Today marks the anniversary of the death of Robert Moffat, a Scottish missionary to South Africa. He worked in one mission station, Kuruman, in the north of the country for half a century. It came to be known as a ‘fountain of Christianity’.
The station was subject to robbery and violence; and yet, just 5 years after Moffat began working there, church services were packed. Additional to this work, Moffat was also a self-taught linguist. Within a year, he had written a grammar of the Setswana (Tswana) language and begun translating Luke.
This was to become what one biographer calls his ‘greatest legacy’, and it was certainly the most exhausting thing he ever did: the Setswana Bible was completed in 1857. He printed it on a hand press, and it was the first complete Bible printed in Africa.
He recalled this exchange between the Christians and non-Christians at the Kuruman base:
When the heathen saw the converts reading the Book which had produced this change, they inquired if they (the converts) talked to it. “No,” answered they, “it talks to us; for it is the Word of God.”
“What then,” replied the strangers, “does it speak?”
“Yes,” said the Christians, “it speaks to the heart!” * From David J Deane’s biography.
Moffat left a legacy. Additional to the massive impact of the Setswana Bible, he was also profusely enthusiastic about calling others to God’s work. His life may seem chronologically and geographically separate from ours, but the call is the same for us as for him: people are waiting to hear God’s word in their own language. You can be involved.
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Tags: biography, South Africa, Tswana
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