Talking to teenagers at church about the value of studying God’s Word was not something I was looking forward to. How would they relate to me? Do they even understand what I do? In their eyes, I’m just that older guy who stands up every now and then to share stories about Bible translation. I talk about how millions of people don’t have the Scriptures in their own language, and I can almost feel them switching off.
So, no, the prospect didn’t fill me with joy. But then, while preparing my thoughts, I read Yoke’s story. “I love God’s word because I have seen with my own eyes how it changes lives,” she says.
Yoke is a young woman from Indonesia. Today, she is a translator with the Dobel language team, but a few years ago, her life looked entirely different. When she was at school, she was a bully. “My fellow pupils were afraid of me,” she explains candidly. “I used to hit them.”
After finishing high school in 2015, Yoke had no sense of direction and no idea that God could use someone like her. But God had a plan already in motion. She met the team who were translating the Bible into Dobel and was invited to join a community checking session for the book of Ruth.
It was her very first encounter with this Hebrew short story, and it turned her world upside down.
Was it Ruth’s faithful devotion to Naomi that caught her attention? Was it the kindness of Boaz, or was it the overwhelming message of redemption? In the book of Ruth, the concept of redemption occurs 23 times. For Yoke, it became a reality. Through the pages of Scripture, the Holy Spirit brought that redemption directly to her heart.
‘After that, I was asked to join the Dobel translation team,’ Yoke recalls. ‘In the year that followed, Jesus slowly but surely softened my heart. By the end of the year, I decided to put my trust in Him. As I got to know Jesus better, I wanted to change the way I lived.’
The transformation wasn’t instant or effortless. There were moments when Yoke thought about giving up, but she witnessed God’s profound faithfulness first hand as He carried her through every trial.
New Testament for the Aru Islands
Here was a story I knew the young people at my church could relate to. A young woman. A bully. Someone carrying a reputation they weren’t proud of. Yet God radically transformed her life, and it all began by engaging with a book about another young woman in the Bible.
And the ripple effect of Yoke’s transformation is now reaching far beyond her own life. In November 2025, the Dobel community finally received the same opportunity to experience this life-changing encounter with Jesus. The Dobel New Testament – available in both print and audio formats – was officially launched across 18 villages on the remote Aru Islands.
Now, Yoke’s deepest prayer is that all of her people will encounter Jesus through these pages, just as she did.
‘I want them to know that our Lord Jesus is so good!’ she says, her excitement palpable. ‘They need to know how good He is! Because I myself already feel that. I feel His love, I feel His great power for me. He is exceedingly good to me. I want all the Dobel people to experience what I feel. That they may know the goodness of God – that God may speak to them in our own language.’
Long after the dedication celebrations have ended, the Scriptures will continue speaking. As Yoke puts it: ‘My hope is that all the Dobel people can read God’s Word, understand it, and they too can put their trust in the Lord Jesus.’
Suddenly, I felt a lot more ready to talk to those teenagers.
