What we’re observing

This week, I met with Frank and Majaliwa again to continue sense-making and to plan for how to do further sense-making with the Malila community. I thought it was time to share a few of our initial observations, rather than just describe what we are doing. So here is a snapshot of what has emerged.

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Having the complete New Testament (NT) makes a difference: people (including church leaders) are more motivated to use the Malila Scriptures now that they have the complete NT. We also heard multiple testimonies of how much easier it is to understand the Malila Scriptures than the Swahili Scriptures.

A variety of materials are being engaged with: there were multiple stories relating to not just print Scriptures, but also audio Scriptures, songs, the Jesus film and literacy materials such as story books. However, deep and consistent engagement was less obvious and distribution may need strengthening. This was particularly noticeable in relation to audio Scriptures; although people obviously enjoy them and they have contributed to people becoming Christians, nearly all the outcomes relating to audio Scriptures involved people hearing the audio on a one-off occasion, rather than being part of a regular listening group. Also, the audio was always listened to via MegaVoice players, with no evidence of the audio Scriptures spreading through other methods such as via flash drives, social media etc.

Certain people and workshops have led to the greatest impact: when assessing what contributed to the outcomes we heard, the most significant contributions were workshops (especially transition literacy teacher training and transition literacy/Bible study workshops), the people trained through those workshops (especially a handful of highly motivated individuals) and employed staff (literacy/SE workers). This leads to questions over how effectively the community will continue the work, now that there is no-one being paid to do it and SIL is no long running workshops. It is hard for volunteers to find the time and money needed to travel and advocate, distribute, teach etc. But it is also really encouraging to see that workshops have worked! All the time and effort that went into training colleagues and teaching in the community has borne fruit.

Church leaders are the main ‘actors’ (where an actor refers to the person demonstrating a change of behaviour): there were multiple testimonies relating to pastors now using Malila Scriptures in church, teaching people to read, showing the Jesus Film etc. This isn’t a surprise but it is encouraging, as our SE strategy involved targeting church leaders, and others with leadership roles in churches, because they are key influencers in the very churched area in which we work.

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There is much more I could write, such as of seeing change at the community level of people feeling freer to use their language in public, or of noticing possible areas of need such as helping families hold devotional times together and providing Bible teaching and study skills for church leaders etc. And there is much to reflect on – what do these findings say about what we have done, what we are doing and what we could be doing, both in the Malila language area and elsewhere?

Our next step is to do some of that reflection with the Malila community by meeting with their NGO. The NGO originated from the Malila Language Committee, which SIL encouraged to become officially registered as a community based organisation. A number of the people we met with during the Outcome Harvesting field trips were members of the NGO, so they already have some idea of what we have been doing. We plan to explain further what we have been doing, particularly talking about our goal of seeing transformation as people get to know God better through His Word, and then do some sense-making with them. We will do this by giving them half of the outcomes (using all of them would take a long time, so instead we’ll select a representative sample) to group according to the ‘significance’ scale and then discuss together which they consider most significant and what that means for us. We also hope to share some of our other observations with them, including some of the statistics, and talk together about how these findings may influence their plans as an NGO.

SE Impact Chain

A note about the SE Impact Chain (Materials > Reach (distribution) > Seeing/Hearing > Individuals changed > Community transformation. All supported by the ‘legs’): as we tried to order the outcomes according to this chain, we felt a need to add something in at the ‘Reach’ level, so we added in a ‘Reach – knowledge’ category, so that reach was captured both in terms of distribution of materials and sharing of knowledge (literacy teaching etc), as both contribute to the next link in the chain.

A taste of the outcomes we harvested

A couple of the outcome statements that seemed particularly significant to us as a team:

In the village of Iwowo, July 2020, the pastor of Last Church, said the following, “Our language is sweet according to the Scriptures I read in our Malila books. I bought the book of Mark which has really opened my mind and removed my fear of preaching or teaching in my mother tongue."

In mid-2021, the SIL Malila Literacy/SE worker (Mwangwale) led the devotional time in a meeting of the Language Committee, using Ephesians and an illustration of what it means to be clothed in Christ, which he learnt through a Bible seminar taught by SIL Tanzania SE worker (Katherine). The LC members began to use the illustration in their churches and invited Mwangwale to teach in their churches. He went to the PHM church in Shuwa and taught a seminar on Ephesians and showed the Jesus Film. 

Through participating in workshops and the Malila Scriptures Reviewers Committee, the elder (church leader) in the Pentecost Church, Ilembo, began teaching in Malila in church. People understood well, and were able to answer questions (which they hadn't been able to do when he used the Swahili Bible). Now even the deacons and the church secretary can teach when he isn't around. (Since 2020, when the Malila NT was launched.)

What do you think?

I’d love to hear your thoughts on these observations. Do they resonate with your experience in other places? What questions do they raise for you? What implications may they have for how we work?

Author: Katherine O'Donnell