The Bible Carey translated into Bangali, is still used today. It is
that ranslation we are trying to get in the hands of the children
by Chuck Ness
On the heels of a Revolution that won freedom, for the American colinialists, from bondage to King George, a lowly shoemaker named William Carey won freedom from his bondage to sin and became a Christian in England.
William Carey always had a fondness for the voyages of James Cook, Columbus, and Vasco da Gama. Their exploits into the lands they discovered moved him to answer God's calling to spread the Gospel to the uncivilized heathens of the World. Convinced to join his friend, Andrew Fuller and a few others, he helped them create a group that would be called the Baptist Missionary Society. Before long Carey was headed to India with a passion to save souls for Christ. Using the business model of the big trading companies like the East India Company, he set up a missionary movement that earned souls like a business earned profits.
Carey and his colleagues served as role models for a holistic vision of mission work. In 1800, Carey finally baptized his first convert, Krishna Pal, who soon became an evangelist. Despite these early years of minimal fruit in terms of conversions, by 1821, Carey and his associates had baptized 1,407 converts. Marshman proved the most gifted evangelist and apologist on the team.
The Lord blesses us all with gifts, and one of William had an exceptional gift for learning languages. This led him to him learn even the ancient laguages of Hebrew, Latin, Classic and Koinie and others. It was this talent that led him to translate religious scriptures. When he arrived in India he took that gift and taught himself to speak and write Bengali. His first translation of the Bible was the Bangali Bible, which is still used today. Her would eventually translate the Bible into 40 languages and dialects along with beginning several schools that helped many locals become evangelizers to their own people. By the time he died in 1834, Carry had done in Calcutta what Paul had done in Antioch and Ephesus from Corinth and Rome. As the news of his success reached England and America, Christians began taking note of their calling to the "Great Commission" and William Carey would became known as the father of the modern missionary movement.
It is this work I am attempting to build upon with my partner, Billo Das, in Bagladesh. Islam has encroached upon the country in the last hundred years and is now the predominant religion in the country at 94%. Hinduism is still the faith of over 5% of the citizens with less than .07% of the population being professed christians. The mission field is wide open for the Lord's work in Bangladesh. With the help of those who's hearts are moved by the Holy Spirit, we pray we can make a difference in the future of millions by getting God's word into the descendants hands of those William Carey reached his translation over 200 years ago.
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