with Martin and Joan Weber, who served for many years as Bible translation missionaries in Cameroon. Welcome to the podcast today. 

01:29
Emily Wilson
Welcome. 

01:30
Martin Weber
Thank you. It’s great to be here with you. 

01:32
Emily Wilson
So, Martin and Joan, you have quite the legacy overseas in West Africa, but our listeners may not know you personally, so it would be great if you could share a little bit about yourself. What is it that you were doing before Bible translation ministry and what it was that led you to become involved in overseas intercultural ministry? 

01:56
Martin Weber
Okay, well, let me kind of start from the top, because that’s where it started for me. I grew up in a ministry family, which I count a privilege. My dad was a pastor, baptized a few weeks old, and I always knew that God was a big part of my life, so that was good. And I can’t remember a time when I didn’t know that God was there and was a big part of my life. It was during confirmation instruction time, which was one of my dad’s favorite ministries, that I began to pray more personal prayers. And through that process, I began to feel a personal ministry call to full time ministry. I thought it probably wouldn’t be pastoral, but I didn’t know what it would be. 

02:37
Martin Weber
And it was at the age of 16 that I heard of Bible translation ministry, and I thought, I think that would be a fit. And my parents also thought so. From then, my goal was to check it out. I wanted to personally see what it was like to be a missionary and what daily life was like. And I didn’t know any missionaries personally or let alone Bible translation ministries. It took six years through a process of me finishing high school, getting some more french junior college, all that stuff. And then God just put stuff together at the end of 1974 that rather suddenly and amazingly to me, it was all put together that I could go to Colombia for two months, Columbia, South America, where Bible translators were working. 

03:25
Martin Weber
And there I just saw missionaries were ordinary people, pretty weird in some ways, but they were working in an extraordinary location, pretty remote, but God was there and working through them and with them. And it was clear to me after that the next step was Bible college. People there know, just take it one step at a time. People in Columbia said, don’t just decide, oh, I’m going to be a Bible translator, and that’s it. But take it a step at a time. And so the next step, yes, was Bible college. I went to Lutheran Bible Institute in Seattle, Washington, and did complete a degree in mythology and communications. And that was a great preparation. Begin with, the next step after that was linguistics study, and I attended the Sil summary pseudo linguistics course in Seattle, Washington. 

04:18
Martin Weber
And by the end of the first week, I was on my knees. I was like, God, are you sure? This is hard. These studies are really hard, and they’re moving really fast. But God was faithful. I did finish that semester, another semester of studies, and God was faithful. I was able to do that and learn that, but I knew I had to depend on God to do the studies, too. And that was important for me. And then I was off to because one of the professors at the summer, second summer course said, martin, why don’t you go for the master’s program? And I hadn’t really thought of doing that. I was like, okay, I’ll try. And God put stuff together so I could do it, including a scholarship from Lutheran Bible translators to do that level of studies. 

05:10
Martin Weber
And the next step for me was those studies and the right partner for life and ministry. And so it was at Dallas that I met this young woman named Joan, and the rest is history. 

05:23
Emily Wilson
What about you, Joan? How was it that God led you on the path to Bible translation ministry? 

05:30
Joan Weber
It started when I was young. I grew up on a farm in Iowa. And it was when I was ten years old that I first heard a missionary speak at our church and learned about missions. And it was shortly after that I had a dream. And in the dream, I was in Africa saying, jesus loves you. Jesus loves you. I had no concept of Africa. I had no concept of all the languages in Africa. But that dream was so strong that I continued to remember that dream for years afterwards and then move ahead till my college years. I went to college at Concordia, Seward, Nebraska. And while I was there in my junior year, I started asking God, seriously, God, what do you really want me to do with my life? 

06:21
Joan Weber
I was preparing to be a lutheran school teacher, but this mission dream kind of haunted me, and I heard God answer. I heard not an audible voice, but like a voice in my mind saying, lutheran Bible translators. Now, I had heard about Lutheran Bible translators while I was at college, and I thought, that’s a great ministry for people who are really good at languages, but not for me. So I was surprised to hear this. So I said, God, if this is really you, confirm it to me. Now, these are the old days when we did not have Internet. We looked at bulletin boards, and I saw on the bulletin board that there was going to be a couple from Lutheran Bible translators there on campus that Friday from three to 05:00 p.m. At the campus center for anyone interested. 

