Language Acquisition

This can be one of the hardest values to understand for some, especially we who live in the third largest country in the would that has one official language ... English. We can drive for three days in one direction, cover thousands of miles, and still speak English to people. There are few places in the world that one language will get you that far. There are many places in the world where you need a couple languages to travel just a few minutes away.

More than a necessity of living, acquiring the language of a place gives you natural access to people. This seems over simple to say, but it is a fact that real access to people and real access to conversations of the heart, real discipleship and influence, happen because of competence in language.

There is also something hard to quantify about learning a language, both in what it does to the learner and in the eyes of the people. There is a road of humility offered to every language learner. The opportunity to not be competent and not be capable for a time, into which (as many of our missionaries have experienced) God moves to mature and prepare their hearts for the work ahead.

There is a shedding of culture and an adoption of culture that happens in the language process. As missionaries, the goal is not to transplant Western culture into another culture, the goal is to transfer the gospel into another culture. Language acquisition and everything that goes with it is one of those tools that help prepare the messenger to be able to speak a purer gospel into another culture.

Culture Acquisition

Complementing our value for language acquisition is our value for culture acquisition. Some of the funniest stories missionaries tell are those points where they made a mistake with the culture, embarrassing themselves. (And who doesn't need to be embarrassed once and a while ... it's healthy right?) At the same time, some mistakes within a culture can end a person's effectiveness in being a messenger of the gospel.

Didn't Jesus Himself show us how to leave behind everything, humble Himself, and take on the form of a servant? Acquiring culture requires the same heart. One beginning missionary said during language school, "I feel like I'm giving up who I am." It's sort of true. But in one sense, that is the spiritual beauty of this process.

A Spirit of Incarnation

All these values lead to one thing: a Spirit of Incarnation.

Incarnation is the idea that God, clothed in glory and power in heaven, became a man on earth named Jesus, who was a humble servant (Philippians 2:6,7). In many ways, Jesus was the greatest cross-cultural missionary.

His model leads our approach to crossing into other cultures. It answers for us, why we learn the language and give up our native tongue and why we embrace the culture and let go of our own. Jesus did. Jesus did it first, and we are seeking to be like Him. Jesus left behind all position and comfort and whatever else was due Him to fulfill the desire of the Father and save the world.