If you have not heard it yet, I encourage you to listen to David Platt’s sermon from the Together for the Gospel conference (audio/video). In it, he makes a passionate appeal for American Christians to do more to reach the unreached parts of the world. It is a compelling and convicting message, and one that should stir people’s desire for the gospel to go to places it has yet to penetrate.

One of the most obvious barriers to evangelism in much of the unreached world is the simple fact that no Bibles exist in the spoken language of the area. There are over 2,400 languages that do not have a translation of Scripture, and many of these language groups lack a written alphabet all together.

If you are moved by Platt’s message to reach the unreached, or convicted by sheer number of people in the world that don’t have access to the gospel in their own language, here are three responses:

Continue Reading…

Yesterday I explained what I see as the biblical mandate that churches and Christians support the work of Bible translation in languages that still, 2000 years after the coming of Christ, do not have the Scriptures. But while the need for Bible translation is great, there are two extremes when it comes to reaching these minority people groups. Both are errors that are common with many churches and missionaries that are involved in this work, and speak to the relationship between church planting and Bible translation.

After all, those who are active in the translation of languages have made huge sacrifices and showed intense devotion to their calling. They usually have moved to the most remote and difficult parts of the world and are obviously passionate about their task. Meanwhile, those who focus on church planting have made similar sacrifices, and have their own entrenched views on translation work. For these reasons, the entire field of Bible translation often has these two extremes:

Continue Reading…

When people hear that I desire to spend my life translating the Bible into languages where there is no translation, I am usually met with this question: “Why don’t you just teach them English?”

This is sadly a question often asked to those who have decided to do something about the fact that in over 2,400 languages there is still no access to God’s word, and at some level it makes sense.

After all, why should American churches support Bible translation? The arguments against it are obvious; there is hardly a people group left that does not have some access to some Scripture. Many of those whose primary language has no Bible speak at least one or two other languages where the Bible has been translated. Also, most of the languages that are still left to be translated are smaller than many church congregations in the United States. And given the rapidity of language death, there may not be many generations of speakers left for these remaining languages. Shouldn’t the church focus her efforts on places with the potential of greater impact?

Continue Reading…