Ross and Lyndal Webb

November newsletter

Dear friends,

Thanks for praying for us. A lot went on. A lot went on well. Hardly a hitch, I’d reckon. We’ve now returned to the ‘civilisation’ of Lae (PNG) before heading to Australia. It’s as if the past 3½ weeks were a dream – like walking through the cupboard into Narnia and out again. But the dream was vivid. We’ll fill you in…

Helicopters are a dream in themselves – an effortless entry (on our part) to Zuepak, along with the precious load of 800 New Testaments, and 600 MegaVoice audio players with the same Psalms and NT on them. We were regaled with dance, and escorted to our ‘dream’ home. Ah, what you would pay for that view if it were in what you might think of as realer places! We were comfortable with our two solar lights, air mattresses, breakfast provided every morning (with hot water for the coffee plunger), and at least another two meals a day for the next 25 days. To call them hearty meals wouldn’t do them justice. The nice part about our dream world is you can pass your half-eaten plate on to someone else!

So, 3 days later, on the 17th of October – 14 years to the day after the original NT dedication, 13 SIL guest including an official one or two ‘choppered’ their way in to Zuepak to join maybe 800 villagers who’d come with their pre-paid-for vouchers for the big celebration. It was hard to believe; so much organization with not a bit of help from us. That’s what I call a dream! And to complete the totally real illusion those 800 people lined up to polish off 700 NT books and every one of the 600 MegaVoice players. Already the cry is for more! The guests helped distribute with smiles on their faces. One visitor couldn’t contain himself: “This is great! It doesn’t get any better than this! Imagine handing out so many Bibles that people have actually paid for. Where I come from I couldn’t give them away!”

That evening about 500 people sat on the grass and watched portions of the Luke video (dubbed in Irumu language back in 1997) and another one contrasting the sacrificial system in Leviticus with ‘the new and living way’ in Hebrews. Then for the next two days, we led a study following Matthias Media’s “Overview of the Bible”. Many attended and for the next 3 weeks we heard again and again how helpful it had been. You’ve prayed for the “Cargo Cult” situation for years. It hasn’t gone away, and so we know that some who raved about the study may not have been helped in the way we had in mind(!), but others who we know are on the right road also found the explanation of God’s sovereign plan from start to finish (when we get there!) a great thing. We’re not sure exactly what part was previously unknown but for some it just clicked! So much so that the following week Ross worked with Kurup to translate the English book we’d used as the guide. We’ll print that when we get the chance with an idea to make a teaching video of it too!

We had a good day up in the next village on the second Sunday we were there. Ross  preached and yes, for all the teaching and preaching and endless talking we were thankful to God for answering our prayer to be able to remember the language pretty well – well, well enough to mostly make sense it seems!

We had another morning session in our village to try to teach a bit of ‘critical thinking’. We have done this in Vanuatu but it was quite a bit harder to explain in language, so I’m not sure people got it all. However after I had taught the ‘rules’ for going through a text, Ross demonstrated with a few Bible passages and that was good. Hanging around for the few weeks and eating with people for every meal we had time to hear many, many stories, some pretty distressing. Every ‘public’ teaching opportunity we had afterwards, we tried to ‘straighten’ some of the weird and not so wonderful interpretations of Scripture we had heard.

It seems some people are almost desperate to find the illusory ‘Good Life’ here on earth and so they read the Scripture through that grid and come up with some pretty wild ideas – mostly flying directly in the face of an easy reading of the passage they interpreted! This has been going on for decades really – with no success – so every avenue is tried. That’s sad. I’m not sure that our exhortations to contentment and waiting with gratitude and joy for our true ‘paradise’ really ring true – in their estimation, we’ve obviously already found what they’re looking for. But we are very thankful for the openness of many who asked us questions which we knew were prompted by such thinking and we pray (please join us!) that God might even use the many talks of these last weeks to allow these friends to see the Truth.

The highlights were our times with the little core group of solid Christians who love nutting out the Word and taking it at face value instead of looking for the ‘deeper meaning.’ One young lady, Gurukenang, gave an amazing talk at ‘Ladies’ Church’ on Hebrews 11 – not amazing in the sense of eloquence but rather that I could tell it all made sense to her.  It’s hard to explain but it was a joy to hear.

