View this email in your browser

Knightlife

An update from T.R. and Angie Knight
Serving with SIL International - Language Technology

August 2023 - This month we had our yearly Assure Alliance Retreat. If you to know a lot more about the Assure Alliance, scroll down for more details. For now, I just want to discuss the Retreat and the impact it has our work with SIL. The most significant benefit the Assure Alliance provides us is opportunities to share the work we are doing and find ways to collaborate in those efforts.

At the retreat, we all shared our technology plans for 2024 and how we could build a taxonomy for documenting and fundraising for these projects. By better understanding and communicating what each organization is currently or planning to work on, the better chances we have of finding areas to collaborate and reduce duplication of efforts.

One of the biggest impacts directly on Language Technology has been collaboration for the next version of Paratext, which we are calling Platform.Bible and Paratext.Bible. Multiple organizations have joined with our teams to help design this next version of this premiere Bible translation software. Early efforts were in systems architecture and data architecture advisory groups. During the retreat, we discussed and began developing a multi-organizational team to design and develop a shared editor for Bible Translation that could be used in software applications across all our organizations.

The Assure Alliance only formed recently but it is already having significant impact on the Bible Translation movement and the technologies we develop.

What is the Assure Alliance?

The technology and data teams of Biblica, SIL, UBS, ABS, Clear, CDBR, Seed Company, and Prescience entered into an informal strategic alliance to help equip the global church to translate Scripture more confidently. This collaboration, called Assure, originated from a shared desire to serve those engaged in the immense task of translating God’s Word faithfully and clearly into the languages of the world. The Bible Translation world has matured to the point where more formal inter-organizational collaboration is needed in order to work strategically. Assure has been formed to meet precisely this need.

From the assure.bible website:

MISSION & VISION

We collaborate to equip Bible translators with the technologies, techniques, and digital resources they need so that all language communities will receive a translation they can have confidence in sooner.

SHARED BELIEFS

God has revealed himself through his Word and tasked us with carrying it to the nations. Translating it into other languages is an ever fresh challenge requiring the best of our resources.

Greater inter-organizational collaboration is needed in order to respond to the ever-changing needs of translation teams, so that each team may be equipped to translate faithfully and effectively.

To answer this call, we join together to enable innovation and development on an unprecedented scale in Bible translation technologies, techniques, and digital resources.

God at Work

“God's work done in God's way will never lack God's supply.” - Hudson Taylor

Here are some things He has done recently:

• The Assure Alliance Retreat (August 20 to 23, 2023) focused on the theme, Renew. “You’re my place of quiet retreat; I wait for your Word to renew me.” (Psalm 119:114 Message). Renewed by worshiping together, praying together, reminding ourselves of God’s faithfulness and goodness, collaborating together, having quiet personal times to reflect, and fun group times to recharge.

• We have gone live with Support.Bible, a Bible translation community support forum for a variety of Bible translation tools such as Paratext, Paratext Lite, Publishing Assistant, FlexTrans, and Scripture Forge. In the future, other software may also be added.

  
  

I hope this small glimpse encourages you to see what God is doing through all of us serving at SIL International.

Prayer and Praise

• Please pray for the upcoming Paratext Summit (September 12 to 15) at Ridgecrest Conference Center. We will be traveling to the event and T.R. will be helping host it.

• Please pray as we work through the ETEN funding proposal process for 2024.

• Please continue to pray for an unspoken request that Angie and T.R. are working through.

• Praising God for a great Assure Alliance Retreat.

• Praising God that T.R. was able to have a respite weekend (August 25 to 27). Angie’s parents came to our house and cared for Angie while T.R. took some time to rest, pray, reflect, and enjoy time with some friends.

• Praising God for our garden that is producing wonderful fruits, vegetables, and flowers this year. T.R. has completed all his canning for this year.

• Please let us know how can be praying for you!

Thank you for your prayers and encouragement.

In Him,
T.R. and Angie Knight

Enjoy the harvest from our garden

Our garden has provided a bountiful harvest this year. It provides spiritual relaxation in God’s creation, physical exercise away from the computer monitor, and so many wonderful fruits and vegetables for our kitchen.

A glimpse into part of our garden in full growth and harvest time.

How can you support the work we are doing with SIL International?

Glad you asked! T.R. is currently in a fully funded position in his role as Director of Bible Translation Software. The finances come from a funding organization devoted to innovation in Bible Translation. Because T.R.’s position is fully funded, we are not currently requesting you to partner with us financially. What we could use the most are your prayers and encouragement. If you would like to financially support the work that SIL does, you can give online or via check. Currently, online donations go to a central fund for SIL. We are in process of implementing a new online donation website that would allow you to give to my department’s projects or even to my work specifically. If you give via check, you can include in the note field a designation of Bible Translation Software - KBTD16. Thank you for your prayers and support.