Why we are doing what we do.
Since we have returned to our village in August 2018, we have met a young couple that has reminded us why we are doing what we are doing.
 The young man, named Ko has been an orphan since he was 8 years old. When his parents died, he went to live with his aunt who had him work for his stay in lieu of going to school. Ko has shown interest in learning more about the Lord but confided in Dave that there was one thing holding him back: he cannot read and thus not read the Bible. When Dave told him that we wanted to build a Kwakum (AKA Bakoum)* literacy/translation center, he lit up and couldn’t wait to start learning. We have hired him to help build the center and he works sun-up to sundown making bricks. We also hope to start teaching him the Bible orally.
His girlfriend, Mami (pronounced “Mommy”), recently lost her father who was allegedly murdered by her step-mom. She works with me (Stacey) daily learning to read Kwakum. I also am teaching through a French children’s story book Bible in Kwakum, explaining to her the character of God through Bible stories. The other day, in the story of Abraham sacrificing his son to Isaac, when I asked her what she learned, she said that she learned that God loved Abraham because Abraham loved Him first. I said, “No, God loved Abraham first and called him out of idolatrous family. Abraham in return loved God.” We then read the verse “We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19) while I explained that first we are receivers of God’s love and then it is reciprocated to him and to others. Her mind was blown as she had previously assumed that we had to earn God’s love. She does not understand the Gospel yet (we are still in Genesis), but she cannot get enough of the Word of God.
The Kwakum house
 As mentioned above, we have started a building a “Kwakum House” which will serve as a literacy and translation center. The property was given to us by our local church and gives our ministry credibility in the eyes of the people. In the 2,500 square feet structure will be a conference room, a screened in porch area (where we will work with children), a translation classroom and office, and a literacy classroom and office. The structure is by the village well and so as people are getting water, they will be able to hear people inside singing the Kwakum alphabet and reading stories aloud. People are talking about the center and some have even been moved to tears as we have told them about it. We hope to have the building completed at the end of March 2019.
Literacy program and Jean Yves
 When we first arrived in Cameroon, we met a Cameroonian believer who works with Wycliffe here in Cameroon. He helped us go from village to village among the Kwakum and explain the Bible translation and literacy project to the people. He has since received training in developing a literacy program. We reconnected when we arrived back in the country in August 2018 and he mentioned that he would be interested in returning to the Kwakum to do an internship and help us get the literacy program started. We are currently talking to his supervisors, but if all goes as planned, he would be assigned to our project starting next month, Jan 2019. He and I (Stacey) would work together on the writing system / how to teach it, and in time, he would run point on literacy while Dave and I transition to Bible translation. We consider Jean-Yves to be a HUGE answer to prayer.
Ethnomusicology
Chris Gassler is an ethnomusicologist who studies music of various Cameroonian people groups. He is based in the capital but has come out to the Kwakum in order to study their music. Our dream is that he and a team of Kwakum musicians could come up with an alphabet song in Kwakum as well as Scripture stories put to music. We are hoping to work with him throughout the years so that when the Bible is completed, we can have songs that sound Kwakum laced throughout the audio version of the translation. It is also a very effective way to transmit the truths of Scripture as the Kwakum are known to sing and dance for hours, usually during their funeral ceremonies.
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