Recently I was attending a Arab Christian Church and I happily picked up a Bible that is written in Arabic. I used my phone to translate (I don’t know any of the Arabic language). The first thing I translated was Matthew 5:17 (the fulfillment of the Law in the Sermon on the Mount). I was blown away, God lead me to that specific scripture. I continued to translate Matthew 5:17-20.
It was the exact same story. I could understand it. This revelation caught me like the first time I ever read Gods word and how it impacted me, I felt like a kid in a candy store on freebie Friday! I was excited.We live in a world today that has translated the Bible in over 670 different languages. Most of these languages will have different meanings of words and definitely different meaning of word in culture. So it is easy to say God has spoken different languages but given us all the same story.
How does this relate to our training in NYC? Well when we look at our Muslim friends we see that you have to know Arabic to understand what is written in the Quran. Not only know the language but understand what each word means, this is why they have such a dependency on Imams so that they may be able to understand and interpret their book. The Quran can only be written in Arabic, no other translation can truly be counted.
What God spoke to me about this Arabic Bible, is that He can reach us no matter what the circumstances. His words are transparent to all languages, that you don’t need someone special to interpret the scripture to have a relationship with Him. God can talk to each one of us in only the way that we can understand. I felt so assured by God that when I share a Bible with someone else of another culture or language that I know they are getting the same teachings I have. God is so impactful.
How is God talking to you? How would you respond seeing the Bible in a different language?
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