The many testimonies of the helpfulness of ‘MegaVoice’ (audio Bible) over the past 2 years were also very encouraging. When we asked people ‘What should we tell the MegaVoice people and others who have helped with it?’ they answered instantly with ‘Tell them it’s a huge help’ and ‘we’ve heard verses we didn’t know existed’. We are thankful that there are 600 players ‘out there’ now with the whole NT and Psalms to listen to.

A particular prayer request is for the weeks to come. There is endless potential for our words and actions to be twisted and given new meaning. Kurup has already been accused of blocking the coming of good things because he spoke after Ross’s study telling people not to change the meaning. “No worries”, said Kurup. “I really understand the Bible overview and how things went bad at the beginning etc. and I am going to hang on to that!”  So please pray for him and the other believers and that as they tell out the true story others will give up their struggle. Listen to Gokasia’s words after the study, “Today is the day to fight. Fight in your heart, fight against what is not good. Leave your other gods and come to the Word and then we’ll be a real Group (church).”

So we’re out of our dream world. Gone, just like that! But what a privilege to have been in it. It was truly wonderful. We enjoyed good health, way too much food, plenty of exercise back in the mountains, freedom from the office (!) and best of all, great fellowship with our Irumu friends. As we were leaving Kurup said ‘I am not worried that you’ll be so far away because our hearts are one so we are not really so far away.’

Wish you could have been there? We wish you could have been – to share the whole lot. Ah, but you have been invaluable partners. It’s just that some partners get the dreamy bits. Thanks for sharing!

Lots of love,

Lyndal & Ross

PS We’ll be in Australia until 31st December. Our phone number will be 0450953202

PO Box 174, Port Vila, Vanuatu                                                     :::

WBT – Graham Rd, Kangaroo Ground, 3097

Oct 12 email

Hi friends all over the Church,

Just thought we let you know we are heading for our village in PNG tomorrow (we are at the SIL centre in the highlands). The plan is to shuttle all the new Irumu Bibles and the MegaVoice players in to the village by helicopter. Then we’ll spend a few days working out how much Irumu language is left in our brains, and then on Monday 17th we will have a dedication of the Books and players. Don’t know what sort of a splash it will be, but God willing, there will be about 12 SIL people coming from the centre here including a few of our old-time friends, to celebrate in whatever way happens, with us.
Please pray that we will have encouraging and life-giving words to say over the next 3 1/2 weeks that will even, if it please God, help to diminish, or dispel, the insidious soul and contentment destroying cargo cult that hangs in the air. We expect some challenges. Who is enough for this?
We’ll report back in November. We’re sort of blacking out internet/email wise now!
Love,
Ross & Lyndal

Sept 29 email

To our great praying friends,
Thankyou for praying for all that we have been mentioning these last months particularly as we have been preparing to go to PNG. We are nearly ready to depart!
We’d appreciate your prayers (still!) for
  • safety in travel - planes, helicopter, truck, walking etc.!
  • Please especially pray for helicopter shuttles on 13th October - good weather and safety to get the Bibles into the village (and us!)
  • 17th October - that the dedication of the new Books would be a God honouring occasion bringing new enthusiasm for believers and a new outlook for those not yet trusting in Jesus.
  • A revival amongst the Irumu people would be great eh?!
  • For language speaking ability for us so that we can help our friends learn more about God’s Word while we are visiting, as well as enjoy good fellowship.
  • That things would go smoothly here in Vanuatu in our absence - no disasters please!
Expect to hear from us in 5 weeks time - we won’t have email contact until then. Could that be bliss in the making?!
Love,
Ross &  Lyndal

September 23 newletter

News from Ross & Lyndal      ::

September 2011

Dear friends,

I’ve just finished an hour of crackle and pop on the two-way radio talking with the SIL ladies out in their island villages. It’s a Monday afternoon ritual when we pray together too, over the radio, after chatting. Sometimes it feels like the 45 minutes talking together is a report of one challenge after another, but today was a bright one!

