#deditos

Mexico (MNN) -- With five days left until Christmas, it’s possible you’re scrambling for last-minute gifts. If there’s a difficult person on your Christmas list, consider giving God’s Word in their honor. Wycliffe Bible Translators makes it easy. They’ve highlighted 23 projects of greatest need in their 2019 Gift Catalog.

(Photo courtesy of Wycliffe USA)

“In this year's catalog, we have a match for the Steep Mountain Zapotec project in Mexico… that's actually a project for children. [It’s] a video [series] called the ‘Deditos’ which actually means ‘little fingers’ in Spanish,” Wycliffe USA’s Melissa Stillman says.

“We're hoping to meet that match in a timely way so that more resources can go to the project.”

Helping kids access God’s Word

As Stillman explains here, Wycliffe partners with Viña Studios, a video team from Guatemala, to create short films of Old Testament Bible stories using finger puppets. Working from a biblically accurate script, “finger actors” perform in front of a green screen. Later, a digital editor adds elaborate backgrounds to fit the scene. “The neat thing about this [project] is that the Viña team produces lesson plans with each of these Bible story videos, and it helps the kids grow in the Lord,” Stillman says.

“In that Steep Mountain Zapotec area, kids are going to church even if their parents aren't.  So, this really helps disciple them.”

(Photo courtesy of Wycliffe USA)

According to the Joshua Project, there are 55 different variations of the Zapotec language in Mexico. Several have little or no Scripture access.  As Stillman describes in her blog, believers in the Steep Mountain Zapotec area had been reaching out to children. However, they lacked biblical, kid-friendly resources in the Steep Mountain Zapotec language – making the “Deditos” videos an invaluable resource. “The ‘Deditos’ videos are [available in] multiple languages around the world,” Stillman says. “They really are effective tools in helping people who can't read and write in their own language encounter God's Word from the Old Testament.”

Give beyond Christmas

To make a Christmas donation to the Steep Mountain Zapotec project, click here. Whether you can give or not, Stillman says, please pray for these Bible translation projects. “We encourage people... to use the write-ups about each of the projects to just pray through them. God [is working] in each of those areas,” she says. See all 23 projects listed in Wycliffe USA’s Gift Catalog.     Header image is a stock photo courtesy Acharaporn Kamornboonyarush via Pexels.