Thanks to Ed Lauber for drawing my attention to this testimony from my Cameroonian colleague Joseph Mfonyam. Armed with a PhD in linguistics Joseph served as translator for the Bafut people in Northern Cameroon. He recounts the impact of the translated Scriptures on the life of the church in Bafut:
When we came to the village, the gospel had been preached in the area for over 70 years. But the Christians were still following pagan practices and the gospel had not really taken hold of the people. There was a lot of fear in the community and people still lived in the grip of traditional religion and all that goes with it.
New life started coming into the church and a revival broke out in our local congregation, PC Agyati, in 1991 when people started using the translated Scriptures. Since then the Christians have been meeting each morning from 5.00 to 6.00 am (Monday-Saturday) to study the translated Scriptures and to pray. On several occasions some of them would exclaim, “Why? We have been in the church all our life and have never understood the gospel as we do now! This is new!” One of the pastors who were anxiously waiting for the dedication of the NT expressed his joy and satisfaction when the NT was dedicated, “All this time Christ has been standing outside and knocking and speaking with no response. The Bafut people will now hear and open for Him to come into their life because He now speaks the Bafut language.”
You can learn more about Bible translation in Cameroon at the CABTAL (Wycliffe Cameroon) website.