Michele started off with “I nearly fell off the church bench yesterday!” She was rejoicing that at the church service in their village on Tanna the preacher used all the Scripture booklets they’ve published in the language. And as icing on that cake,  the guy, though previously a pretty poor reader, read beautifully. That’s what we like to hear!

Then Mendy told about Jenri’s latest doings. Jenri’s the guy with wonderful enthusiasm for God’s Word in his language. Now that the translation work is finished, he’s working hard to make sure everyone knows that the new Book will be available at the dedication service on 31st May 2012. It’s not too early to buy one and he’s made 5 sales so far. Pray there’ll be plenty more as he tells people about the need to know God clearly through His Word.

This morning we met with Michael and Danielle - you’ve heard of them too as we visited them earlier this year up north on Mota Lava island. They’ve been here in town for a bit and on Wednesday will head back to the village with big plans on their mind. They’ve spent the last two years learning the language ,and while that job will continue for years to come, they’re now at the point of being able to get going on the ’real’ stuff of translation. You could pray that God would bring the right people to the fore for them to train and work with. Trying our best to be an encouragement to our teams is a pleasurable part of this job!

Our plans feel pretty big too for the next few months. We are booked to leave here on 3rd October and will spend a few days in Cairns with the other Pacific Area directors - a ‘retreat’ they call it - should be good! Then to PNG for a month. Yes, the books are there, the MegaVoice are there, the revised Pilgrim’s Progress is in the printshop there, and a place has been found as a suitable helicopter site to shuttle it all into the village. The 13th October is the planned day for that so we’d be happy if you would pray for all the operations that day.

Then on 17th October a few visitors will join us in the village and we hope most of the Irumu speakers will get together for another celebration, 14 years after the first massive event. It won’t be as grand a celebration but we are praying for a repeat of the total sell out of the 800 books and 600 Megavoice.  Could you pray with us about that? Sales are already underway thanks to Kurup’s good organising and distributing of the pre-sale vouchers. We hope to follow this with an Overview of the Bible course - if our language ability allows! When you think of the Irumu people, please keep praying for those who are still thinking that if they ‘do it right’ God will bless them with abundant goods (otherwise known in PNG as Cargo Cult). We know they will challenge us again and we also know that only God’s Spirit can change their thinking. As I’ve been reading through Acts lately I’m reminded that God is more than capable to do the changing!

Meanwhile I am frantically trying to finish writing a Sunday School lesson book to take with us. I’m thankful for Christopher and Paul’s editing help on that.

There are a quite a few other things we need to get in order since we’ll be out of the office for a long stretch. From 11th November to 31st December we’re looking forward to catching up with many of you as we visit a few churches here and there. If we miss you, know it wasn’t deliberate… just that my planning abilities are limited by me and time!

Love,

Lyndal & Ross

Click 4 Extras: Pacific Bible news on FB :: A nice short video :: Pictures of orginal Irumu NT dedication

WBTA : 70 Graham Rd., Kangaroo Ground, VIC 3097         ::

R & L Webb : PO Box 174, Port Vila, Vanuatu

September 8 email

Hello again,
Thanks for your prayers. What a weird but wonderful thing to do - ask people across the ocean to talk to God in heaven about Ross & Lyndal and things around them. What a great family that does the talking on our behalf! What a wonderful God who invites the requests!! And puts his inexhaustible mind and resources to them!!! So, on we go:
  • Pray for VBT board meeting on Monday: for wisdom for Ross in his part as he guides them with sensitivity to their aspirations.
  • Pray they work well together (with us & each other - nothing ominous in that request!) for the sake of God’s great name, and the promise of His liberating forces unleashed through the translation of his very Words.
  • Would that all our planning make that possible for more & more people - though it just looks daunting!
  • It’s not all that easy organising our PNG trip and stay from this distance. Could you ask God to send Kurup to a nice spot where his mobile phone works well so we can check on a few more things.
Thanks!
Ross

