hitting the homestretch

so you have your gregorian calendar, your lunar calendar, your fiscal calendar, your liturgical calendar, your school calendar, your chinese calendar... but my calendar, of course, is the quiz season calendar. i don't remember if i was born in the year of the monkey or the rabbit or the rat, but i DO remember that i graduated in the year of luke. and crazy enough, i keep track of when others graduated in the same way.

well, i've just about come full cycle again. there are just over two months left with this gospel which is so full of treasures. it seems like so long since the days of meditating on Luke 1:4.

this morning i had the opportunity to speak at chapel for the christian school (the first time since they became our new downtown neighbors), and i expanded some on saturday's quiz devotional. i read a good portion of chapters 22 and 23 (thank you whitney and joey and justin - you got my head in these ones a lot) looking at different people's reactions to who Jesus is. we focused most specifically on the thief on the cross who understood his just punishment, Jesus' undeserved death AND the fact that Jesus alone had say over his eternal destiny. (Luke 23:39-43; 2 Corinthians 5:20-21)

anyway, i just came away from that time marveling at the goodness of God as He has opened up the whole of the book throughout the year and enabled me to pull further illustrations from earlier in the book even as i spoke today about chapter 23! what an exciting process, what an amazing God!

little did i realize that i was about to receive a multiplied blessing... in checking my email before heading home to put out pap's trash, i read a missionary update from the sawka's who work in Bible translation in zambia (ironically, ken used to teach at the christian school). i'll share a paragraph:

Because their language has been neglected and is not well known outside their own area, the Soli have been called ‘the hidden language group’ of Zambia. They number well over 50,000 speakers but have never had a book published in their language. We hope to have the first book in Soli by the end of this year, and it will be a book of the Bible!!

and below that paragraph is a picture with this caption: "first drafts of the gospel of luke in the soli language"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

yeah, this living and active Word that has been unfolding anew for me this year will be the first thing that these people EVER READ IN THEIR LANGUAGE! praise God - may He open hearts and eyes!

***please pray for the sawka's in their translation work, for our quiz teams as we wrap up the local season and head for nationals in st. louis AND for the christian school... i would love to see them add Bible quizzing next year - especially since they are now down here close!