Twenty Five Years on our Knees
Even the littlest intercessor can make a big difference in the world. Years ago, a five-year-old boy heard a missionary speak about all
the people in the world who didn’t have God’s Word. He decided he wanted to pray for one of these language communities, so he began praying each Sunday afternoon for God to send missionaries to the Rapa Nui people on Easter Island. His mom and dad would smile each time they heard the fervent prayer.
Finally a Wycliffe friend of theirs reported that he was assigning translators to serve the Rapa Nui! The little boy started writing to the translators and then began selling stationery so he could give them some of his profits. His parents later discovered that the missionaries had become interested in Easter Island around the time their son began praying!
God has called many others to prayer for the Bibleless. Decades ago, a young Italian man visiting a Wycliffe center was gripped by the realization that over 3,000 language communities around the globe did not have any Scripture in their own language. He returned to Italy deeply moved, and took out an ad in a newspaper, appealing to anyone who would agree to pray for a Bibleless people group. Using a copy of the Ethnologue, an international language directory, he vowed to send willing prayer partners the name of a group in need. Over 200 Christians answered his call to prayer.
With this idea offering inspiration, a Wycliffe missionary named Bernie May launched the Bibleless Peoples Prayer Project (BPPP) in 1982. This was a strategic effort to provide at least two intercessors for every language group on earth in need of Scripture translation. Jesus promised, “If two of you agree here on earth concerning anything you ask, my Father in heaven will do it for you” (Matthew 18:19, NLT). Armed with this assurance, and a belief in the God of the impossible, prayer teams began praying for Bibleless language communities by name.
One of the first pairs of intercessors to join BPPP was Bernie’s son and daughter-in-law, Bob and Grace May. Before she married Bob, Grace worked in Wycliffe’s home office and helped recruit intercessors for this newly launched prayer effort. As newlyweds, she and her husband Bob committed to pray for the Kwara'ae people of the Solomon Islands.
After praying for a number of years, the Mays received word that their language group had been surveyed, and later translators were assigned to work with the Kwara'ae. The Mays asked to support the missionary couple leading the translation project. Finally—after over two decades of prayer—the translated Kwara'ae New Testament was joyously dedicated on Jan. 4, 2004. Bob and Grace placed a copy under their Christmas tree—one of the best gifts they’d ever received.
Reflecting on her family’s experience seeing the Kwara'ae receive their own New Testament, Grace remarked, “It was really unbelievable to think that had been accomplished in the time we’d been married. It was good for the kids who saw all this happen right before their eyes. We saw tangible results from our prayers.”
Some of the prayer project’s most faithful partners are the more seasoned saints, some of whom have been praying since the beginning. One woman who has been praying for Bibleless people since 1983 said, “I am a senior now, 90 years old—active, but limited. I am committed to prayer as my service to God as long as I will live.”
Over the last 25 years, people have had many reasons to intercede for the Bibleless, but perhaps the best motivation is summed up by George Cowan, former director of BPPP.
“Lord, You’ve given me the whole Bible. I’ve got multiplied versions. I’ve got more versions than I know what to do with! But what about that poor guy out there? He’s one of a little group of 300. He’s got nothing.” What should I pray for him, “Lord give him some crumbs, please”?! And I’m stuffed with a gourmet meal. “Give him some crumbs!” I can’t pray that, it chokes in my throat! I can only ask that God give him the same as He’s given me. And I just hope that no one will ever be able to say in Heaven that, “they stopped before they’d come to my language.”
After 25 years, God is still calling His children to prayer through the Bibleless Peoples Prayer Project. And with nearly 2,100 language communities around the world still waiting for Scripture, His command to “never stop praying” (1 Thess. 5:17, NLT) seems more critical than ever.
(Story by Borghy Holm)