Why is JAARS needed?
Getting to the rural areas where much of today’s Bible translation takes place isn’t easy. Rocky, rutted roads during the dry season become a slippery, sloppy mess during the wet season.
And many teams don’t have their own transportation, making travel even worse. Few, if any, vehicles are available for hire in remote areas. When they are, they’re overpriced, don’t run on the schedule a team needs, and may fall through at the last minute. Traveling rough roads in old, poorly maintained public vehicles makes travel hazardous, not to mention highly stressful.
Tough as it is, translation can’t happen without travel. One language might be spoken across hundreds of miles—and visiting the community is the best way to get input, test drafts, help churches, and start literacy classes.
What is JAARS doing?
Dedicated, well-maintained vehicles are the best solution for helping our partners who must travel across difficult terrain to rural villages. The result? More visits, training, and changed lives, even in the most remote areas.
Vehicles are the best fit for many of our translation partners:
- They can move more people. Translation workshops, literacy classes, training, and more simply can’t happen if the staff, students, and translation teams can’t get there.
- Transporting people throughout a region is especially important for “cluster projects” spread over large, remote areas.
- They can master rough terrain. Rugged, high-clearance vehicles are made to handle even the toughest roads.
- They can also deliver supplies, from literacy booklets to Bibles, recording equipment, food, or construction materials.
Who benefits from our work?
A vehicle is often the practical solution for making it less trying to travel in remote areas of the world where Bible translation and literacy projects are underway. Besides transporting Bible translators, literacy staff, leaders, and others working to put God’s Word into the languages people understand best, vehicles can also deliver supplies needed regularly in remote regions.
In Papua New Guinea, a Toyota Hilux 4WD carries Bible translators and language consultants to isolated villages. Their home base is the Alotau office of the Bible Translation Association (BTA), one of our partners. Another vehicle, a Nissan Patrol 4WD, provided to the Ghana Institute of Linguistics, Literacy and Bible Translation (GILLBT) for use in the Kaakye area conveys workers over difficult terrain to remote locations.
To support this project and others like it, please give to our Transportation Solutions, Africa Initiative, Asia Initiative, or Pacific Initiative. Thank you for partnering with us in this ministry!