Missionaries are rarely excited and enthusiastic about language learning beyond the first couple of weeks of study. By the time a few weeks of language learning have gone by, the missionary task that was originally a great adventure for God seems to have turned into hours (and sometimes years) of drudgery: memorizing vocabulary, conjugating verbs, and remembering a bewildering variety of new grammar forms and modes of expression.

How does language learning transform the average missionary from a ball of enthusiasm into a puddle of discouragement in such a short amount of time? In my experience, the reason is not a lack of intelligence or language learning techniques but from a lack of a God-centered Biblically based theology of language learning. To address this problem, I outline four important Biblically based core values as they affect language learning: weakness, diligence, lordship, and the Sabbath. I do not merely address abstract concepts, however, I also provide ideas on how to apply those concepts to the daily language learning task.

Any problem related to language in the Christian context must begin at Babel (Genesis 11:1-9). In Genesis 9:1ff, God made a covenant with Noah and his sons that He would never destroy the earth through flood again. As a part of that covenant, God instructed them to “multiply and fill the earth” (Genesis 9:1b cf. 9:7). Thus, it clearly was not God’s will that they clump together and live in a small area but that they spread themselves out and fill the earth as a whole. By chapter 11, however, the people had migrated only slightly eastward to Babylonia and then settled down to build a great city. The Babylonians said, “This [city] will bring us together and keep us from scattering over the earth” (Genesis 11:4b). This statement reveals the rebelliousness of the Babylonians’ hearts - for such a goal was directly contrary to God’s instructions in the covenant made with Noah in Genesis 9. The city was built in direct defiance of God’s instructions. Moreover, the Babylonians were people filled with pride who tried to honor themselves over God. They schemed together to build a tower that would reach to heaven as “…a monument to our greatness” (Genesis 11:3b). God saw the two sins of disobedience and pride and proposed a unique solution to their sin: He confused their languages and thus scattered them across the earth (Genesis 11:9). He did not destroy them, though their sin seemed to be worthy of destruction given the Lord’s response to the pre-flood peoples. He merely confounded their languages.

In Genesis 11:5, the Lord asks what the people will not be able to accomplish in their own strength and will if He doesn’t stop them by confusing their language. The people’s sin does not seem to be in the accomplishments as much as in what the accomplishments represent. After all, the monument was to be a testament to the greatness of the builders themselves and not a tribute to the One who had given them that ability. The city also represented open defiance to God’s instructions. As a result, God imposed a weakness on the people so that they would be forced to scatter over the earth, i.e. so that they would be forced to do His will. The nations would learn to lean on him and not on their own understanding (Proverbs 3:5-6). Donald Gowan said, “Human beings tried to do more than would be good for humanity in general. Accordingly, God intervened to thwart their immense project by confusing speech, making life more difficult for them; but that also protected them from the worst that they could do to one another.”

As language learners, missionaries need to remember that different languages make life more difficult, but they are also a protection. They protect humankind from becoming so powerful that it falls into disobedience and pride. God designed a solution that deliberately made people weak so that they would seek after Him (Acts 17:27). Missionaries should also realize the role of weakness in language learning and learn to seek after Him. 

The purpose of creating languages was so that humankind would not be able to glorify itself. Given that God designed languages to destroy human pride and false ambition, it stands to reason that He will not (usually) allow humans to easily overcome this barrier. The language barrier is protection against each other and against our own pride and disobedience. Therefore, the fact that language learning is difficult and discouraging work should make us rejoice in the Lord. We should feel grateful for the opportunity to address areas of sin and weakness in our lives – areas where we have become prideful in ourselves and in our own intellectual abilities. In this sense, the learners who have the most trouble and struggle the most with language acquisition are actually receiving the most spiritual benefit from the process - for they are the ones learning most to rely on God. In many cultures (particularly American), a person who can conquer a foreign language is looked upon with great respect and admiration. This can become a stumbling block to missionaries in that it creates pride in their own abilities rather than what God has done. Language learning was designed from the beginning to teach the attitude that Paul epitomized in 2 Corinthians 11:30: “If I must boast, I would rather boast about the things that show how weak I am.”