18 August email

Dear friends,
Thanks - yes, we still are very thankful for your prayers.
  • The MegaVoice players are almost on their way from Israel to PNG. Fortunately Ross realised just in time that the ones already in people’s hands have too small a memory to fit the full NT and Psalms so we will quickly order an extra 200. Please pray they reach PNG via DHL without any hitches!
  • We have heard from Kurup, our Irumu liaison (since he owns a mobile phone!) that people have started paying for their new Books and players - that’s great news. Thank God! Pray that the 800 pre-sale vouchers out there will get snaffled up!
  • The revised Irumu Pilgrim’s Progress is ready to roll - we will have that printed in the SIL print shop in Ukarumpa PNG.
  • Less exciting and more challenging - For some time our bosses have asked us to work on a “Comprehensive Plan” for the translation work in Vanuatu - trying to map out how things could look in the next 10 or more years. We’ve made a start and next week will dedicate time to moving the written plan along significantly. Future funding of projects we run here, particularly Vanuatu Bible Translation are dependent on this plan looking good! We’d really appreciate prayer for wisdom, for patience and perseverance!
We pray that God will encourage you all this week too…
Lyndal

June 2011 news

Click on the image below to download a 2 page PDF. Or if you’d prefer to receive these directly via email, please email kelly@hunterbiblechurch.org to request to be added to the list.

8/7 email

Dear Prayers,
You can do a bit of thanking this week!
Lyndal and I just spend a very nice 5 days on the faraway island of Ra visiting one of our translation teams who are in the early days of the rest of their life! They successfully passed their language test and are about to embark on translation. This project is a ‘restarted’ one and is looking pretty promising with involvement this time from the Anglicans, SDA’s, AOG’s and a couple of other smaller church groups. I preached 4 times on the necessity of understanding the Scriptures, and answered good questions about translation. Lyndal gave a morning’s seminar on ‘really reading’ - i.e. reading to understand what is written as it is written.
As well as thanking God the perseverance of the local translation over the past 10 years, and the Smiths over the last two (amidst hot heat, remoteness and health issues), you could pray thus:
  • Pray for the Smiths as they shift gears from language learning to ‘real work’!
  • Pray that the new committee will remain enthusiastic
  • Pray that the new committee will be keen to find new keen local translators
  • Pray that the SIL guys with the local committee and translators will ways to engage each church in the language community
Thanks for your prayers,
Ross

27/5 email

Dear praying friends,
Our “Training you Thinking” workshop for ni-Vanuatu translators got off to a great start. Lots to praise God for:
  1. Amazingly the transport worked out and everybody arrived in Vila on time, despite a week of visions to the contrary!
  2. Amazingly everyone has come everyday right on time, and with smiles and eagerness
  3. Nicely the participants seem to be grabbing with both hands the critical thinking principles that seem so lacking at times and yet so necessary to grasp Biblical truth
  4. Another component of the course is some exegesis principles based around understanding (and applying) the book of Ruth, and also going thru the sacrificial system in the OT. Our aim is to help the guys think and think thru what they read, and to provide missing Bible education into the bargain.
  5. This is a tall order which in two we are only able to fulfil minuscul-y.
  6. Please pray that the eagerness will remain and hearts that might never have beened opened to the wonders of God’s gracious provision, be wonderfully expanded!
Thanks for being there.
You might find a little more by ‘liking’ the Pacific Bible facebook page if you’re into that. We’d like a few more keen ‘friends’!

19/5 email

Thank you for your prayers and praise God for answering them….
The Irumu audio files for the NT and Psalms are enroute to Brisbane to be then couriered to Israel to be put on 400 players to ultimately reach PNG - God willing.
It’s a relief I can tell you and we thank God for keeping us in good health to maintain the extra workload for the past few months.
Moving right along…
On Monday the course we mentioned begins - 2 weeks with 14 ni-Vanuatu, who are involved in Bible Translation. The course is called Trenem Tingting - literally Training the Thinking. That is developing a questioning mind in a way that assists the reading and understanding of God’s Word.
Thanks for praying for us as we’ve been working on the materials - they are almost finished now. We’ll see how it goes!
Please pray for the participants -
  • that they would grasp what we are teaching,
  • that they would have an increased desire to study God’s Word as they see the importance of it and develop the skills to do it,
  • that their love for God would grow because of what they hear and learn
  • and for the logistics;
  • travel, health, etc.
  • and for the staff - Ross and I, Steve Gibb and Erik Stapleton - that we would communicate clearly and be good examples of God’s followers and of lovers of His Word to the participants.
With Christian Love and thanks,
Lyndal

