Understanding Scripture

Olivia traveled to another town to visit her uncle, who had been sick in bed for months. On her arrival, she had a surprising response from her elderly aunt, Cristina, who said, “Thanks for coming all this way to visit us, Olivia. Your uncle has been very sick and he’ll enjoy your visit. I can’t visit right now because I am in a group where we listen to Bible studies in Mam on cassette. Today is the evaluation session, and I don’t want to miss it.”  

Olivia was delighted to hear that her aunt, whose husband is a practicing shaman, had a new interest in the Word of God. This was an answer to prayer.  

Cristina had joined a group of women who gathered to listen to Bible texts on cassette tapes. The women, many of whom were uneducated, like Cristina, found that the Bible stories in the Mam language were easy to understand.  

That day, Cristina wasn’t sure what to expect, because she had never participated in a course evaluation. She relaxed when she heard that the questions were in Mam rather than Spanish as she had feared. When asked about what she had heard on the tapes, she could quote many of the Bible passages almost word for word.

When the course leader asked whether God would accept the blood of animals as a sacrifice for her sins, she responded, “Oh no, that’s why God sent his perfect son Jesus to die in our place. If we continue in our custom of killing animals, it means that we reject Jesus, God’s Son.”