Footsteps in the Word

1 Peter 2.2—Crave the Pure-Wordish Milk

June 17, 2024

Crave the Pure-Wordish Milk—1 Peter 2.2 In 1 Peter 2:2, Peter commands his audience in Türkiye (formerly Turkey) to desire “the pure-wordish milk.” As many...

The Main Message of 1 Peter

May 28, 2024

The Main Message of 1 Peter This May, I completed the final course of my M.A. in linguistics, Greek Discourse Analysis. Discourse analysis is essentially the...

Why are you looking for the Living among the dead?

April 15, 2024

Why are you looking for the Living among the dead? Have you ever wondered why some words or sentences stick with you longer or feel more powerful? It turns...

More on Surprise and Amazement in Luke 24.1-12

March 25, 2024

From https://www.gospelimages.com/paintings/46/peter-and-john-visit-the-empty-grave?focus=true More on Surprise and Amazement in Luke 24.1-12 Amazement, the...

Religious Significance of Amazement in the New Testament

March 5, 2024

Religious Significance of Amazement in the New Testament Moses was called at the burning bush, Isaiah through a visionary experience in the temple, Peter...

Angels dressed like Lightning - Literary Echoes and Emotion in Luke 24:1-7

February 12, 2024

Angels Dressed like Lightning - Literary Allusion and Emotion in Luke 24.1-7 I have been busily working on my thesis. Something I came across while doing my...

The story of God’s name pt. 4 - Our Translation Strategy for Yahweh and Kyrios

January 22, 2024

The story of God’s name pt. 4 - Our Translation Strategy for Yahweh and Kyrios Welcome to the fourth and concluding part of this series, which delves into...

The story of God's name pt. 3 - How Yahweh and Kyrios were translated into other languages, including English

January 8, 2024

The story of God's name pt. 3 - How Yahweh and Kyrios were translated into other languages, including English Happy New Year! This week, I will continue with...

The Semester Wrap-up: A Journey through 1 Peter 1:17-21

December 13, 2023

The Semester Wrap-up: A Journey through 1 Peter 1:17-21 In the business of closing out this semester, I have not had the opportunity to finish the 3rd part...

The story of God's name pt. 2 - Kyrios in the New Testament

December 4, 2023

The story of God's name pt. 2 - Kyrios in the New Testament In the previous newsletter, we explored the sacred name of God, Yahweh, and its transformation...

The story of God's name pt. 1 - From Yahweh to Kyrios

November 20, 2023

The story of God's name pt. 1 - From Yahweh to Kyrios Did you know that God has a personal name, and it appears three times more frequently in the Bible than...

Highlights from the International Bible Translation Conference - Engaging OBT and Emotions in Translation

October 30, 2023

Highlights from the International Bible Translation Conference - Engaging OBT and Emotions in Translation Me speaking during the Plenary Panel on AI I have...

🗝️ Unlocking the Gold Mine - How AI Can Quickly Simplify Technical Commentaries

October 5, 2023

Unlocking the Gold Mine - How AI Can Quickly Simplify Technical Commentaries All around the world, men and women sit daily around a team computer, diligently...

'Salvation' BEFORE Christ Appeared

September 19, 2023

'Salvation' BEFORE Christ Appeared In language, some words are like mansions and others like trailer houses. Our trailer-house words generally refer to...

Accurate Translations and Artistry in the Bible

September 12, 2023

Accurate Translations and Artistry in the Bible If you've been in Bible translation for any length of time, friends, family, and others you meet will often...

More Zingers in 1 Peter

August 21, 2023

More Zingers in 1 Peter Last week I introduced the idea of zingers and talked about one in 1 Peter 1:3-4. This week you get a window into two more of my...

Zingers in 1 Peter 1:3-4

August 14, 2023

Zingers in 1 Peter 1:3-4 Good speakers pepper their speeches with sonically pleasing "zingers" - the types of statements that stay in your head long after...

Luke's Unique Voice as a Writer

August 7, 2023

Click here for the original YouTube video by @magnity. Luke's Unique Voice as a Writer "Dids't thou know that reading the Bible is oft impeded by a...

What AI and Bible Translators have in common - Corpus Linguistics

July 24, 2023

What AI and Bible Translators have in common - Corpus Linguistics ChatGPT and other "Large Language Models" (LLMs) use collections of texts, called corpora...

🪟 A Window into My Research

July 10, 2023

A Window into My Research Most of my emails present work that I have already finished. In this email, I wanted to give you a window into my current projects....

Encouraging Results - OBT vs Audio Bible

June 26, 2023

Encouraging Results - OBT vs Audio Bible Simple changes can lead to dramatic results. Our oral Bible translation of Luke 15 focused on highlighting the...

Audio Bibles - the challenges and what we're doing about it

June 13, 2023

This is part two of a three-part series summarizing my paper on the way that capturing the artistry of the biblical text in its original language results in...

Uncovering gems in Luke 15

June 5, 2023

Uncovering gems in Luke 15 My first paper has just been published! Heather Beal and I used our oral Bible translation of Luke 15 as a case study to...

We don't need your game... an OBT Story

May 29, 2023

We don’t need your game… an OBT Story I just got back from a two week partnership development trip to Michigan. One of the stories that I shared with a...

