A searchable, downloadable PDF of the original article appears below. Paul McLean is a missionary in Taiwan.
We have just returned to Taiwan after a wonderful summer furlough in Canada. Today – August 19, 1993 – we opened The Renewal Fellowship’s Prayer Calendar, which came while we were away. And we were amazed at God’s timing and a remarkable answer to prayer.
On Thursday, May 27, members of the Renewal Fellowship were asked to pray “that the Hakka New Testament and Psalms will be published this spring in Taiwan, and that they will be distributed among the Hakka Christians and over 3 million non-Christians.”
Notice the date, May 27th. That’s the day we completed the third and supposedly final proofreading of the typeset Hykka Bible manuscript. But what fatigue and anxiety we had to endure! And the timing was so tight! The third version of the manuscript arrived just after noon on the 26th. And two months earlier, I had booked reservations to fly to Canada on the 28th. Not only that, but the printers had to have the final manuscript in their hands by June 1st, in order for the Bible to be published in time for its dedication at the August 8th Hakka Mission Festival. Pressure from all directions was on me and the other two proofreaders.
We prayed for “eagle eyes” to catch any mistakes in the typesetting and worked straight through from 2:00 p.m. on the 26th, to 2:00 a.m. on the 27th. After a deep sleep and a breakfast of rice, chopped meat and tea, we went at it again from 8:00 a.m. until 11:00 p.m. Somehow four verses were missing from Romans and 14 verses from Revelation, let alone about 20 minor typesetting errors! “Ai-yo! The verses were there in version 2 – what went wrong? We’ll never make the deadline!” (Anger, frustration, fatigue and disappointment.) No – keep on praying! Send an immediate fax to Singapore and have them make the corrections as fast as possible! And you members of the Renewal Fellowship started to pray with us at that time, although we never knew it!
I flew out of Taiwan fifteen hours later knowing I had done all I could, and entrusted the corrections and checking of the galley-proofs to coworkers in Singapore, plus my fellow translators. “Lord have mercy. Guide their eyes, their minds, their hands. May there be no typesetting mistakes in the published Bibles. May we somehow make the printer’s deadline.” Today I am holding a brand new copy of the Hakka Bible in my hands. All the chapters and verses are where they should be. The final corrections were all incorporated. The Bible came off the press on August 5th, just three days before 800 Hakka Christians gathered for its dedication. I hear that nearly 3000 copies have been sold already.
Our sincere thanks goes to everyone who took the time to pray for us on May 27th. God heard your prayers, and mercifully answered in his own way! The rejoicing is still going on…