South Africa
Bible translation
At the request of the leadership of the Reformed church of the village of D'kar, Hessel and Coby Visser were sent to Botswana in 1991 for Bible translation work. They learned the language and wrote it down.
Hessel put together a translation team of Narospeaking people under the name Naro Language Project (NLP) to translate the Bible and teach the San people how to read and write. In 2016, Hessel was succeeded as translation coordinator by one of the team members, a linguist. The translation project became part of the Botswana Bible Society.
Hessel has since continued working as a translation consultant for various projects across southern Africa. Coby was involved in education from the beginning and later became a consultant for Scripture Engagement.
As of 1 April 2026, Hessel has retired. In the summer of 2026, Coby and he therefore returned to the Netherlands for good.
Church planting
In 1992, Jan and Beppie Wessels were sent out to supervise a church planting project. They returned to the Netherlands in 2010. Rev Wessels' work is continued by two local pastors, Rev Olebogile Derek and Rev Retabile Sibeko.