07:10
Joan Weber
But I looked at my schedule. I was teaching, student teaching off campus and then walking back and then had an organ lesson. I thought, well, I can’t see these people. That’s the only time my organ lesson was canceled. So I figured God was talking. 

07:27
Emily Wilson
What a God moment. 

07:28
Rich Rudowske
Yeah. 

07:29
Joan Weber
And then I went to talk to these people, and I said, well, I’d be interested in teaching missionary kids. And they said, you really ought to consider getting the training and helping do literacy with another culture. And so I started really considering that and praying about it. But I had three objections to God. The first one was organ. I was a music major with organ as my main instrument. While I was at Seward, I loved playing the organ. I had been playing for church since I was 13 years old, and I couldn’t take a pipe organ with me to Africa or anywhere else in the world. I said, but God, I want to play organ. My next organ lesson, even though I’d practiced, I just couldn’t play anything right. And so I surrendered it to God. 

08:21
Joan Weber
After that, I said, God, you gave it to me. You can have it back. And after that I could play again, but I gave up that one. And since then, when I come back during furloughs and stuff, I have been able to play organ a little bit here and there. Secondly, I felt I was inadequate. I said, God, I don’t really think I have what it takes to do it, to be a missionary. And God answered me through an article by Ken pike that talked about what it takes to be a missionary. And he said, it takes exceptional people who are physically in good shape, healthy, and very adaptable to new cultures, who are strong in learning languages and have intelligence to analyze and written languages. My reaction was, good. That leaves me out, but I kept reading. 

09:17
Joan Weber
And he said, but God doesn’t choose those strong, independent, capable people. He chooses those who have human weaknesses and are willing to rely on him. And I said, yes, God, I’m willing. And my third objection was, I needed reassurance that God was answering my prayers where I was at before I was willing to step out to a whole new place. Since high school. Well, since my second year of high school, I had a friend, Elaine, who was an atheist, and she would laugh at me when I tried to witness to her about Jesus, said I was brainwashed. And so I just prayed for her. And now it had been six years since I started praying for her to become a Christian, and I hadn’t seen any results, so I was bold enough, and I asked God, if you want me to go overseas. 

10:08
Joan Weber
Let Elaine become Christian by my birthday this year. So I had lost touch with her. But when I was home in Iowa for Thanksgiving vacation, I happened to run into her mother when I was in town and got her address, found out she was married now in another state, and wrote to her when I was home for Christmas. I got a letter back from her, and she said a week before Christmas, her husband and her had both received Jesus after listening to science films at college. My birthday is December 18, one week before Christmas. God answered my prayers very specifically. So then I began the steps towards becoming a missionary with Lutheran Bible translators. I went to linguistics training in the three summers between teaching school two years, Lutheran school at St. 

11:06
Joan Weber
John’s indianapolis, which was good experience for me in general in life and in teaching. Then, during my second summer of linguistic studies, I became a member of Wycliffe Bible translators, largely because lutheran biow translators at that time just had mission fields in Africa, and I had taken Spanish in high school, and I was thinking Latin America would be a better fit so I could build on the Spanish I’d studied. So I was gearing up to go to Guatemala with Wycliffe Bible translators. Part of the training at that time was jungle camp training in Mexico. I was there to learn village living and survival skills. During that time, I was there. 

11:49
Joan Weber
I came home because my father passed away, and then I went back, and when I went back, were just assigned to village situations, and I was assigned with two older single ladies who did not relate to me very well and did not understand my grieving. I felt so lonely that I said, God, I’m not going to make it on the mission field unless you give me a partner that I can feel supports me. So I started praying urgently for a partner, and I was told to pray also for a four wheel drive vehicle. 

12:22
Rich Rudowske
While you’re at it. 

12:25
Joan Weber
So I went back to Dallas while I was praying these things to study, and that’s where, as I was studying for my master’s degree in applied linguistics, that’s where I met Martin. He wasn’t heading the same direction, but God seemed to be pulling us together. I’d been praying for a partner, and when he proposed, I didn’t answer right away, but God seemed to speak to me. You’ve been praying for a partner? Trust me. So that changed my direction back to Lutheran Bible translators, which was where I’d started from. Anyway. 

