Thursday, March 14, 2024



These three stories are examples of shell books (quality is better in original). 

The illustrations and page set up are the “shell.” 

The shell is designed so that the text can easily be changed to another language. (Again, the quality of the images and the text is better in the original.)

It is simply a matter of “cut-and-paste” to put in Spanish or Slovak or Ukrainian rather than English.

These three books do not require any additional translation. 

The captions come straight from a printed Bible. 

This way we do not need to know the language ourselves to put in the proper text.

We have already used these coloring books in several different languages. 

The story of Dorcas has been printed in Dutch, English, and Sinti Romani. 

The parables of Jesus have been used in Romanian, English, Russian, and Ursari Romani. 

The pages would have to be rearranged to print them in languages that are written right-to-left like Farsi or Hebrew. But it would be possible.

If you are interested in having the “shell” for any of these stories, feel free to contact us. We put these together ourselves. And if you are interested, we can connect you with even more shell Bible stories and coloring booklets.

Happy reading—and coloring!

Mary  & Keith 


Tuesday, February 27, 2024

Action re the Book of Acts

Do you remember Dean Jones, the star of Disney films like The Love Bug? After he became a Christian, he helped found The Visual Bible, a company which made Scripture films like The Book of Acts. You can see AND hear the original here.

You can also see and hear it in nine different languages here, including Mandarin Chinese, French, Latin American Spanish, Russian, and two versions of Arabic. The Jesus Film Project now owns the rights to dub this video into different languages.

Before Cru (the Jesus Film people) had the rights, Keith also dubbed it into Sinti Romani. It is possible that others also dubbed it into other languages which are floating out there somewhere on the Internet. If you find one, let us know. 

Since the film follows the Scripture text, some people have used the video in Bible studies. They watch a portion instead of or in addition to reading the text. If you experiment with this or know someone who has, let us know about that, too.

Prayerfully, 
Mary & Keith

Tuesday, February 13, 2024

Roma at Work

 I love baskets. So I my ears really perked up when our friend Zoltan told me about this Roma basket-maker in Romania. The man is a Christian. During the growing season he, like many other Roma, does  agricultural work. Some people go to Germany to pick soft fruits (strawberries, raspberries, etc.). Others go to Spain to pick garlic, among other things. 

I do not know what this man does then. But during the other months, he makes baskets. One of Zoltan's Roma friends helps sell the baskets. Zoltan had bought a big, sturdy one for harvesting grapes.

In America, baskets for such farm work were often made from split hardwood like white oak. Here in Europe, the weaving material of choice is more likely to be willow. Polled willows were grown specifically for this sort of purpose. These trees, often ancient, are still seen along fence rows today. 

Keith and I will be at the same Roma Networks Meeting as Zoltan in April. Perhaps Zoltan can buy and bring one of these baskets for me. Which would you choose:  an oval one with a handle or a big one for yardwork? 


Whatever you are doing, let your hearts be in your work, as a thing done for the Lord and not for men. Colossians 3:23, Weymouth New Testament


Friday, February 2, 2024

Choosing a Standard

On a weekend visit to a province north of where we live, we stopped in a drugstore to pick up a few things we'd forgotten. We understood the local teenage-clerk behind the counter perfectly well--when she spoke to us. We didn't understand anything she said when she turned to chat with a friend in the store. What was the difference? She spoke standard Dutch to us and the local dialect with her friend. But who decided, way back when, which of the many local Dutch dialects would become the standard? Why the people in the nation's capital, over there on the west coast. (Even our image of typical Dutch costumes comes from the west--photo from 1993 OC Tulip Time.)

Typically those in power in a nation choose the standard. But what if your language isn't centered in one particular nation-state? What if, for instance, you are Romany? After all, it can be really handy to have a standard from speaking to spelling. I don't try to write down things the way my mother pronounced them (upper Midwest accent) and Keith doesn't try to write things down the way his mother pronounced them (TEXAN). No, we have a standard. It's imperfect (right?), but it's standard.*

The International Romani Union realized this. In 1990, they approved an international Romani alphabet to help unite Romani** around the world. 

The Romani Bible Translation Committee also decided to go for a translation into Standard Romani. You can read more about it or read more in that Standard on their website.

You can hear AND read that language in the recently completed Gospel of John

And you can pray for the translators, voices, technicians who are making this Standard Romani version of the Gospel available. (Feel free to pray in any version of any language you choose!)


