God’s Word in Lolo
Matt and Debi Zook went as Ethnos missionaries to Mozambique in 2005. Later that same year, they moved into the Lolo people group to begin ministering there. As heart language ministry is one of the tenets of Ethnos, they spent the next three years in culture and language study.
From 2010 until 2017, they worked on Bible translation, eager to get the Word of God into the Lolo mother-tongue for the nascent church. They worked with Lolo helpers, the mission’s consultants and people from the Seed Company and the Summer Institute of Linguistics.
Lolo Scriptures
Getting the Word Ready
After finishing the first version by the end of 2016, Matt and the team produced a second version at the end of 2017, making some dialectal changes for another Lolo dialect. The final touches and checks were finished in 2018. The Bibles were ready to be sent off to the printers.
These are not completely Lolo Bibles; they could be considered “hybrid” Bibles. The books of Genesis, Ruth, I and II Samuel, Jonah, Daniel, Malachi and the entire New Testament are in Lolo. All the other books are in Portuguese or Chichewa, the two common trade languages used by the Lolo people. Matt said, “There are over 1850 footnotes designed to help people understand the text, see the differences between Bible truth and their cultural understandings and show the necessity of putting and keeping our faith in Christ.”
And It Will Arrive . . . ?
The Bibles were printed in China. Right now, somewhere in the Indian Ocean, there is a boat heading toward Mozambique with 6,149 Bibles in a container. Pray for good speed in the shipping, in clearing customs, in transporting the Bibles to the Zooks’ location, and in the distribution of those Bibles to the Lolo people. Most of all pray that these Bibles will bear good fruit among the Lolo people.