Faith-based travel takes on a different perspective when you decide God has called you to international ministry. In 1992, as we prepared to move to Jackson, MS, where I would enter Reformed Theological Seminary, we knew we would leave the USA to take the Good News of Jesus Christ to people who had little opportunity to hear it.
After I graduated from seminary, our decision took us to Uzbekistan in Central Asia and then to Brazil, where we served in ministry for ten years. That’s long-term faith-based travel which is very different from a short-term mission trip. I could tell you many stories about those ten years but I’ll save them for another time. I want to focus on the potential impact of a short-term mission experience.
In 2004, we returned from Brazil and I received a call to be an associate pastor with Doug Pratt, Senior Pastor at First Presbyterian Church in Bonita Springs. An integral part of my First Church ministry was developing the mission and outreach program. This responsibility kept me involved with Christian mission organizations and missionaries in our community, the USA, and worldwide. By 2015, First Church was supporting the work of 50 organizations and missionaries. I had the privilege and joy of traveling on short-term trips to witness the ministry of many of these partners.
In 2014, I had the opportunity to meet with the director of a new, accelerated Bible translation methodology that Wycliffe Associates (WA) was promoting. It was intriguing and seemed to be a Bible translation game-changer. I was interested in visiting one of their translation projects. The First Church elders surprised us with a gift in honor of my having completed ten years of ministry at First Church by sending us on a short-term mission trip to visit a WA translation project using the new methodology.
In March 2015, Linda and I traveled to Cameroon to join a two-week WA Bible translation project, one of the first projects experimenting with the new accelerated methodology. It was amazing to work with 31 women and men, all Cameroon nationals from five different language groups, as they began the first translation of the Bible into their languages. We were all taught the translation methodology, and they went to work translating while we helped facilitate the process. To watch each language group realize they could translate the Bible was amazing and joyful. Linda and I were captivated by the thought that this new translation methodology could revolutionize Bible translation.
On the return flight from Cameroon, Linda and I decided we wanted to be part of this Bible translation movement. One of my first meetings back at First Church was with Pastor Doug. I gave him a report on the short-term experience in Cameroon and the potential of the new translation methodology. Then, I informed him of my intent to retire from First Church by the end of 2015 so that Linda and I could work full-time with Wycliffe Associates.
I retired on August 30, 2015, and Linda and I were in India, Africa, and Brazil before the end of the year working on translation projects with Wycliffe Associates. By the end of 2019, we had organized and traveled to direct Bible translation workshops with 26 language groups in eight countries. In 2019, a deaf pastor and a few talented deaf believers invited us to join their team to translate the Bible into Libras, Brazilian sign language, for the 3 million Brazilian deaf. We accepted the invitation, resigned from Wycliffe Associates, and affiliated with New International of Fort Myers as our USA administrative umbrella. As members of the Libras Bible translation coordination team, Linda and I participate in planning and organizing the translation team and are the key fundraisers for the project in the USA. Our participation is primarily via Zoom and we travel to Brazil once a year to meet face-to-face with the team.
After five years, in February 2024, the Brazilian team celebrated the completion of the New Testament in Libras, available online and through a digital app (Biblia TPS). Since January, the Brazilian team has begun the translation of the Old Testament with the book of Genesis. The Old Testament has three times as many verses as the New Testament, which will likely take 10-15 years to complete. We appreciate your prayers and encouragement.
Short-term mission experiences do not always generate such radical life-changing decisions as I have just described, but they can and will transform your relationship with God and how your life fits into his plans for the world, both near and far. The Lord uses faith-based travel to encourage those whom you visit and, perhaps more importantly, transform your life.
by Pastor Emeritus Paul Fahnestock
