May Greetings

Happy May! While most of you are enjoying the end of spring and looking towards beginning of summer, weâ€™re writing to you from the constant warmth and occasional rain of Cameroon. Teresa is finishing up teaching her first crop of kindergartners here in Cameroon and Matthew has also seen many encouraging accomplishments in his work.

While it has been a while since our last newsletter, we hope that, if you are able, you have been keeping up with us in the meantime through posts on our blog (whereyousendme.wordpress.com) and through Facebook. These newsletters offer a summary of recent events, and we wish to engage with you more closely and personally through these other means.

Lectionaries in local languages!

What is a Lectionary?

Lectionaries are books that contain passages from Psalms, Old Testament, and New Testament for each Sunday and special day of the year (see image below).

In some churches, Lectionaries are used weekly to guide services and keep the congregation aware of the current place in the church (or liturgical) year from Advent through the Special Feasts.

Since just before Christmas, I (Matthew) have had the pleasure to work closely with Joan Weber and a team from Lutheran Bible Translators to adapt/create templates for Protestant and Catholic lectionaries in 4 different languages of Cameroon: Kwanja, Dowayo, Vute, and Ndung. These carefully-constructed templates take the headings and â€œautomagicallyâ€ import each of the nearly 800 passages from ParaTExt, producing an output that is just a few hours of work away from being ready to publish, print, and bind. To cover more of the available Bible verses, there are actually three alternating years of different readings. 2016 is a â€œYear Câ€, and 2017 will be a â€œYear Aâ€. This means that each language group will need to print three books.

While Joan and I have built and checked the templates, the translation teams and their Translation Consultant, Martin Weber, have been working hard to finish translating the final verses that will fill the lectionary into their â€œheart languagesâ€, as well as checking to make sure that the message is clearly and soundly communicated.

The team behind the Kwanja Lectionary: From left: Matthew (language technology), Gillaume (printer), Joan (linguist), Nganko (Kwanja translator), Martin (consultant), and Yuare (Kwanja translator). [Alfred, a Vute translator, was holding the camera.]

Hallelujah! The Kwanja have already dedicated Book C of the Protestant Lectionary and are using it not only in church, but in their homes, often for the first time.
In the coming months, weâ€™re also nearing the printing of Protestant Book A in Kwanja, Dowayo, and Vute. Only a few more verses left to translate!

They're moving on up!

My (Teresa's) first year of teaching at the Greenhouse is coming to a close. It has been an incredible year! I have been blessed to work with some awesome staff and parents and have had an amazing group of students. My students have taught me patience, motivated me to try new things, said many things that have made me laugh, and it has been an overall joy to watch them get excited about learning! God has been my strength on the tough days and has been rejoicing with me on the awesome ones. He has shown me His love through the love of these students.

Top left: Pretending to be astronauts with their bottle rockets! Top right: Learning the phases of the moon using Oreo cookies. Bottom left: During Joint Learning Session we took a field trip to the aviation hanger. Bottom right: Pretending to be paleontologist and digging up dinosaur bones!

Urgent staffing needs for this coming school year (2016-2017) at the Greenhouse:
~ A 1st/2nd grade teacher.
~ A librarian
Would you please pray for a teacher and librarian for these kids? If you know of anybody who might be interested, or if you may be interested in helping out yourself, please let us know!


Teresa went with the running club from Rainforest International School to hike Mt. Cameroon.	Teresa at the top of the 4000-meter volcano.

We were able to go with some friends to visit the Ape Action Primate Park.	Dr. Kenmogne, the new SIL director, being prayed over at his commissioning service. Matthew coordinated security for this event that attracted more than 700 people..

In Cameroon, Women's Day (March 8th) is an important day for celebrating women. Teresa is wearing the special women's day fabric for this year.	Nicoline, our househelp, invited us to have Easter lunch with her family. What a special treat!

At the end of March, our organization gathers together for a spiritual retreat and for branch meetings. This is our branch "family" photo! Can you find us?	On April 18th, there was a big celebration for the 40 years of missionary aviation in Cameroon. There was a big picnic to celebrate!

Matthew and I were able to attend an Operation Christmas Child distribution here in Cameroon. It was a joy to hand out a few of the gifts.	Teresa and a few others trained for and ran a 10K!

Matthew has had the opportunity to interpret a few of the sermons from French to English at church.	Nicoline invited us to her church on Mothers' day. She helped lead worship!

Mango season has arrived! A highlight for many as plenty fall from the trees next to our apartment.	Matthew and I hiked up Nkolbisson to enjoy a great view of the city.

We would love for you to be a part of our Wycliffe Ministry team!

Ways to join our Wycliffe financial or prayer partnership team:
(1) Visit https://www.wycliffe.org/partner/302162
(2) For tax deductible gifts, checks should be made payable to Wycliffe Bible Translators with a separate note indicating "Preference for the Wycliffe Ministry of Matthew and Teresa Lee: Account #302162" and sent to Wycliffe Bible Translators P.O Box 628200 Orlando, FL 32862-8200 USA
(3) Contact us and we will get you started. Teresa_Lee@Wycliffe.org or Matthew_Lee@Wycliffe.org

To learn more about Wycliffe and Bible Translation, visit: www.Wycliffe.org

Check our our blog: http://whereyousendme.wordpress.com

If you have been praying about joining our Wycliffe team either as a prayer partner or a financial partner we would love to talk with you!

May the Lord answer you when you are in distress; may the name of the God of Jacob protect you. May he send you help from the sanctuary and grant you support from Zion. May he remember all your sacrifices and accept your burnt offerings. May he give you the desire of your heart and make all your plans succeed. May we shout for joy over your victory and lift up our banners in the name of our God.May the Lord grant all your requests. Now this I know: The Lord gives victory to his anointed. He answers him from his heavenly sanctuary with the victorious power of his right hand. Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the Lord our God. They are brought to their knees and fall, but we rise up and stand firm. Lord, give victory to the king. Answer us when we call!
(Psalm 20: 1-9 NIV)