You’ve probably never
heard the name Geronimo Martin. I hadn’t either, until I read about his
contribution of getting the Bible translated into the language of his people—the
Navajo Indians. Geronimo was born blind, but as a young man He trusted in Christ
as Savior. He understood the power of the Bible to change lives and he had a life-long
dream of the Navajo people having God’s Word in their tongue.
In 1944 the Wycliffe Bible
Translators enlisted Geronimo to help them translate the Bible. Geronimo would
read an English Braille Bible and translate it into Navajo, while his wife Lois
wrote it down. It took 12 years to complete the New Testament. Navajos accepted
the NT with gladness, but after a few years, there was an outcry for the Old Testament
to be translated. Geronimo set out again to help translate the OT in 1968, which
was finished in 1984, the same year he died at age 67. One year later, the
complete Navajo Bible was published which Lois witnessed.
The translation process
did face setbacks along the way. Lois Martin remembers an unexpected problem.
“We had just finished the Book of Job, which took maybe three month’s work, and
we were going to Tucson, AZ. We had the handwritten manuscript, at least 100
pages covered front and back, in a suitcase tied on top of the car with other
luggage. The rope must have loosened and the suitcase fell off. I walked over
the entire area but never found it.” Smiling serenely Lois says, “We learned
Job’s tribulations by doing the book over again.” In all, it took the Martin’s
42 years to complete their entire translation of the Bible.[i]
The Martin’s were the epitome
of plodders, which means “to work or act perseveringly; to drudge; moving or
walking heavily and slowly making laborious progress.” It's not a pretty word.
It conjures up images of a person trudging along with their legs knee deep in
mud or crossing sandy dunes in a blistering desert.
We can sometimes get
discouraged when we’re plodding, because we aren’t seeing results soon enough. So,
we consider throwing in the towel. But many times, if we would just plod on a
little longer, we’d reach our goal. We need to adjust to the idea that being a
Christian is always a dazzling mountaintop experience. More likely it involves
plodding through the lowly valleys and sometimes these spells of plodding may
even last years.
The Martin’s were
consistent plodders and so were many others in the Bible. Noah plodded for 120
years to build the Ark (1 Peter 3:20). Joseph diligently collected grain for 7
years (Gen. 41:53-55). Moses trudged through the Wilderness with the Israelites
for 40 years (Acts 7:36). Nehemiah worked 52 days to repair the walls of Jerusalem,
brick-by-brick (Neh. 6:15). Then there is Jesus who inched His way up Calvary
to die for our sins, each step more painful than the last (Mark 15:20-22).
Plodders have their eyes
on the goal; they resist every effort to get them on a detour. “This one thing
I do!” is their special verse (Phil. 3:13), and they will not change. Warren
Wiersbe joked, “Consider the postage stamp. Its usefulness consists in the
ability to stick to one thing till it gets there.” If we are going to be
plodders we must stay diligent until the harvest comes (Gal. 6:9).
We think faith means doing
big things for God, but more often faith is about a consist day-to-day trusting
God over a long period. Faith is believing God one task at a time, one day at a
time, trusting in God’s power to change the world through a series of obedient
steps. Don’t be afraid to plod for God! -DM
[i] IVER
PETERSON, “NAVAJOS WELCOME A NATIVE AMERICAN BIBLE,” The New York Times, 20 January 1986
<http://www.nytimes.com/1986/01/20/us/navajos-welcome-a-native-american-bible.html?mcubz=1>
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