Dear Team: Was Piotr’s New Translation Really Necessary?

This article was originally published in the February 2017 edition of ITMI Monthly. 

Dear Team,

Who can you trust now days?

The news stations with regularity manipulate headlines, both conservative and liberal stations, to get us to watch their brand with
over-charged and exaggerated statements that almost always more closely resemble their flavor of truth than real unbiased reality.

Who can you trust?

It should be on the minds of all those that truly want truth and not just fed information that already supports their current and flawed
emotional leanings. Who can we trust?

Just this last week, I had breakfast with a couple of men in ministry who presented me with a great concern for the Arabic speaking
Christians world. Seems that, more than a few of the small, yet intense Arabic Christian national church leaders are asking the U.S.
Christian organizations, who are translating Bibles and commentaries for the Arabic speaking world, to please stop sending the
“culturally adapted” versions to their countries.

They say it is doing more harm than good.

Imagine, the ones that need Christian material most desperately, are asking those that are sending some of the far too “softened”
versions to please just not send them at all.

They say that our western attempts to make the gospel palatable to the Arab world only destroys any chance to use God’s word to show them their sin and blindness. The enemy has already convinced much of the Islamic world that our Bible has been “corrupted” it has been “contaminated” and it can’t be trusted.

When we try to soften the gospel too much in our translations, and try to use their words instead of what the Holy Spirit caused the Bible’s writers to pen, we do damage God’s truth.

Who can we trust? Only God’s word.

We must build our lives, our belief systems, our world views, our basis for everything we do and say…on God’s word. Without a Biblical foundation our politicians, our news media, our scientists, our humanitarian organizations, our missions, our missionaries and churches are all doing more harm than good.

My passion as Director of ITMI is to find and empower those men and women that truly are not just doing ministry, but those that
are grounded and built on a vibrant alive relationship with a our living God and His living Word.

Enjoy this sweet note from one of the new readers of Piotr Zaremba’s new Bible translation:

Hi Peter, 

I’m reading the Old Testament in your translation, and it feels like scales had fallen from my eyes and I can see again. 

Everything is so clear to me, everything comes together, everything is so easy to remember. 

I never thought I would be reading the Old Testament with such interest and with such ease. 

It feels like a novel and I’m taking it all in. I wonder what happened, has God opened my eyes? 

Yes, He has given me my sight back--using you, your work, your passion and your perseverance. 

Was your work necessary? Yes, yes, a million times yes. 

I’m almost at the end now. I just have four more books to go. I can’t believe I am seeing patterns and it all comes together for me into one big picture. 

I never thought that the difference in quality would be that huge! 

I didn’t really see it with the New Testament because that part is so much easier. And all the sermons in church tend to turn on the New Testament truths. This way they get to be explained and repeated again and again. 

And with the Old Testament… it’s only now that I’m understanding it fully. 

Peter, you have done a tremendous job. 

I think I’m not the only one who’s seeing this. 

I now have my own Bible. Your Bible. 

I put the old translation on the shelf, and I don’t think I’m going back. Ever. 

I remember I once thought I would stay with that translation for ever. 

But if the old translation was difficult for me, then I can’t even imagine what it seemed like to the young generation! 

The new translation was simply indispensable. 

The need was NOW! 

We couldn’t wait any longer. 

You have made it in time. Ann 

“God didn’t add another day in your life because you needed it, He added it because someone out there needs you.” –Anonymous

We as the ITMI team still have much to do. We know that “…someone out there still needs you” to help be the hands and feet taking
the good news of truth, real truth to the lost and dying. Stay strong and together we will finish well.

In HIS Service,

Steve Evers has advocated for and served the ITMI partners as ITMI Director since 2001. Approximately once a year, Steve visits with ITMI partners in their countries and brings stories back to encourage supporters. Steve enjoys photography and mechanics, (both hobbies that have greatly benefited ITMI partners!) Prior to becoming ITMI's Director, Steve served on the Board of Directors for 4 years. Steve lives in Arizona with his wife, Darlene.