Joe and Jerry Snyder
Wycliffe Bible Translators
October-November 2006 Joe's Report
Did you know that history says that Thomas the Apostle (Doubting Thomas) traveled all the way to India to preach the gospel? He journeyed around southern India visiting Kerala, Mylapore, and Madras (now Chennai). Legend has it that he was pierced with a lance on a hilltop just outside Chennai. We visited the site, where the chapel in the photo to the right stands and is still in use. We also visited the traditional burial place which is in the city and where a cathedral now stands. We are able to go into the chapel under the cathedral but not down under that into the burial chamber. As you can imagine, for some this is a very important monument and pilgrimage destination. Both locations are obviously Catholic churches but in each case we observed services underway using contemporary English songs and music.
Two of us went to India to talk with vendors about working on software development with us. We have received a grant to fund the work with one of the vendors. My department will be renting office space from this company and relocating 3-5 families to be the senior development team augmented with locally hired Indian programmers. We looked at some of the resumes of potential team members and interviewed one of them. They appear to be well-trained, Oracle-certified developers. I am excited about the possibilities of "accelerating the pace of Bible translation through creative IT strategies".
Jerry's Update
Thanks to all of you who have been praying for me. I’m feeling much better but still struggling with cutting back on responsibilities. It is very difficult to do when I see so much that needs to be done. Please continue to pray for me. Pray specifically for some one to be found who can take over some of my responsibilities with payroll.
I am really looking forward to Christmas because we will be going to Amarillo, Texas to see the grandkids. They are getting so big now. We enjoy talking on the phone with them and have gotten a little video camera so they can see us on the computer. Being so far from them has been very hard. Learning new ways to "grandparent" from a distance is always a challenge.
Praise and Prayer requests:
Please pray about being a part of our support team, if you are not already, and, if you are, we thank you for your investments of prayer and funds in our ministry with Wycliffe. Continue to pray for our team that is doing a complete redesign and redevelopment of the wycliffe web site. The new www.wycliffe.org has been delayed until after the first of the year due to slow delivery from the vendor and inadequate time to test. Praise God for Joe's trip to India. It was safe and enjoyable in many ways. But, best of all, we have found a way to augment the short-handed software development team and to partner with Christian businesses in India. Praise God for the time that all of Wycliffe had during its world-wide Wycliffe Day of Prayer on November 10th. We give thanks to God, and hope you will too, that Jerry is doing well and not experiencing further chest pains. She is following up with her doctor for some additional tests related to acid reflux. Now Joe is going through some tests for a very painful knee. Pray for healing of whatever is causing the problem.
