As I promised in my previous post here is an article that will show you the Guatemalan Connection to Wycliffe.
William Cameron Townsend
By Claude Hickman
"The greatest missionary is the Bible in the mother
tongue. It needs no furlough and is never considered a foreigner." -
William Cameron Townsend
William Cameron Townsend was one of the three most
influential missions leaders in the last two centuries. This was the
statement that Ralph Winter made after hearing that Townsend had passed
away in 1982. 'Cameron' was born in California in 1896 into a time of
poverty for the country. He was raised in the Presbyterian Church and
decided to stay in California, enrolling in Occidental College in Los
Angeles.
The influence of the Student Volunteer Movement, though
in its early beginnings, had gained enough momentum to reach from the
East coast to Cameron in the West. During Townsend's junior year, the
movement's lead visionary, John R. Mott, visited Occidental and
challenged students to give their lives to the evangelization of the
world in this generation. Cameron met with Mott and joined the SVM,
committing his life to the Great Commission. He had joined the National
Guard in 1917, and was prepared to serve his country in the war, when he
was challenged by a missionary on furlough to obey his SVM commitment
and go to the mission field instead of the battlefield. He applied for a
discharge in order to become a missionary to Guatemala and was
surprised to get it approved by his commanding officer.
Cam left for Guatemala in August 1917, with a Bible
association that sold Spanish Bibles there. He was serving a one year
commitment in Guatemala, and almost finished when, on one day, something
radically changed his perspective and eventually the course of missions
history. One afternoon, one of the Cakchiquel Indians that Cameron had
been living among last few months, approached his table and looked
curiously at the Spanish Bible, asking what it was. Townsend explained
to him that it was the words of God, the creator of all mankind. The man
replied, sarcastically to Cameron, "If your God is so smart, why
doesn't he speak my language?" Cameron was stunned to find that this
man, though he lived in Guatemala, was one of the 200,000 Cakchiquel
people and spoke zero Spanish.
The cutting remark left Cameron with a scar that he
would never get rid of. It began to burden him that there were thousands
of individuals, and hundred of other tribes, without one page of
scripture in their language. Townsend would not return from his one year
missions trip. In fact, he dedicated the next 13 years of his life to
Cakchiquel Indians, translating the Bible into their language in an
incredible 10 years. Cameron allowed the gospel to interrupt the course
of his life. He began an organization known as Wycliffe Bible
Translators, named after the Reformation hero who first translated the
Bible into English.
Concerned about other minority language groups, Townsend
opened Camp Wycliffe in Arkansas in the summer of l934. The camp was
designed to train young people in basic linguistics and translation
methods. Two students enrolled. The following year, after a training
session with five men in attendance, Townsend took the five to Mexico to
begin field work. From this small beginning has grown the worldwide
ministry of the Summer Institute of Linguistics, Wycliffe Bible
Translators, and Wycliffe Associates. No cultural group is considered
too small, no language too difficult. Pioneering continues as several
thousand workers break new ground in many parts of the world. The
highest standards of linguistics and anthropological orientation are
upheld. Service is stressed. All field work is done in cooperation with
host governments, universities and philanthropic groups. Portions of the
Christian Scriptures are translated for people in their mother tongue,
the language of their hearts.
"Uncle Cam" as he is known by Wycliffe staff was also
credited for beginning the final missions era that we are living in
today. It is an era that focuses not on just reaching continents and
inland countries, but on every distinct ethnic group, or people group in
the world. This people group focus, taken from the original meaning of
the word 'nations' (ethnos) as it was used in the New Testament and in
the Great Commission, is the commitment to pioneer into every
ethno-linguistic group. Cameron truly was one of the greatest missionary
pioneers of our time. Today Wycliffe has the goal of translating the
Bible into every language on the earth. Currently, there are over 3,000
languages without scripture, but 4,000 have at least portions in their
dialect, all because Cameron stumbled on the idea of People Groups.
