Bondia friends. As I organise the printing of my third book, I feel it is time to tell the story of this ministry.
It all began...when the formal Moderator of the Presbyterian Church of Australia, Rev Robert Benn, came to Darwin to talk to us about the newly formed Evangelical Presbyterian Church of Timor Leste. Like many Australians, my knowledge about Timor Leste was dreadfully inadequate. They were little more than an item on the news. We saw the horrific images, we heard the stories of their fight for independence but we knew so little about who the people really were. We didn't even know what language they spoke. Sure, we knew that they suffered in WWII as a result of helping our soldiers, but even this history failed to become part of our popular culture like the tales of Kokoda and the people from Papua.
Maybe because of this ignorance, because so much research had to go into the basic things like literacy, languages and resources, it wasn't until several months later, in December 2008, that I decided that the only way I could send children's Christian literature in a language that both the children and their parents could read, was to send books in Tetun, the national language. As there were no such books in the world, they had to be produced from scratch and translated into Tetun. I threw the idea at Robert Benn and his reply came back...: "Crazy idea . . . but a good one!"
And so began...'Timotio Nia Istoria'.
... and so began a very powerful tool for ministry! Crazy - ??? Good - YES!
ReplyDeletePraise God for your willingness to be obedient to the seed planted that day by Rev Robert which has flourished under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
Bless you, Jo, in your writing.
Thanks be to God that the crazy idea fell into good soil and has begun to flourish. May God himself encourage you to continue and may he stir up others to encourage you in practical ways so this work will prosper.
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