*Our daughter spent a couple of months in second grade at a school in North Carolina. On a spelling test, she wrote down exactly what she heard her teacher say:  "fav." The word was "5". 

**Romani can refer to the language or to the group of people.

Friday, January 12, 2024

FUNdament = Parents and Children learning together


Olesea Ciochina would like to see mothers and children in her community connect more. She will be using the ideas in 
FUNdament as a springboard for a weekly gathering of mothers and (preschool) children in the Romany village of Vulcanesti, Moldova.

Olesea and her husband Petru have worked with the people in this village for many years. They have gotten to know the culture and established relationships with individuals and families. (Photo:  Olesea with Roma friend)

Olesea is also an experienced teacher, of children as well as adults. (Photo,  Olesea teaching teenaged girls.)

Please join us in prayer for this venture, scheduled to start in February. 

May the right people be led to join the group. 

May the group gradually turn from a collection of people into a happy learning circle. 

May Olesea be inspired with the right Bible stories and related activities to draw in and keep these mothers and children learning together.

Amen.





Wednesday, January 3, 2024

Happy (Old) New Year!

How did (or will) you celebrate the New Year?

In the Netherlands, people eat oliebollen (sort of round donuts) and, at midnight, they watch the neighbors shoot off fireworks. And then they watch the neighbors do this some more, sometimes until 1:30, depending on the neighborhood. 

When we first moved to Missouri, I was puzzled by the supermarket special of a single rose (for the loved one of your choice) and a can of black-eyed peas (?!). My Southern-born husband explained the black-eyed peas were to bring good fortune through the coming year. We now eat them regularly on January 1. (When we first moved to the Netherlands we had to go to a foreign food store to find them and to buy corn meal). 


In Moldova, many are still waiting to celebrate. Our partner Olesea Ciochina explained, "We still have the old-style (Gregorian Calendar) New Year, on January 13. In the evening, the children will go to the houses with wishes and carols.  The next day children go from house to house with a poem for New Year's greeting. They sow seeds (rice, corn, grain, sometimes even dried beans) to wish you a bountiful year, and you give them something in return. I have to cook some cookies & I will buy some sweets for them." 
She never knows ahead of time how many will come by. 
"It can be 10 or it can be 100. They go 2 by 2 or in groups of 3 or 5 or just 1." 
She leaves the seeds in the yard until late in the evening, when she gathers it all up and feeds it to her chickens. She added with a laugh, "When I open to see how many children there are and to listen to them, they can sow seeds inside the house, too." 

It gives new meaning to the story Jesus told: 
A sower went out to sow his seed, and while he was sowing, some of the seed fell by the roadside and was trodden down and birds gobbled it up. Some fell on the rock, and when it sprouted it withered for lack of moisture. Some fell among thorn-bushes which grew up with the seeds and choked the life out of them. But some seed fell on good soil and grew and produced a crop—a hundred times what had been sown. Luke 8:5-8

We wish you a bountiful harvest in 2024, however you started this New Year!

Mary VanRheenen & Keith Holmes 

P.S. Let us know if you want the recipe for oliebollen, corn bread, or vegan black-eyed peas.



Monday, December 18, 2023

A Boat Brings Good News

This December it's a boat--not a sleigh or a donkey--which is bringing joy at Christmas. 

Earlier this year Keith recorded the Jesus film in Lipovan. Several hundred years ago, this group of people disagreed with Tzar-sponsored changes in the Russian Orthodox Church. They split off a couple of hundred years ago and became known as "Old Believers" because they preferred the old forms of worship to the new changes. 

They moved to isolated corners of Europe like the Danube delta. They not only kept using old forms of worship. They also kept using an old version of Russian which developed into Lipovan.

Keith felt a bit at home, since much of the Danube Delta looks a lot like South Louisiana. Many Lipovan settlements, like traditional settlements in Louisiana, can only be reached by boat. 


So a Baptist pastor Keith met while he was recording had gotten together with a number of others to buy a 12-person boat.  Now all they needed to reach Lipovan people was a motor to go with the boat (note vacant space in back of boat for motor).


The pastor acted in faith. He took out a loan to buy the motor. The loan was due in December. Keith was able to connect the pastor with a donor who gave half the money to repay the loan. 

And that's how it's a boat bringing the Good News of Jesus' birth. Immanuel:  God is with us, on the water and on dry land.