12:59
Rich Rudowske
I just love these conversations with God in the specifics and, yeah, just like, I believe this, but I need you to help me believe more. And it was really great. And how God answers those prayers, it’s really fantastic. So the two of you, after that training in Dallas, then went off to Cameroon. When was it exactly that you first went to Cameroon, and what was it like? 

13:21
Joan Weber
May 1982. 

13:24
Rich Rudowske
Okay, and what was it like there when you first got there? What were you assigned to do? Who were you working with? 

13:30
Joan Weber
Well, for us in Cameroon, there was only one other couple working in country, and they were working up quite a bit further north than were, so we didn’t even see them for a long time. For me, going to Cameroon was like jumping off a cliff, because at that time, there was no cell phone, no Internet, no way of communicating back home except by slow mail. And went almost directly to the village. We didn’t have a lot of orientation to Cameron. We had about a week of orientation in Gounde and then met the Sil people in Yonde and then went to the village. And village living was a whole new level of learning since I’d had some training in that it helped to keep us healthy, how to cook, food basics and keep clean, but it became very relational. 

14:21
Joan Weber
But my first term, my French wasn’t very strong. I’d start out with Spanish and had tried to learn French before went there, but my French wasn’t very strong, and I didn’t know any kwanja when we first came there. So it was like I was in a wilderness. What broke the ice was having a baby. People didn’t have to talk to me. They could talk to my baby. Of course, he wasn’t going to answer them, but it gave me an ear full of language and I didn’t have to say anything. 

14:47
Rich Rudowske
There you go. 

14:48
Joan Weber
That was icebreaker and helped me to start picking up language. And most of the first expressions I learned, of course, is what they said to the baby and greetings, and gradually the language learning grew. But the first term was much like being in a wilderness, because learning a language, there were less tools at that time when we first went, and it was like this wide thing to do and huge and didn’t see as much progress as we wanted to. But by the end of the first term, we had a provisionary Alphabet for the language. I mean, it was an oral language. We had not had anything written down before we came, so were learning orally and writing it down phonetically and then trying to figure out the sound system of the language so that we could have an Alphabet and write it down. 

15:40
Joan Weber
So the first term was really heavy. When we came back at the end of first term, I remember somebody at our church asked me, are you going back again? And I said, well, yes. And he said, oh, you must really love it there. And I said, no, it’s been hard. I felt lonely and isolated. I was gradually learning the language, but I wasn’t strong in it because I had a baby. When I left to go there and I had another baby come back, I didn’t have time to just study the language. It was hard. But I said, God called us there and we haven’t finished the call, so we’re going back. And it got easier. It’s like after that, I saw God leading us more directly, like how to do a phonology and how to do this and how to do that. 

16:24
Joan Weber
We got more help, and God led us each step of the way. But I have to admit, it was hard first. It’s not like new missionaries now can call home and talk for an hour or whatever, right? 

16:35
Rich Rudowske
Yeah. How long had you been married at that point? When you went that first time? 

16:40
Martin Weber
We got married, the very end of the was the last thing and the best thing I did in the term. For me, went in May 26. So that was 1982. That was almost two and a half years later. 

17:01
Rich Rudowske
Okay. 

17:02
Martin Weber
And meantime, I had done carpenter work, and then we did some french study and partnership development. First term for me was a lot of practical things. I had to be there to support my wife and my family, my six month old son. But there was house. Oh, what do we do for a house? Well, there was a three room house, the only one in the village. It had three rooms that were sort of big enough. So one bedroom for us and the baby and one for a kitchen, one for the living room and everything else. But the roof leaked like a sieve. And the more we fixed it, the worse it got. So finally, Alan said, you got to build a house. I’m like, okay, I have a construction experience. That’s one of the things God put in my life. So, okay. 

17:54
Martin Weber
I supervised the building of a house, and it looked way too big at first, but when Alan Freudenberg visited, he said, you’re going to need it all. Don’t worry. We did. And I had to do. The first linguistic project. For me, besides learning language, was a sociolinguistic survey to determine which dialect of Kwanja we should study and use as a reference dialect. And we find there were about five dialects, but the two that were important. And we proposed this to the people, a meeting of elders in chiefs, and said, well, here’s what we found. And what we propose is that we live in Yimbury and study and begin with the Sundana dialect and end up as we can with the Indong dialect, which is exactly what we did over a period of more than 30 years. 

