乔·科尼恩·西耶不识字。

他住在利比里亚一个名叫塞亚的村庄，但是村庄没有学校。小的时候，他就在家里的水稻农场里工作。长大之后，他结婚了并且有了九个孩子。他因为一直在农场里工作，就没有任何识字的需求。

有一天，一位名叫威利·黑尔比希的传道人来到这个村庄。乔对学习《圣经》十分感兴趣，所以他和其他的同村的人请求传道人给他查经，威利同意了。一个月后，一共50名在塞亚以及隔壁村德胡尤的成年人受洗了。

威利是复临教会在利比里亚任命的第一位牧师。他告诉教友们现在轮到他们出去传扬福音了。乔不知道该想什么。他爱耶稣并且想与别人分享福音，但是他已经45岁了还不识字。

“我并不能打开《圣经》来教别人。”他说。

威利一点也不担心。他邀请了乔和其他五位刚刚受洗成为教友的人来参加在德胡尤的一个《圣经》培训学校。在学习的第一天，乔看了看在威利课堂里的其他五人，没有一人上过学，也没有人识字，因此他没有感到寂寞。

威利献上了祷告，并且给了他们一人一本新《圣经》。然后他打开了他自己的《圣经》，教他们如何找到重要章节。他把每个章节都大声读了出来，并且逐字地解释其中的意思。

乔很恳切地祷告，因为并不知道自己要如何才能记住所有的章节。虽然他想和其他人诉说耶稣快来的信息，但是不知道自己什么时候才有能力做到。

每天乔和其他几位弟兄都会和威利一起来学习《圣经》；每天乔都会祷告中祈求圣灵祝福他们的课程。

一天，威利上课讲解一些《圣经》中重要的章节的时候，乔发现他自己就能轻松地找到章节了。当威利朗读的时候，他看着自己的《圣经》也能跟得上了。他看向他的同学们，就发现他们也都可以找到章节并且跟上威利了。乔和其几位弟兄都站了起来，向吓了一跳的传道人大声朗读《圣经》。

回家后，乔尝试阅读一本书而非《圣经》，但是他一个字都看不懂。他拿起另一本书，但是还是一个字也看不懂。然而他能很轻松地读懂《圣经》。

后来，在1937年，乔成为了塞亚和其它村庄建第一个复临教会的首席长老。

尽管他从来都没去过学，但是他在建于纽西斯的新教会里，积极用《圣经》传道和布道。在2003年，老迈的乔去世，享年90岁。

“这是圣灵在做工，”66岁S·E·乔·塞亚说道，他是乔的儿子，也是教会的长老，“是圣灵赐的知识，并且祂想复临安息日的信息传到我们的地区。祂使我父亲能阅读《圣经》。”

“这是圣灵在做工，是圣灵赐的知识，并且祂想复临安息日的信息传到我们的地区。祂使我父亲能阅读《圣经》。”

Reading Made Easy

Joe Konyon Seeyah couldn’t read.

There were no schools in his village, Seeyah, in Liberia. As a boy, he worked on the family rice farm. When he grew older, he married and had nine children and still worked on the farm. He had no reason to read.

One day, a Seventh-day Adventist evangelist, Willie Helbig, arrived in the village. Joe was interested to learn from the Bible, and he and other villagers asked the evangelist to study with them. Willie agreed and, a month later, all 50 adults in Seeyah and a neighboring village, Dehyu, were baptized.

Willie, the first ordained Liberian pastor in the Adventist Church, told the new church members that it was their turn to spread the gospel message. Joe didn’t know what to think. He loved Jesus and wanted to share the gospel. But he was 45 years old and couldn’t read.

“I can’t open the Bible and teach from it,” he said.

Willie wasn’t worried. He invited Joe and five other newly baptized church members to attend a Bible training school in Dehyu. On the first day of classes, Joe looked at the other five men in Willie’s classroom. None of them had gone to school. None of them could read. He was in good company.

Willie prayed and gave a new Bible to each man. Then he opened his own Bible and showed the men how to find important verses. He read each verse out loud and explained the meaning of every word.

Joe prayed earnestly. He didn’t know how he would remember all the verses. He wanted to speak to others about Jesus’ soon coming, but he didn’t know how he would ever be able to do that.

Every day, Joe and the other men met with Willie to learn from the Bible. Every day, Joe prayed for the Holy Spirit to bless their classes.

One day, as Willie guided the men through important verses in the Bible, Joe noticed that he had no trouble finding the verses on his own. As Willie read, he was able to follow along in his own Bible. He looked over at his classmates. They also were able to find the verses and to follow along. Joe and the other men stood up and began reading the Bible out loud to the astonished evangelist.

Back at home, Joe tried to read a book other than the Bible, but he couldn’t understand a word. He found another book, but he couldn’t read it either. However, he was able to read the Bible easily.

Joe went on to become head elder of the first Seventh-day Adventist church established to serve Seeyah village and several other villages in 1937. Although he never attended school, he energetically taught and preached from the Bible at the new church, located in the village of Newcess. He died in 2003 around the age of 90.

“It was the work of the Holy Spirit,” said his son, S.E. Joe Seeyah, 66, who also is a church elder. “It is the Holy Spirit who gives knowledge, and He wanted the Seventh-day Adventist message to come to our region. He allowed my father to read the Bible.”

“It is the Holy Spirit who gives knowledge, and He wanted the Seventh-day Adventist message to come to our region. He allowed my father to read the Bible.”

S.E. Joe Seeyah, 66