6/5 email

Dear praying friends,
Thanks for praying for us. You are probably tired of hearing us talking about our job of editing the audio files of the Irumu NT and Psalms - well, it is VERY nearly finished. We thought we were finished but oops, 20 Psalms had missed the processing line!
That’s not too bad though, and we are thankful to God for helping us get this far.
Please Pray for the final processing that now has to happen - some here, some in Israel to get it into the right form to go inside those nifty MegaVoice players (you can tell I am not technically minded!!).  The files are big, Israel is a long way away and technology has its ways that aren’t always ours. Thanks to the help of many of you we are able to order 400 MegaVoice players which after being loaded with the good sounds of Irumu will be sent to PNG. We need them there by October - sounds like a long way away but please pray that God would oversee all the steps to allow it to all happen.
We really need God’s help as we work on curriculum for the upcoming Mother Tongue Translators’ Bible course. Our part will be to teach ‘Critical thinking’ skills - applying them to Bible reading and understanding and application.  Pray that we will know the best things to include in the 2 week course.
Thanks as always for your supporting us in the many ways you do,
With Christian Love,
Lyndal and Ross

8/4 email

Thanks for praying for the Bible Translation Foundations Awareness Course we held 23rd – 29th March

I think we already mentioned that the idea of the time together on Santo was to give some of our Vanuatu Bible Translation leaders and potential leaders a deeper understanding of God and His Word, and their importance to each other (Psalm 138:2) and so to equip them to be spokesmen and women for their organization.

We thank God for the good time. It seemed the angle we took really clicked with at least a few of the participants Bible translation presented as a tool or bridge in the scheme of God’s communication in the world. Isaiah 40 provided the underpinning perspective of God as massive, man as tiny, and yet God cares for his people and speaks to them.

Kalite was one who really ‘got it’ and we are thankful for his good mind and heart for God and His Word. He went home and translated Isaiah 40 into his Uripiv language ready to pass on what he learned! Please pray for him and his other plans to share what he learned with a nearby little Bible school - next week I think.

Our participants had a few ‘practicals’ too - one at the Seventh Day Adventist church near where we were staying. You could pray that what was presented would have had an impact on the audience in terms of their appreciation of God’s Word.

We enjoyed good fellowship – a privilege and pleasure for us to spend time with these men, teaching and learning.

Love,

Ross & Lyndal

31st March email

Hi Everyone,
Thanks for praying for us over these last busy weeks of 2 different workshops.
  • We are just back from Santo where we led a course with 10 Vanuatu Bible Translation leaders. The idea was to help them learn to present ‘Bible Translation’ to communities, churches, schools etc. We tackled it from the angle of ‘who is God’ (Isaiah 40 got a good look over again) and so What about His Word and then where Bible translation can fit in as a bridge for giving people the important understanding of His Word.
  • Thank God that several participants made comments that showed they ‘really got it’!
  • All the participants made good presentations in the ‘practicals’ we had in a few churches
  • Please pray for the men (and one lady) who we spent the week with - that they would be personally challenged by the Word we studied and that they would be able to communicate a true and clear message to others.
  • Pray that God will open doors for Jenry, of South West Tanna (we’ve mentioned him before), eager to tell some of his ‘resistant’ village communities the Good News and to use some of the communication tools he learned last week. The NT in this language is expected to be dedicated in June 2012.
  • We’d appreciate prayer for daily strength as we ‘catch up’ after being away, get back into Irumu audio again etc.
  • Maybe you could pray for Paul (Webb!) too - he’s got some kind of flu bug which wants to hang on.  There doesn’t seem much time in Paul’s schedule for rest!
Love,
Lyndal

March Newsletter

Click here to download the Webb’s March newsletter.