18:50
Martin Weber
But, yeah, it was a lot of physical challenges, which I kind of enjoyed, but it sure was different than working in Canada or in America. 

18:59
Emily Wilson
So over the three decades of ministry, you saw multiple dedications. You kind of hinted at that a bit, and the impact of literacy and just how scripture use, and especially audio scripture, how that impacted the community. Can you share a little bit about those experiences and give some examples? 

19:21
Joan Weber
My first work was a lot in literacy, and after we had dedicated the Kwanja New Testament, our next step was to get it ready in audio form. And one of the first things I did was set up reading contests in the different villages. Now, I had been preparing for that by having classes in the different villages. This developed over especially summers as I started homeschooling my kids. It was every summer that I would have literacy courses going on. I would supervise them and train the teachers in the different villages. So it was very gratifying to me to realize we had readers in all these different villages who could read the scriptures. And in the contest, we found the best ones or the right ones for different parts. 

20:07
Joan Weber
And some of them were very good readers to read, like narrate whole books or read the voice of Jesus or read the voice of John through revelation, as well as the epistles and the Gospel. So I was very grateful that it made an impact. It was some years later were in Goundari, and a kwanja, young lady whose husband had left her, had two young kids, came to me for help one day, and I recognized her as being, having been in one of the literacy courses in the village. So I asked her about it, if she was reading Kwanja. And she said, well, she had read Kwanja. I got out my New Testament and she was reading it, and she wanted one. And so I helped her earn money, get money to buy her New Testament. 

20:53
Joan Weber
But it was so gratifying to me that there were people who were reading God’s word. When we got it out, audio made a lot of impact. Then when we got the audio scriptures not just recorded, but out, then to the people, it took a couple of years time for them to get the proclaimers, is what the audio recording, the audio listening machines were called, and people were starting to listen. Muslims in the village were saying, hey, this is God talk. Can we have one for our mosque? And people were saying, giving testimonies, like in marriages, they were saying, were separated, but now we’re learning to forgive each other. This has saved our marriage. People who never went to church were saying, hey, this is important. We want to hear God’s word. 

21:46
Joan Weber
We heard several testimonies of people who had been stealing when they got convicted from hearing the scriptures, said, we’re not going to do this anymore. It was quite an impact. We’ve heard a lot of testimonies from the audio scriptures, and that’s been one of the most effective tools we’ve had. But we had to have the written scriptures first to have something to record from it, right? 

22:08
Rich Rudowske
Sure. 

22:08
Martin Weber
In 2013, just as we are moving away from Yimbury to Goundary, the church center, David Snyder, acting director, said, martin, go to Cameroon. And as you’re working now in more languages, this Kwanja, identify what is or are the most effective strategies for scripture engagement and see how that can be replicated in other languages. Yeah, sounds like an easy question, but maybe not so easy to pull up. 

22:38
Emily Wilson
Right. 

22:39
Martin Weber
Okay. And over the years, what we have seen is, yes, the audio scriptures in numerous languages has made a lot of impact. And I’ve seen the key to that is to have someone or some people who really have themselves a vision of what this can do and the passion and the commitment to keep on promoting those. So we’ve seen there’s a little lady who could sing the song. I’m only four foot eleven, but I’m going to heaven. Her name is Alice. And Alice, she’s just a great promoter for this. She gets out there, and she’ll cross through a river with these things on her head. And she says, no, I got to get out there. 

23:23
Martin Weber
There’s other women who don’t know God, don’t know the scriptures, don’t, haven’t heard of it, and I’ve got to get the word to them, whether it’s the Bible in Dewyo, whether it’s the scriptures, the audio recordings. And so she’s been out there, and now the big thing is these micro SD cards that they can buy for, like $6 and put in their phone, and they can have their own personal recording of not only Dewayo, but a few other languages as well. And she just can’t even keep up with the demand for this. People are always asking, where’s mine? Where’s mine? So that’s just great to see. And she lost her daughter, her only surviving daughter. And I was saying to Alice, don’t you think she’d take some time off? Now? She’s like, no, I got to continue. 

