Love Language
ฉันรักคุณ. 사랑해. Я люблю тебя. 我爱你. 愛してる. أحبك
How do you say “I love you” in Bengali, Korean, Russian, Chinese, Japanese and Arabic?
Just as in our own culture, it is more than just saying the words.
The words may be important to say in a culturally appropriate way, but it will not speak to the heart unless it is shown by our works.
How will you know what says “I love you” in action in these different languages and cultures?
We have the Word from our God who speaks every language, defining true love for every culture.
By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. 1 John 3:16
The standard expression of love across cultures is selfless sacrifice. Effective, loving, cross-cultural communication will act in ways that shows sacrifice.
Even uprooting your family from the security of your home and living among a foreign people speaks volumes. Several times I was told that people know we loved them because we left the comforts of our lives in the West to live among them. To them, we had become one of them.
This relocation alone is not enough. It demonstrates sacrifice but not the full sacrifice of identifying with people you have come to serve.
In love, Jesus came to his own people and sacrificed his entire life for theirs.
We do not sacrifice our lives in the same way, but it is a selfless sacrifice to learn a new language in order speak of Christ’s life-giving sacrifice.
The ability to communicate in a mother tongue is the door into their hearts. The love of God in Christ will be expressed and understood fully in their own words and in the context of their own culture.
—Why? Because language is a verbal expression of the culture and culture is imbedded in the language.
Above the importance of acquiring the language and culture is the indispensable call to love.
There are some missionaries who have gain fluency with their gift in language learning but have lost their witness because they lack the love defined in 1 Corinthians 13.
Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; It is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 1 Corinthians 13:4-7.
To show forth the love of God in Christ, it does matter both what we say—and also but also how we say it.
Say “I love you,” not in “word or talk only, but in deed and truth” (1 John 3:18).