From before our birth, God loved us. His love continues. He wants us to be a part of his family and of his purposes.

Do you enjoy doing things with your kids, your spouse? I think God feels that same way when we do things with him.

I was born in 1955 and grew up in Fort Wayne, Indiana. I attended Holy Cross Church and Grade School, and went to high school at Concordia Lutheran High School, which was a brisk, ten-minute walk from my home.

I am the second of four children, which may say something to you psychologist types who are reading this. My older brother lives in Florida, my sister lives in Montana. Our youngest brother died, sadly, in a very unfortunate mishap during scuba diving training course when he was just 16.

My father was a very successful Realtor during most of my school days. He received numerous awards for his service to the real estate community. But I mostly remember him as a dad. He taught us kids how to work, and the value of money.

I think as kids we don’t really understand who are parents really are. I remember once that my dad sat down at the piano and played a song he called the “boogey-woogey man.” It was a fast jazz piece. Until then, I had no clue he could play the piano! (He said it was the only song he knew. But I have always wondered how a person can only know one song.) He also played jazz on the slide guitar, a lost art these days. My dad passed away in 1984.

My mother was a homemaker, a mom who was always there. She was the one who made everything happen behind the scenes. Where my dad was outgoing and the life of the party, she put the party together. She’d get us ready for school and send us off while dad would capture the magic moment on the old movie camera. This was in the days before cameras had sound, so when we played them back, we could add whatever commentary we wanted!

One of my favorite home movie clips is the clip where my sister got a new xylophone for Christmas. She took those two sticks with the wooden balls on the end, and played every note up the scale. When she ran out of metal bars to hit on the xylophone, she reached over and bonked my brother on the head — the final note!

Although I grew up in a great home and a Christian environment, I didn’t have a “personal” faith until my last year of high school. I only knew God as someone “out there” who looked out for us. I still don’t know how God turned me around, but sometime between the end of the fall semester of my senior year and the beginning of the spring semester, I couldn’t get enough of God. I was devouring the Bible. God was answering my prayers in very real ways. God was not just “out there”, he was now within and his Spirit was making major changes in my life. My focus was dramatically shifted from me to God.

After high school I attended the Concordia Lutheran Junior College and then Concordia Lutheran Senior College graduating with a Bachelor of Arts (cum laud) with a concentration in Greek. I was in the clergy track, but by the third year of college I felt that Bible translation was where I should be seriously looking. I finished my BA in three and a quarter years, started right into the Seminary program, and half way into my second trimester when it was clear that I was in the wrong place. I was supposed to be involved in Bible translation work, not a pulpit ministry. I left the seminary.

Ruth and I were married by that time, and we diverted our energies toward preparing for Bible translation. I took more graduate level courses in linguistics, but we decided to go overseas before completing a graduate program. (I eventually went back to graduate school and received a Master of Arts degree in Linguistics from the University of Papua New Guinea in 1996.)

Ruth and I met at Concordia Junior College in Ann Arbor. After completing her AA degree at Ann Arbor, she attended a year at Calvin College and went on to complete her BA at the University of North Dakota with a related-fields major in Linguistics, Anthropology and Religion.

Ruth and I were married in 1976. We first went to Papua New Guinea in 1979 as translators and were assigned as interns on Bougainville Island for two years. At the beginning of 1982 we received a new assignment to Solomon Islands to start up the Roviana Translation Project.

We spent close to two years with the Roviana people. It was an ideal situation – a qualified and motivated local pastor/leader who wanted to be trained to be the primary translator. A local couple who had been missionaries to Papua New Guinea themselves for years and who took us under their wing. We enjoyed the language work. We developed good friendships. But like the seminary days, I realized that my own gifts and personality was not a good match for leading a village level program.

We returned to PNG in late 1983. Within a year I was working in the Computer Services department, supporting translation work. And within a few more months I was managing that department, mentored by a Dutch man who was managing the printing department in the next building.

God has a way of changing your circumstances. Within a couple years I was combining my linguistic knowledge and skill with my computer aptitude. I took a position training linguistic consultants in the new computer tools that were just becoming available.

I love making other people successful – the computer work allowed me to experience that. And it led to other opportunities to help others be successful.

My final position in PNG was serving as the Branch Director for the Summer Institute of Linguistics. I was responsible for about 600 adults (plus dependents) sent by churches in 22 different countries around the world as well as about 300 Papua New Guinean employees. During most of that time I also served on the international board of directors for SIL. Being Branch Director was a tremendous honor and a tremendous challenge.

One of my most rewarding moments was at my farewell party for serving as PNG Branch Director. A large group of Papua New Guinean staff hosted the party and a spokesman stood up and told me that they now truly owned the vision for advancing Bible translation. I could return to the USA for an extended time knowing that they would continue to press ahead! Wow. Success – theirs!

Our years in PNG were rewarding, stretching, and equipped us in unique ways for out next step. We learned to love the hot, humid weather of the tropics. We’ve developed a taste for some wonderful foods. We’ve learned to express hospitality in new ways. I have spent nights on the road waiting for torrential rains and flooded rivers to subside. I’ve been held up at gunpoint. Our home has been broken into several times. I completely ruined a pair of shoes and a pair of pants when I had to walk 10 hours through the jungle to the nearest town when the village airstrip was declared unsafe for aircraft. (The government decided that the very day after I landed at that airstrip!).

God taught me patience, the value of friends and family, and mostly the huge impact that God’s Word can have in the lives of people. That becomes most obvious when you see people who never understood it before finally gain access to it in a language that really speaks to their heart and mind. As one villager said, “We are dying of the deliciousness of these words.” (Try reading the book, In Search of the Source, by Neil Anderson.)

In 2003 we returned to the USA, home for us but a foreign country in many ways to our children. We spend two years in Indiana, then moved to Wycliffe’s national headquarters in Orlando, FL

We have been using our overseas experience as we serve with Wycliffe in the USA. I currently serve as the Vice President for Personnel – responsible for accepting new missionaries, preparing them for service here and abroad, helping missionaries when they return to the USA for furlough, and handling the many care issues related to keeping staff healthy, hardy and successfully engaged in Bible translation vocations. Again, I’m making people successful.

We have two children: Sarah, who graduated from Valparaiso University with highest honors and is now working with the National Bureau of Asian Research (nbr.org), and Micah who also graduated from Valparaiso University with a BS degree in Computer Engineering. Micah works in the Washington DC area, about 40 minutes from Sarah!

God’s Word continues to have a big impact in my life. And I am grateful to be involved in Bible translation work – in part because it keeps me focused on what is of eternal value for myself and for others.

It amazes me that we who have God’s Word seem to value it so little. Our people have had the Word of God for over 500 years. Our culture has been transformed because of it. God has blessed us with great knowledge, education and wealth. I firmly believe we have a responsibility and honor to reach the remaining people of the world with the message of Jesus. The time is right. The world is relatively open. Transportation is easy. Communication is easy. Computer tools exist that can help us publish quality translations of the Bible. We have the wealth. Do we have the will?

Churches grow that have inspirational worship, quality teaching, focus on God’s purposes, and allow people to be involved in something truly significant. Involvement in Bible translation promotes those very things. The Word of God is foundational for the growth and development of any Christian, of any church. While few people can do what Ruth and I do, many can be involved financially through supporting our ministry with Wycliffe and in spirit by praying regularly for us, modeling your prayers after Paul’s prayers in the Bible.

Let us keep our eyes fixed on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross. That joy is ours as well.

If you want to be a partner with us in Bible translation, give us a call at: 321-766-6936.