24:10
Martin Weber
People need the word, and I’m going to get out there. There’ll be time to grieve, but I’m not going to worry about that. I was just blown away. The other thing that’s been the best impact is the lectionaries. A lectionary is a collection of scriptures which are read regularly in the churches. And these started way before the time of Christ, even, but it’s continued through the traditional churches, especially. Lutheran Church is one and Catholic is another. They have these sets of readings which are read every three years and go through the gospels and all the other readings, Old Testament and psalms as well. So we saw that. 

24:57
Martin Weber
We have seen that people are even more excited to have electionary than they even are to have the New Testament or the Bible, which kind of surprises me because that’s not my own personal commitment, but that’s what they want, lectionaries, and that’s what they use, is a lectionary to read God’s word, big, significant parts of it. And so we started going ahead with the lectionaries, first of all, for Kwanja Sundana, and through research, more and more research, Joan found out that the second dialect of Kwanja was really another language. And that’s what a PhD linguist told us, said, you got to look at this as a language, not just a dialect, similar to the first one. So that’s how we ended up with. Is that the dedication of the second language of Kwanja? They just loved it. 

25:50
Martin Weber
It was such a big thing for them. Like, now we have God’s word in our language, our dialect too. So that was huge. And there are other lectionary projects that are on the scope, other ones that we’ve helped with, and we see that as a real leading edge in ministry in Cameroon. 

26:07
Rich Rudowske
When you’re thinking of translation of the whole Bible, there’s still a certain order things need to be done in. And so the lectionary provides or suggests that if you’ve covered those texts first, then you have a tool that can already be in the hands of people and even being read in churches while a translation of the rest of the scripture goes on. Is that basically how you approach it? 

26:30
Martin Weber
Absolutely. And in many projects, not all, but many projects, there are trained translators who are still not too old and not too worn out to be able to continue. So it’s like, yeah, they’ve got the basic training. They may not have any background in Hebrew, but, yeah, they’ve got the training. What is translation? How to do it. And that’s a really good first thing, both for experience in Old Testament translation and something to give to community while they’re waiting for the full Bible. 

27:00
Rich Rudowske
Yeah. And I just really have thought this was a great strategy because it responds to the language community and the christian church in that area, saying, somehow I would guess you had some input from them saying this would be useful or valued by us and would get scripture also being read in churches. And so anytime that you can respond to that sort of thing, and the language community is significantly involved in choosing what’s going to happen, then that’s a win for the Gospel. 

27:28
Martin Weber
Absolutely. There’s a language community, the bute. We have done a protestant lectionary for them, but we asked the other church, the Catholic Church, which is big in the area, I asked the priest, so how many language communities would actually use a lectionary that was made for your church? And he counted. He calculated. He said, there’s over 100 worship centers where it would be used. That’s like a bigger opportunity than we’ve ever had in Cameroon. 

28:00
Rich Rudowske
Sure. 

28:01
Martin Weber
So I was like, yeah, let’s do that. So that’s a project in the future, hopefully near future. 

28:07
Rich Rudowske
Yeah. Excellent. 

28:09
Emily Wilson
You’ve shared the impact in the communities of the impact of scripture in their lives and the hunger to share with more brothers and sisters in Christ and to spread the faith. But just wondering what was the role of scripture in your life as you lived in Cameroon and to this day, how has it impacted you and transformed you? 

28:33
Martin Weber
Scripture has always been key in my life, and as I was younger, I didn’t have the habits of reading my own particular portions, but that has become a habit and a very important thing. There’s nothing more important to me than God’s word and getting God’s word out for others. And so that’s a big thing for me. And I was reflecting this morning what have been the greatest privileges in my life. The greatest privilege is knowing Jesus as my lord and savior and knowing that I’ll share eternity with him. The second greatest privilege of my entire life has been the privilege of being called and equipped and sent by God through LBT to translate the scriptures for a people group. And that is just huge for me. 

29:27
Rich Rudowske
How about you, John? 

29:28
Joan Weber
Scriptures were part of my life as I was growing up, and I had a key Bible verse that’s helped me all the way through. It’s Matthew 633, seek you first, the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. And it’s like in working with Bible translation and literacy and overseas, I was seeking God’s kingdom, that the word of God is. What builds God’s kingdom is people hearing God’s word. Faith comes from hearing and hearing the word of God. So that was part of my focus. Put that first, and the promise is there and all these things. God has taken care of me in all the ways that I have needs. I felt a lot of inadequacies. We were in a village, rather isolated most of the time. 

