Sometimes, a translation project can take years. Sometimes, months. On the rarest occasions, only weeks.

Since our earliest connections with Ahmad Zeividavi, we have been aware of the fact that we were involved in a “special” partnership. Ahmad is an Iranian. He immigrated to Canada and since his arrival, he has been involved in reaching other Iranians immigrants to Canada with the Gospel. He founded the House of Omeed, where he and his team serve immigrants and refugees in the Vancouver area with language assistance, housing, food, and many other services to make their landing in Canada less complicated. All of those services help provide opportunities to share Christ.

It has been only a short time since Ahmad and Clear and Simple Media formed a partnership to put the Travel Guide to the Bible into Farsi. Because of Ahmad’s connections to the Christian community in Iran, we knew that, once the book was translated, the ebook could be delivered widely throughout the country. But Ahmad felt that the book also needed to be put into print. That, he said, could be easily done through connections he had with printers in Armenia.

If any of our readers have worked cross-culturally, you will know that the words “no problem” are – relative. We have been working on some projects for years after being assured, in good faith, that a project would see smooth sailing from start to finish. So when Ahmad assured us that he had translators, designers, and printers at the ready, we believed him (of course), but also knew that – things happen. And in this case – things happened indeed. Very good things! Before we knew it, Ahmad’s team had completed the Farsi translation, and the files were on their way to Armenia for printing. The first 500 copies of the book came off the press a few days later. Then, one week ago, the first printed copies of the Farsi translation of Travel Guide to the Bible were placed into the hands of Iranian pastors and church workers at an undisclosed location in Western Asia. The books were immediately put to use by Iranian church leaders as a tool to help Iranians disciple Iranians.

Pray for the church in Iran. Reports by various Christian organizations speculate that the church in Iran may be the fasted growing in the world. We are so pleased that we can add one tool to their toolbox to help them as they “help people read the Bible and help them understand what they read.”