The Missionary That Never Sleeps

By Dick and Sue Montag

My husband Dick and I were Bible Translators with the Cashinahua in Peru (now spelled Kashinawa in Peru and Kaxinawá in Brazil) from 1969 to 1981. There had been a previous team with them and when we arrived, there was some rough translation, and one believer, Mario.

Almost as we got off the plane our first trip there, Mario told us he had been promised by our predecessors that we would help him to become a bilingual school teacher. We were a bit overcome with the project so soon after our arrival, but set right to work on revising the school books left in a rough draft by our predecessors, and took Mario back with us to the jungle linguistic centre of Yarinacocha to begin the necessary schooling.

He could read and write his own language and had a big smile which caused one not to notice that he spoke almost no Spanish. He began teaching school after finishing his first course-- second grade! He also preached every evening to his whole village, as well as teaching the Scriptures to his students in the bilingual school, using the Life of Christ passages left by our predecessors, and then new books as soon as they were available. They apparently hadn't heard about the Sunday morning and Wednesday evening custom!

In 1981, the Bible League printed 700 copies of the Kashinawa New Testament, and although there were only maybe 12 sincere believers at that time, each household had many readers, and the New Testaments were soon in all the homes, and being read. In 1999, while Dick and I were living in the US and both teaching at a Christian college, we received letters from the Kashinawa pastors asking us to come back and help them revise their New Testament so they could have another printing. What could we say but, Yes!

After about a year of raising our support, we left for the jungles of Peru, and when we arrived in the Kashinawa villages, we found about 700 believers, and about 50 or 100 worn out New Testaments. When we asked pastors how many were believers in their village, often the answer was, "Well, all of them!"

The Word of God in their own language has made a deep impact on the Kashinawa people. They have now just about completed the construction of a permanent centre for their Kashinawa Bible Institute, which meets twice a year to further prepare leaders and all interested in deeper Scripture teaching. Their own pastors do most of the teaching.

Who can be a better missionary than one who never sleeps, doesn't take a vacation, is always there when you want to read it? God's Word has brought maybe 700 or more to Christ among the Peruvian Kashinawa and more are hearing the Gospel in Brazil from the Kashinawa missionaries. There has just been a revision printed for the Kashinawas in Peru and an adaptation for those in Brazil, and Old Testament portions are underway. We await more of God's miracles.

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