Here are a few highlights and updates from our year, much of which looked different from what we had planned! :)
Wycliffe Bible Translators
P Y L E F A M I L Y
Provision, Challenges, and Hope
January 2021
We hope you found ways to celebrate and remember Christ's birth this season, even though your year may have looked different than you planned. We enjoyed time at home for Christmas this year, including some video calls with family.
Here are a few highlights and updates from our year, much of which looked different from what we had planned! :)
Digital Bible Library
Over the past year, Eric and his team have made good progress on making more Bibles (and portions) available in the Digital Bible Library (DBL). Eric's big accomplishment was creating a way for chronological sign language Bibles to be shared in DBL. This will be so helpful for reaching deaf learners with God's Word!
Overall, in 2020, DBL added text content in 301 languages, audio recordings in 128 languages, and sign language videos in 5 languages. It's exciting to see God's Word available to more people around the world each year!
Roles
Eric started out 2020 on a team of 3 software developers working on DBL. Unfortunately, due to various circumstances (including COVID-19), Eric is the only remaining software developer on the team as we enter 2021. We hope that he will soon be training someone else to work with him, but, whether he is working alone for a while or training someone else, he is likely to feel like he has a lot on his plate. We would appreciate prayers that he would balance his time, energy, and responsibilities well.
Early in 2020, Allison started serving one morning a week at the IT Helpdesk for Dallas International University, which is a new name for the school where she received her MA in Applied Linguistics for serving with Wycliffe. Once the pandemic hit and shut things down, she needed to be home full-time to watch the kids, manage Sarah's virtual learning, and cook for her low-histamine diet to manage hives. Unfortunately, having no outside help with the kids made it clear that she's dealing with chronic fatigue, which goes back to her pregnancies. She's not sure when she'll attempt to take on a part-time role again but would appreciate prayers for energy and healing. We're thankful to be able to have some babysitting help right now while the kids are home all the time and we're navigating virtual learning.
🙏🏽 Please continue to pray
For health for our family
For energy and wisdom for each day
For financial provision and for wisdom in seeking new financial partners in the current circumstances. (It is a huge praise that giving toward our Wycliffe ministry has increased overall in the past year!)
Financial Update
Ever since returning from Tanzania and adding three kids to our family, we've been significantly under budget for our Wycliffe ministry. Would you pray with us for more partners in our ministry with Wycliffe and for wisdom in how to proceed?
We are SO thankful that we've been able to receive some temporary provision related to Eric's work on DBL, which has enabled us to continue serving with Wycliffe for the past several years. However, in the long run, we need to increase the number of partners on our team with Wycliffe as the outside funding decreases.
We set some ambitious financial partnership goals early in 2020, as we planned to have more time to focus on building our team of partners. Our kids were attending some childcare and Mother's Day Out programs, going to school (Sarah), and doing childcare exchanges with other families. Right after we sent out our spring newsletter with ambitious goals, everything shut down, we lost all our childcare options, and Sarah started virtual learning. Our time became consumed with surviving as a family, trying to find a balance between health and sanity, as Allison's responsibilities and challenges increased dramatically. Eric needed to take some sick leave to help when Allison's fatigue was taking over, and our financial partnership goals had to be adjusted.
Nonetheless, the year provided us with great opportunities to connect with friends and partners and see how everyone is faring. We have greatly appreciated some extra financial gifts toward our Wycliffe ministry this past year, we have gained a couple of new partners, and a few people have increased their giving.Almost every year, we also lose a couple of partners, but overall we saw progress over the past year, which has been a great encouragement at a time when many have been concerned about finances, and we were hesitant to ask people to give.
Would you pray with us that God would raise up more people to partner with us in the work of making the Bible available to speakers of every language who still need access to it? If you haven't already, would you consider joining us as a financial partner in our ministry with Wycliffe?
Thank you to all of you who pray for our work and who give so that we can continue to serve with Wycliffe! We're SO thankful for God's continued provision in our lives, even if it doesn't always look like what we expect!
Family Update
Sarah (7) is enjoying 2nd grade and finding creative ways to connect with friends. She seems to really excel at art, as well as math, and greatly enjoys reading. She finally got her first loose tooth this month. (Two permanent teeth already came in behind her lower teeth.)
Caleb (5) and Jonah (3) are enjoying times they get to see babysitters and friends. Jonah enjoys being a little ninja, hiding himself in things, and hiding things inside other things. Caleb is gaining a household reputation for his ability to remember things that others have forgotten. We suspect Caleb is allergic to dogs, since he seemed to be extra sniffly and sneezy while we took care of a golden retriever for two weeks.
Eric and Allison are happy they were able to do a few home repairs/improvements this past year, and they'd still appreciate prayers that they'd find underlying issues for health problems. Eric's MRI didn't reveal anything concerning, but he needs to decide whether to schedule an EMG to further investigate causes of tingling in his lips and hands.
