The Higby Herald - Christmas 2010

Dear Friends,

Last night I (Doug) had the privilege of preaching a sermon to the English-speaking international community for a special Christmas program.  Much to everyone’s surprise, a group of around 40 unchurched local students showed up in response to  someone’s invitation.  Most of them were Muslims, and they all heard the Gospel message clearly that night, along with beautiful singing and joyful praise from the whole group.  We pray that the seeds that were planted will bear fruit.  It was a beautiful reminder of the purpose for our being here in Africa.  Even though our primary ministry is enabling others to do effective Bible translation through the use of technology, we are still Christ's ambassadors in our direct contact with people here.

This will be our sixth Christmas in Burkina Faso, and probably our last. That's right, when Kevin graduates high school next June we will have finished six uninterrupted years of ministry in Burkina Faso. We are long overdue for a furlough, but are happy to have been able to provide a stable environment for the older two boys to complete their high school years. Although it is possible that we return to Burkina Faso, my international role will involve more travel -- something that is rather impractical and expensive to do from where we currently are.

Speaking of travel, our son Roger commented that he didn’t like some music playing at our house the other day because it reminded him of “airplane music”.  Airplane music, what’s that?  Oh, you mean elevator music!  But of course… Roger has spent way more time in airplanes than in elevators and for him the comparison was more natural.  Just add “elevator music” to the list of idioms he has to learn before he integrates back into US culture some day.

As we look back on the past year, we are thankful for the way the Lord is at work. Training in the latest tools to facilitate Bible translation is now happening all over the African continent in places where there was none before. And now the doors are thrown open before us to forge paths to train translators around the globe with tools to more adeptly render God's Word into their heart language.

We recently had a breakthrough in keeping our software specialists up-to-date. In the past, I would manually prepare the latest software for distribution each year at the trainers’ training workshop.  The participants would leave equipped with a thumb-drive containing everything they needed to travel to a remote village and help translation teams. But during the course of the year, this material would quickly go out of date as program updates and bug fixes were released. A technology breakthrough helped us make a new version of the thumb-drive that has the ability to update itself! Dubbed as the Language Technology Toolkit, users can just bring it to the nearest Internet Café and run the update command. All of the newer files and explanations of how to use them are downloaded. Voila, the thumb-drive is up to date and ready to service the computer of any language worker or translator on the field.

P.J. and I are happy that our jobs are intersecting more now that we are both working under the Africa regional department. P.J.’s school board responsibilities have finally leveled now that the new school director has been chosen. Both of us are feeling a bit too busy, but we are still making time to take a family vacation to Ghana with friends for the Christmas holiday.

The college years are in full swing with Henry at Calvin and Kevin knee-deep in applications and scholarship forms. Helping the boys transition back to the States and setting them up for college is taking a financial toll on us. We are told that having two in college will make us eligible for more government aid, but those applications are not very friendly for people living overseas. We are praying that Kevin does as well as Henry did with scholarships for college.

We admire your courage and faithfulness for sticking with us these past six years, even though we have not done a stellar job at visiting and communicating. In many places, outdated pictures of our family are still hanging from our last furlough in 2004. Even though we include pictures in these newsletters from time to time, they don't often make the cut into the black-and-white church bulletins or newsletters that some of you are reading. But despite all this, and despite the economic downturn in the US, you have continued to back our ministry with both your prayers and your financial support. Your role in this ministry can be equally challenging, and we are grateful for the way the Lord is using you to expedite the translation of God’s Word in Africa!

Partners in the Gospel,                     (Phil 1:5)

Doug & Priscilla Higby

Prayer & Praise

• Burkina Faso just celebrated the 50th anniversary of its independence from France.  We are thankful to serve in a country that is open to the gospel and politically stable.  Please pray for Burkina’s southern neighbor, Cote d’Ivoire, which is still reeling from the recent presidential elections as the winner is being disputed.
• Praise God that we were able to obtain 15 refurbished laptop computers for Africans who are training to work with SIL in language and translation projects.  They should have been delivered yesterday.  Pray that these computers hold up well, and that we have wisdom to know whether this is a good way to continue to meet the need for computers in the future.
• Pray for Kevin as he continues his college search.  We are aggressively pursuing the best option with 8 applications already in process. Pray for a good scholarship package that will enable him to attend with minimal loans.
• Praise God for three important workshops taking place in January and February where new technology to speed up Bible translation will be taught.  Pray for those who are leading these workshops, that they will be able to train well enough that the participants can go out and train others.