It’s been a while since we’ve written, so we
need to start with family news. There are two new family members since we last
wrote!
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| Winslow Joy Roberts. |
Kate and Jordan welcomed Winslow Joy Roberts on July 15. Kate tells about Winslow’s name:
Winslow is named for Octavius
Winslow, a pastor and writer who lived in the 19th Century. We appreciate his continual emphasis on the
Gospel. Jordan's father has read daily to his family from Winslow's
'Morning Thoughts' and 'Evening Thoughts' for many years. Baby Winslow's name
is a way of honoring her parents' Christ-centered heritage--and we also had a
reading from Octavius Winslow at our wedding!
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Aurélie
Anne Van Wynen
and big sister, Wynnie
|
Josh and Heather, and big sister Éowyn (Wynnie) welcomed Aurélie Anne Van Wynen on September 13.
Heather wrote the following when they announced Aurélie’s
birth:
We are pronouncing her first name "ah-RAY-lee," though it may also be pronounced
"oh-RAY-lee" or "oh-ray-LEE," which would be closer to the
French pronunciation. When I was little, I loved that my middle name, Renée, had an accent mark in it. I
thought it was sophisticated and special! Wynnie's given name, Éowyn, also
has an acute accent mark. When I saw the name Aurélie, I thought it looked
and sounded so pretty and that it would be fun for my daughters to have the
accented é in common
in their names. We chose Anne after the fictional character in Anne of Green Gables.
We were in Philadelphia with Kate and Jordan
before Winslow was born, but then I had to leave for meetings in Ethiopia (it
was sooo hard to leave!) so missed Winslow’s birth. But Tom was there, hanging
out in the waiting area with Jordan’s parents and I was able to join them
briefly on Skype! I came back to the U.S. via Philadelphia so got to spend a
few precious days with little Winslow.
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Wynnie
turned three in August
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We haven’t seen Aurélie yet, but will soon! Wynnie was holding her
the other day and told her “Grandma and Grandpa are going to come to our house
to see you and hold you and hug you. Aren’t you excited? Yes, you are!” We’re
excited, too. And every day Wynnie asks if we are on our way. She also suggests
that she should come back to Texas! We had her here for a week in May and it
was a major success. She is the only family member who has ever spent the 16
hour drive from Colorado to Texas (it’s that long West Texas stretch that gets
to most of us) saying cheerily, “I’m so excited we’re going to Texas!”
We are doing a lengthy road trip in October
going to Colorado, Michigan (for Tom’s board meetings at ASM), Philadelphia and
Tennessee. Fortunately I can read and work in the car! I think Tom sometimes
solves major web problems as he drives, too. The change of scenery is
good…especially when it includes three granddaughters!
The reason we are also stopping in Tennessee is
the other bit of major family news! My parents moved back to Tennessee from
Waxahachie last month. It all happened pretty quickly and their house here sold
in a day! We miss them a lot but they love being back in Tennessee and they
bought a nice home there in a retirement community that can provide care when
and if they need it in the future. They are in the same general area where they
were before, near Crossville. We drove (well, Tom drove) the moving truck up
there, hauling our car behind so we could then continue our journey to meetings
in Oregon after helping with a bit of the unpacking.
Yes, in the midst of all these family events,
work continues! Tom has been making lots of improvements to www.wycliffe.net and doing all it takes to keep the site
running. We have a good team to help support the site, too. Craig and Anne
Combs in Oregon who handle editing, posting and manage the flow of
translations, Nancy Duncan in Dallas who does special projects, Rick Harman who
handles the server stuff, and Josh who is doing a redesign for us!
You may recall that in our last
newsletter (May 2014) I told you about the Missiological Consultations on
Funding sponsored by the Wycliffe Global Alliance during 2013-2014. They
started with a global meeting in Turkey, followed by regional meetings in
Thailand, Kenya, Germany and Mexico.
What an honor to spend time in Scripture and conversation with
colleagues all over the world as, together, we sought to discern God’s heart
and mind concerning His mission and His resources. As
I mentioned before, we wanted to identify what principles need to
be in place for us to be good stewards of the many resources (not just money)
God provides. We have been looking at what it means for all of us to be both
givers and receivers. Following our leadership team meetings in Ethiopia, a small
group of us met to go through the pages and pages of input from the
consultations. The goal was to articulate some of the principles that emerged
from these meetings. You
can read more about the consultations and the principles on Wycliffe.net. I’ll keep you posted on some
of the “what next” as the Alliance organizations continue to think about how to
put all this into practice!
This year’s travels continue. I’ll be
participating in communication meetings in the country of Georgia, working with
a colleague for a week in New Zealand and attending a missiological
consultation on Bible translation in Europe. It will take another newsletter to
share some of the wonderful things we are seeing God doing through the Wycliffe
Global Alliance organizations and the rest of His Church worldwide. So I will
try not to leave such a gap between newsletters next time!
We do appreciate your prayers and support so
much. Be sure to let us know how we can be praying for you. We pray for you
anyhow, but it’s great to have specifics to pray for from time to time! And please do keep our family in your prayers—
Praise and Petitions
Josh, Heather, Wynnie and Aurélie.
Rejoicing over the new baby! Josh is now working fulltime for a web design firm
so no longer has the ups and downs of a freelance income. That’s good news
since Heather has now quit her job to be home with the girls.
Kate, Jordan and Winslow. Also rejoicing over
little Winslow! Jordan is back in seminary after a summer of manual labor as a
roofer. Kate has a part-time nanny job and is looking for editing and writing
work. Jordan is also looking for part-time work. Pray that their faith will
continue to grow as they look to the Lord to meet their financial needs.
My parents, Jerry and Marlene Roach. We are
grateful that they are getting settled in their new home, are making friends
and have already found a good church home.
Vivian, Tom’s stepmom, turned 91 last month and
is still doing well, gardening and entertaining dinner guests, at her apartment
in Dallas.
Tom and I need wisdom and discernment as we
juggle work and other projects. I’ve also started a study program, so am
excited about that! Pray we will use our time wisely. We are grateful our schedules are flexible
enough to allow for the occasional road trip to visit family while still
keeping up with very busy jobs!
Ethiopia
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| Ethiopian Orthodox Church, Addis Ababa |
Our
Wycliffe Global Alliance leadership team was privileged to learn about this
ancient country from our Ethiopian colleagues during the week we met in Addis
Ababa. Ethiopia
has a long and rich Christian history. Ethiopia (once
also known as the ‘Land of Cush’) is referred to 15 times in the Bible. The Ethiopian eunuch
who was baptized by Philip became a disciple in approximately 36 AD (Acts
8:27-39) and
brought the gospel back to Ethiopia.
The Ethiopian
Orthodox Church has a membership of between 40 and 45 million. Ethiopian
Protestant congregations include 13.7 million people. The largest Protestant
group is the Ethiopian Evangelical Church Mekane Yesus, with about 5 million members. Mekane Yesus is
also one of several Ethiopian Wycliffe Organizations.
All 87 languages of Ethiopia are ‘national languages’
and are encouraged and supported by national organizations. The Ethiopian
Wycliffe organizations are facilitating Bible translation in a number of these
languages. But Bible
translation is not new to Ethiopia. In 450-500 AD New Testaments books were translated into Ethiopia’s
Geez language. This was 1,000 years before any Scriptures were translated into
English!
