If I speak with the tongue of a national but have no love I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.
If I wear the national dress and understand all forms of cultural etiquette and if I copy all mannerisms so that I could pass for a national but have no love, I am nothing.
If I give all I possess to the poor and if I spend all my energy without reserve but have no love I gain nothing.
Love endures longs hours of language study, and is kind to all those who mock his accent.
Love does not envy those who stayed in America.
Love does not exalt his home culture, is not proud of his national superiority, does not boast about "the way we do it back home," does not seek his own ways, is not easily provoked into telling about the beauty of his home country, does not think evil of this new culture.
Love bears all criticisms about his home culture, believes all good things about this new culture, confidently anticipates being at home in this place, and endures all inconveniences.
Love never fails, but where there is cultural anthropology it will fail; where there is contextualization, it will lead to syncretism; where there is linguistics, it will change.
For we know only part of the culture and we minister only part. But when Christ is reproduced in this culture, then inadequacies will be insignificant.
When I was in America I spoke as an American, I understood as an American; but when I left America I put away American things.
Now I adapt to this culture awkwardly; but he will live in it intimately; now I speak with a strange accent, but he will speak to the heart.
And now these three remain: Cultural adaption, language study and love, but the greatest of these is love.
-This is something I read yesterday and I thought it was good. I know there are some differences between it and I Cor. 13 but i enjoyed it.
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
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