The Word of God is living and active. Hebrews 4:12
Growing up in the Bible belt of America, I’ve always had the Word of God at my fingertips. Bibles were a common occurrence. On my shelves at any time there would be two, three, four Bibles. Journaling Bibles. Study Bibles. Travel Sized Bibles. Children’s Bibles. Teen Bibles. The Message. NIV. ESV. All within reach at all times. And most of my childhood, they were just books. A space filler for my shelves. A thing to be taken to church and read on Wednesday nights. Nothing special to me. I had a million Bibles to choose from, and for a majority of my life I chose none.
This month in Battambang, Cambodia I have been teaching with my teammate Maggie at an Elite Elementary School. The children there are fluent in English and talking to them flows naturally. They are full of so much life and so much curiosity. The past couple weeks, Maggie, my squad leader Laura, and I have had the opportunity to talk to two girls specifically about Jesus. Given that Cambodia is primarily Buddhist, this was the first time they heard about a God that loves us even when we don’t get it quite right. They had a million questions about this Jesus who wants to be our friend and who is with us at all times. Their eyes shone like the sun when they heard they could live forever with Jesus in a place called Heaven.
This past Wednesday, my favorite little second grader ran up to me and wrapped her arms around my waist. “Harper!” she said, “I’m going to be with Jesus forever!” I felt the tears coming to my eyes. “Yes! We get to be sisters now and forever and ever,” I replied. I saw it on her face. She believed Jesus was real. He had put a spark in her tiny heart. A spark that one day I pray will be a flame that lights up the darkness here in Cambodia.
Your Word is lamp to my feet, a light on my path. Psalm 119:105
Maggie and I knew that we had to leave her with something. Something that would continue to fan the flame, even after we leave. At breakfast on our last day of ministry, I heard our host talking that she had received the first Khmer children’s Bibles to ever be printed. Her friends had been faithfully working on translating these Bibles into Khmer so the kids of Cambodia could read and understand the Bible in the language of their heart. Three years of hard work coming to fruition on the day that we needed exactly what they had to offer. Our God is so faithful.
I went to school that day with this groundbreaking Bible in my bag. When it went into the hands of this little girl with a newfound faith, her smile was so big I was sure there had never been anything more beautiful. “It’s about Jesus!!” she said over and over again. “Yes! It is. It is the whole story about Jesus!” I told her. “I can’t wait to tell everyone,” she said excitedly, “I want all my friends to know Him too.”
The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the Word of our God endures forever. Isaiah 40:8
His Word is powerful. It is special. It is not something to be taken for granted, nor something to assume everyone has access to. It is just as alive as you and I, breathing life into the hearts of people everywhere. And because of people who have been faithful to translating it, it has been given into the hands of a Khmer child. A world changer, no doubt.
My heart is steadfast, O God,
my heart is steadfast!
I will sing and make melody!
Awake, my glory!
Awake, O harp and lyre!
I will awake the dawn!
I will give thanks to you, O Lord,
among the peoples;
I will sing praises to you among the nations.
For your steadfast love is great to the heavens,
your faithfulness to the clouds.
Be exalted, O God, above the heavens!
Let your glory be all over the earth!
Psalm 57:7-11