News From Ross & Lyndal

March 2010

Dear Friends,

Yes, another letter from the Webbs, and so soon! Well, we wanted to thank you for praying for the workshop on Tanna last week and let you know how things went. Maybe I should let the participants speak for themselves;

“ We used to think you just read the Bible as a story but now we know we need to work out the meaning. Our preachers trick us each week because they don’t teach us from the Bible like you have taught us to do; reading and really thinking about the meaning. They just say anything that comes into their heads.” (I hope she raises that issue with the leaders in a diplomatic way!)

And another

“ We’re going to go back and do that skit you did at church next Sunday to show the community how important Bible translation is and how they should be supporting it.”

Then I heard that Tanna translator Jenri told someone after his wife’s arrival home;

“ It must have been a good workshop. Now my wife understands about Bible translation and wants to support me as I do the work!”

How about that – mission accomplished on one small front!

It was a well-worked out week, with not much thanks to our working out! God held off the rain for us to get there (well almost - He reminded us of what he’d done when it poured 5 minutes walk from the village!). God allowed 3 of the 4 groups to get there - albeit one group a day late - quite the journey for them. God provided food despite the recent cyclone which made the gardens much less abundant than usual.

And God timed it such that we arrived the same week as “Prophet Fred”, the revered leader of a local cult, had decreed that something terrible was going to happen on Tanna this week or next. Many were afraid of his predictions. But we were able to assess Prophet Fred’s real power and place in God’s scheme of things with the words of Isaiah 40. Seems as though the good prophet is just an ant like the rest of us ants loved by God! None of the 17 ladies there missed that point!

Yes, and God helped Serah, the ni-Vanuatu lady whose idea had initially prompted the workshop to do a great job at leading some of the sessions – it was pretty good to see a lady who lives in town, with education, a decent home, and a small but reliable income, really caring about her less fortunate rural sisters. Life is tough for them and she knows it. Their lives are full of stories and many animistic ideas. How do they know what’s right and what’s wrong? We tried to give them some skills to work it out. Serah really wants them to get it right! “Don’t be like the Pharisees of Matthew 25:15, who were giving out the wrong message” she encouraged.

Yaing told me how a few of the ladies on the last night prayed over water to give it power, and then poured it out on the church entrance to help the men to not disobey God’s Word. My heart sank at that one. Hadn’t we just spent 3 days talking about the exclusive and personal power of the God of the Bible? Serah was indignant, “Did she think God made a mistake when he made water? Does she think water is not good enough the way He made it and for the purposes he made it?!!” Good on Serah. But it reminded me of the long road of learning ahead for these ladies who have such limited teaching, and even access to it.

The workshop was great, but I’m conscious it was but a mere drop in a big, big bucket. Please pray that God will continue to fill the bucket for each one, revealing more of Himself and His truth as they read his Talk.

After all it is he who has “exalted above all things His name and His Word. Psalm 138:2

Thanks again for being part of the week …

Love,

Lyndal & Ross

WBTA : 70 Graham Rd., Kangaroo Ground, VIC 3097

R & L Webb : PO Box 174, Port Vila, Vanuatu

Dear friends at HBC,
We are very thankful for your very generous gift to us last month. We continue to appreciate your support so much and recognise the degree of generosity you are showing - it’s no small amount that you send our way. Thank you!
We would appreciate your prayers as we are trying to work extra hard to fit in the Irumu audio editing now. We have touched it here and there up till now but realise we have to get into it in a big way to get it finished. Makes the days long!! We are thankful for several people who have helped us by editing out the obvious mistakes which leaves us, who know the language to make the finer adjustments. The list of normal jobs doesn’t seem to get any less!
Today Serah (our ni-Vanuatu secretary) and I met together to decide on the programme for a 3 day ladies’ workshop planned for 8th - 11th March. It will be on Tanna island, for wives of local translators from 4 different languages where we have translation projects happening. Please pray for our continued preparations and that those who have to travel across the island to attend will be willing to and be able to find transport to do so.
Ray and Glenda Leach have joined us to do Finance and Maintenance. You could pray that they settle in well and that we all work really well together.
Thanks for your support in this way too,
Sincerely Lyndal