30:22
Joan Weber
I mean, finally we had cell phones the very end, but there wasn’t very good cell phone coverage even then in the village. But I called on the Lord a lot. How do I figure out this problem with long vowels? I mean, there’s something going on here and I don’t understand it. Or were using some Old Testament stories on a device called megavoice, and I had trouble loading the stories onto the mega voice players. How do I make this work? God and I had a lot of issues through the years of things I didn’t know how to do. And I would call on the Lord, and sometimes he used other people as part of the answer. Sometimes he just directly sort of brought thoughts to my mind, what to try, what to do. 

31:04
Joan Weber
But I’ve seen God constantly there, and often his word has been what’s reassured me, encouraged me, given me the strength to keep going when it wasn’t that easy. His word has been very foundational to me personally, and that’s one main reason why it’s been very important to me to get it to others right. And what’s interesting also is your heart. Language matters. I mean, after being there for some time, I knew French, I knew Kwanja. I’d go to a church service, and somebody was preaching another language. I’d write down notes in English, and then I’d go home and read it. And when I was hearing it, I was taking it intellectually. But when I read it back in English, it hit my heart. And I’m thinking, this is important, that these people hear it in their heart language. 

31:56
Joan Weber
And even my friends Veronic and Madeleine came over the last time I was in the village and thanked us again. They said, thank you. Thank you. We didn’t used to understand God’s word very much when went to church, and now it’s in our language. We understand it because you came and. 

32:11
Rich Rudowske
You translated for after, you know, all these years in Cameroon. What do you think that our churches here in the west can learn from some of your ministry colleagues in Cameroon and the churches there? 

32:24
Joan Weber
I have seen friends and colleagues trust God for a lot more basic things than here. Here you want the government or the institution to take care of you, and if you have needs, you try to make claims through other institutions where there people go to God for basics. Somebody’s sick, they don’t have money to go to the hospital, or they don’t have enough food for the next month or whatever, people go to God. And it’s a grassroots faith in God that I have appreciated very much. Also, it’s an awareness of the spiritual world in America. A lot of people see the world just physically and not aware of the spiritual forces that are behind what’s going on in Africa. They see very much a spiritual world. 

33:20
Joan Weber
And the christians realize that we’re not contending against flesh and blood, but against the principalities and powers, against the spirits of the dark places. Our war isn’t against people. It’s against spiritual satanic powers. And that’s what’s often holding back faith and the gospel. So I appreciate my brothers and sisters in Africa who understand the spiritual world and who seek God’s power to overcome, and God is stronger and greater. 

33:58
Rich Rudowske
How about you, Martin? 

34:00
Martin Weber
Yeah, what do I think the church in the west can learn from some of our ministry colleagues and also the culture in general? I would say two things. One is generosity and another is hospitality, generosity. We think tithing is generous, and that’s good. But some people that I know, like our main translator in Kwancha for the first few years, Unganko Emmanuel, he would live in a non cemented house to be able to support brothers and cousins and others in school. And he would use up to like 50% of his income, his actually cash income, which was quite meager, to support others. That was just a very humbling witness to me. Another thing is hospitality. They’ll often give up the little that they have to help strangers or guests or even the mentally ill and just help them because they are people. 

35:05
Martin Weber
Well, those are a couple of things I’ve learned. 

35:08
Emily Wilson
So what advice would you give to someone who is considering missionary service with Lutheran Bible translators or just intercultural ministry in general? 

35:18
Martin Weber
For me, the way I look at my life, it was important to take the next step. What is the next step? And instead of saying, oh, well, I’m going to be a Bible translator in this or that country, well, maybe God will give you that vision in one foul swoop or whatever. But for me it was, take the next step. Take the next step and see how God is leading. And God has lead us all these years. He’s provided everything, including a wonderful partner to work with Joan, and he’s made it work. 