'Throw out', 'lead out', or 'send out' - the senses and semantic prosodies of ἐκβάλλω, pt. 2

May 8, 2023

'Throw out', 'lead out', or 'send out' - the senses and semantic prosodies of ἐκβάλλω Last week I discussed semantic prosody, the "voiceless" emotion which...

Determining the 'voiceless' emotion in biblical words

May 1, 2023

By DALLE-2 Semantic Prosody pt. 1 - determining the 'voiceless' emotion in biblical words Paradoxically, some words ring with a particular "voice" of emotion...

5 Foundational Metaphors for Distress in the Psalms

April 17, 2023

5 Foundational Metaphors for Distress in the Psalms When Job says, "I will speak in the bitterness of my soul" (Job 10:1), what does he mean? Does he have...

Herod The 'Great' Angry Tot

March 27, 2023

Herod The ‘Great’ Angry Tot The Gospel accounts of Jesus’ birth contain a wealth of mysterious theological insights, worthy of long pondering and adoration....

Setting up for success – Creating a high-flow teamwork environment

March 8, 2023

Art generated by DALLE - 2 Setting up for success – Creating a high-flow teamwork environment Translating the Bible into every language on earth is one of...

I've started and may never stop: Internalizing Scripture

February 20, 2023

I’ve started and may never stop: Internalizing Scripture I want to share with you a topic that has been inspiring and challenging me lately: internalizing...

The paradox of comprehending emotions during inter-cultural communication pt. 2

February 16, 2023

The paradox of comprehending emotions during inter-cultural communication pt. 2 The paradox: we may understand just enough about emotions (cf. pt. 1) in...

The paradox of comprehending emotions during inter-cultural communication

January 30, 2023

The paradox of comprehending emotions during inter-cultural communication Our ability to comprehend the emotions of someone from a distant culture is...

Psalm 11 - A Poetic, Oral Translation

January 23, 2023

—Picture credit, CDBR’s page on Psalm 11. Psalm 11 - A Poetic, Oral Translation Last week, I shared about the role singing the Psalms has in God’s mission on...

Singing the Psalms - God's Missiological Strategy

January 16, 2023

Singing the Psalms - God's Missiological Strategy Happy New Year! Seeing the connection between singing the Psalms and the fulfillment of God's mission on...

🗣️💡Digest - Sudanese Arabic Oral Bible Translation Project Report

December 19, 2022

🗣️💡Digest - Sudanese Arabic Oral Bible Translation Project Report This semester I have labored long to report accurately the context and progress of the...

The Power of Visualizing the Scriptures

December 5, 2022

The Power of Visualizing the Scriptures Imagery pervades the most influential sections of the Christian cannon—a chosen ruler drips with oil, breaks his...

Rejection at Nazareth - a Bridge Between Sections

November 28, 2022

Rejection at Nazareth This newsletter explores Mark’s account of Jesus’ rejection at Nazareth (Mark 6:1-6), examining the role it plays within Mark’s...

Hardness of Heart & the Organization of Mark

November 21, 2022

Hardness of Heart and the Organization of Mark How are Pharoah, the Pharisees, and the Apostles connected? The Bible shows that each of them had hardened...

Fresh Perspectives on the Gospels

November 14, 2022

Fresh Perspective on the Gospels The energy and passion of professor Stephen Venable's voice still rings in my ears: *"Even if you lived in Israel during...

The Birth of the NLT: A father, his son, and a sick Billy Graham

November 7, 2022

The NLT’s predecessor, the Living Bible, was a widely acclaimed and equally controversial English translation that may have paved the way for many of the...

I love what I used to hate - routines and templates

October 31, 2022

I love what I used to hate -

My First Research Digest: access to my latest notes and research

October 24, 2022

My First Research Digest: access to my latest notes and research I first started this weekly update as an avenue to share the fruit of my research. Over the...

Three Principles That More Than Doubled My Academic Productivity

October 17, 2022

Three Principles That More Than Doubled My Academic Productivity 15 Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, 16 making the best use of...

Personal Benefits of Biblical Emotion Exegesis, Part 2

October 10, 2022

Benefits of Biblical Emotion Exegesis As I wrote last week, I have found five distinct benefits of studying the emotions in Biblical passages: We see God...

Personal Benefits of Biblical Emotion Exegesis, Part 1

October 3, 2022

Benefits of Biblical Emotion Exegesis Studying the Bible in different ways yields different benefits. Studying the Scriptures from a linguistic perspective...

A Reflection on my time studying oral Bible translation

September 26, 2022

A Reflection on my time studying oral Bible translation Heather Beal’s presentation on oral Bible translation in my Foundations of Translation course...

A Closer Look at Josh's Translation of Psalm 9

September 19, 2022

A Closer Look at Josh's Translation of Psalm 9 Last week, I discussed some of the translation philosophy behind my oral translation of Psalm 9. This week, I...

Bridging the Gap: Bringing the Beauty of Biblical Poetry to Life through Poetic Oral Translations

September 12, 2022

Bridging the Gap: Bringing the Beauty of Biblical Poetry to Life through Poetic Oral Translations There is a huge gap between the beauty of the Psalms in...

Labor Day Break

September 5, 2022

Labor Day Break! Hey everyone! I am on vacation this week with my wife and her family. In lieu of a normal update, please enjoy these cute pictures of...

How Oral Bible Translation May Enrich Other Disciplines

August 29, 2022

How Oral Bible Translation May Enrich Other Disciplines Oral Bible translation (OBT) requires a translation both in language, from the biblical texts to...