Language Barrier

Luke & Matthew – my two youngest sons

When my wife and I adopted our youngest son from Nicaragua, we didn’t understand or speak Spanish. We took classes to learn the language, but found it extremely difficult. Our teacher taught Spanish from Mexico and our son spoke Spanish from Nicaragua. I remember the first full day here in the US; I had to use an app on my smart phone to communicate. We also had a young lady who blessed us by living in our home and she was our bi-lingual interpreter while we learned to communicate with our son. In less than 10 months he learned to speak and understand 90% of what we were saying to him. I’ve learned that language barrier is bigger than just words. There are cultural barriers. I’ve also learned that a smile and a hug is the same in most any language or culture. I’ve also learned that tears are understood in any language or culture.

I came across the story regarding the Tower of Babel this morning. I’m pretty sure that’s were different languages were born. Check this out…

1 Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. 2 As people moved eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there.

3 They said to each other, ‘Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.’ They used brick instead of stone, and bitumen for mortar. 4 Then they said, ‘Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth.’

5 But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower the people were building. 6 The Lord said, ‘If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.’

8 So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. 9 That is why it was called Babel – because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth. (Genesis 11:1-8 NIV)

The Lord obviously saw the need to add language barriers among these people and scatter them across the world. I’ve been to several countries and I’ve seen many cultures and heard many other languages, there is nothing quite as nice as being in a foreign land and hearing your native language. There something comforting about understanding what is being said. I’m not sure what all happened here regarding the tower of Babel, but I know that the Lord understands any language. I’ve decided that no matter what country I’m in, I want the language of love to come out of my heart and my life. I want others to hear my heart before they hear anything else. God’s love erases any barriers of language or culture!

Pressing On!

Dwayne