35:51
Joan Weber
What advice would I give? I still take my key verse, seek first God’s kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. We didn’t go there to have a fulfilled life. We went there because were seeking for more people to have God’s word in a meaningful way. But God also fulfilled our lives through it. We had so many opportunities to see people, to answers to prayers, to see God’s word, touch people, to see things happening, to help people physically in many ways. Here, people don’t come to my door asking for help so they can eat tomorrow or so that they can have a medical need. But we had many opportunities to help people, and in a way that’s very fulfilling. I mean, there’s also things to deal with that isn’t so fulfilling. 

36:42
Joan Weber
But absolutely, God has blessed us with in so many ways. And somebody considering missionary work, it’s a real life overseas, you don’t have needs covered up and things glossed over. Life is very real, and it’s blessed if you seek God in it. 

37:02
Rich Rudowske
So when you reflect back on the years of your ministry in Cameroon, what’s something that stands out as something that really gives you great joy? 

37:10
Martin Weber
For me, I love Bible study in general. I love exegesis even more, which is answering the question, what exactly does the text say and what does it not say? So I love casting that message then into another language and seeing it coming alive. But even more than doing the work, I love enabling other people to do the work. And I find as much, sometimes more fulfillment and joy in seeing someone else equipped and enabled, empowered, envisioned to be able to do God’s work. Bible translation getting the word out, that just really gives me joy. 

37:50
Joan Weber
I would recall a time after the dedication of lectionaries in our village that was a less significant dedication than the New Testament or the dung lectionary because there was a lesser turnout. It was less well organized. And to me the dedication itself seemed like just a formality. But after the dedication, I had good times with Kwanja people. A Kwanja evangelist came to me. He had been through some tough times before he had finished his training as evangelist. He had been in prison because of a feud over family property. And when he got out of prison, he had to start over with a bad reputation. And he was trying to share God’s word with people and sharing with me the struggles. 

38:45
Joan Weber
But I was just blessed because we could communicate in his language and we could pray together, and he was encouraged and ready to more equipped to do God’s work. And then I had a conversation of a friend of mine came over with her brother, who was sick, and he was blaming the sickness on someone we had worked with and wanted revenge on that person. And were able, in his language, to bring him through the steps of God’s forgiveness in his life and to forgive the other person, rather than trying to change his mindset that this other person had made him sick, I said, first of all, you need to receive God’s forgiveness and you need to forgive. And at the end of that time, he was healed. God healed him. 

39:30
Joan Weber
But these times of being able to share and for me, being able to share in a language that I’d struggled so hard to learn. And finally the fruit of it came that I could share people’s real needs and pray with them and see God work. This was something that gave me great joy. 

39:47
Rich Rudowske
Yeah, what a great illustration of the call that Paul gives in the New Testament, that we are ambassadors for Christ, calling on folks to be reconciled to God and to each other, and what a fantastic fruit of the ministry there. 

40:00
Emily Wilson
Well, we want to say thank you so much, Martin and Joan, for not only your faithful service and what God has done in and through you and through the partners along the years, over 30 years, but we want to say thank you too, for sharing your story not only with us, but also all of our listeners. And may God continue to bless you in these next steps along the journey. So thank you so much for joining us. 

40:28
Martin Weber
Thank you for inviting us. 

40:29
Joan Weber
Thank you. 

40:34
Rich Rudowske
Thanks to Martin and Joan Weber for spending time with us on the podcast today and sharing about God’s faithfulness and the awesome ways that he is at work in West Africa. 

40:42
Emily Wilson
If you’d like to get involved by praying for or giving to put God’s word in their hands of the people of Cameroon, go to lbt.org slash give. Under the project list, you’ll find two projects for work in Cameroon Department of Bible Translation and Literacy and Cebula Bible translation and literacy. Together we can put God’s word in their hands. 

41:04
Rich Rudowske
Thank you for listening to the essentially translatable podcast brought to you by Lutheran Bible translators. Look for past episodes of the podcast@lbt.org Slash podcast or subscribe on audible, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Follow Lutheran Bible translators social media channels on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter. Or go to lbt.org to find out how you can get involved in the Bible translation movement and put God’s word in their hands. The essentially translatable podcast is edited and produced by Andrew Olson and distributed by Sarah Lyons. Executive producer is Emily Wilson. Podcast artwork was designed by Caleb Rotewald. Music written and performed by Rob Weit. I’m Rich Rudowski. So long for now.