Therefore, when language learning gets hard, we should thank God for the opportunity to get to lean on Him. It is a unique chance to find out whether our pride is in the fact that we are His or whether our pride is rooted in human abilities. Instead of hating the fact that language learning leads people to prayers of desperation, we can be thankful that it does.

Having established that language learning is not going to come easy and that this is a blessing of protection from God, we need to look at Biblical approaches to the tasks that God puts before us. Diligence is mentioned throughout the Scriptures as a clear work value, but nowhere as clearly as in the Proverbs or in Paul’s writings. For example, Proverbs 21:5 says, “Good planning and hard work lead to prosperity, but hasty shortcuts lead to poverty” (cf. Proverbs 10:4 & 13:4). Paul often talks about this aspect of the Christian life in terms of the analogy of an athlete who must train hard to win the prize that is set before him (1 Corinthians 10:24ff; 2 Timothy 2:3-6). Paul describes himself as a hard worker and “worked to exhaustion” (1 Corinthians 4:12; 2 Corinthians 6:5). In 1 Timothy 4:15 Paul tells us to “throw ourselves completely into the task” and in Hebrews 6:10 says that God will not forget how hard we have worked for Him. Spiritual gifts are given freely from above (Hebrews 2:4), but then believers are to be diligent in fanning them into flames and diligent in their work for Him (1 Timothy 4:14; 2 Timothy 1:6). In fact, Paul believed in hard work so much that he argued that those who did not work should not be given any food to eat! (2 Thessalonians 3:10)

In my own experience, today’s missionaries seem to fall into two traps where work is concerned. The first is that they feel cheated by God that the work is so difficult. They often reason that they sacrificed lucrative careers and their family, went to a far away place, and did it all voluntarily. Surely God will repay them by shining on them and making the work easy for them. However, Paul did not have this attitude though he suffered more than most modern missionaries (2 Corinthians 11:16-29). He did not feel cheated because he had to work hard. He merely considered it how things are done. Those who expect God to give something because they served Him have not given a gift at all. In fact, they have entered into a kind of spiritual blackmail. God promised to give everything needed to do the job, but He did not promise that hard work would not be involved. Christians would do better to rejoice in being counted worthy to be among the spiritual elite that get to work especially hard (like Paul) than fretting of the difficulty of the task.

The other trap that missionaries often fall into is simply being overwhelmed by life on the field and therefore having greatly reduced daily output. Life on the field is often truly chaotic, unpredictable, and hard. Shopping for groceries can take hours and hours out of a week. Going to the bank or paying a bill can take half a day and require another half a day to recover from the exasperation of the experience. These are all real stresses and should not be overlooked. They cannot, however, be a shield to hide behind when it comes to work. If time is not invested in language learning, odds are that there will not be much return either. Missionaries should each strive for diligence given individual family and field situations. It is often helpful to ask someone outside the situation to help a family to work through these kinds of practical issues. They can also help in praying for wisdom on how to be diligent in all tasks (family responsibilities, other ministry tasks, language learning, etc.).

For Paul everything else was nothing in comparison to the reward. We each need diligence as a core value. Some will learn how to not mind giving up a night of game playing or movie watching in light of the great reward accompanying the task. Others might have to learn how to relax a little more.

In all things Christians must remember for whom we work. Believers work to please God and not to please men. Missionaries work for His approval and not the approval of men. Paul says, “Work hard and cheerfully at whatever you do, as though you were working for the Lord rather than for people” (Colossians 3:23).

Christ’s lordship is especially important to remember on the days when language learning is especially frustrating. In my experience, frustrating days of language learning almost always have one of two causes. There is either a lack of adequate preparation or lack of enough brain cells to understand the lesson. Sometimes folks just are not smart enough to get it the first day. If a student has been diligent and spent their best effort, then there should be no shame in this. The Lord certainly is not disappointed since He knows what each person’s brain can and cannot easily comprehend. Sometimes there simply was not time for adequate preparation given the other items that the Lord placed on a person’s plate the previous day. That happens. When it does, students should not evaluate themselves by the bad mark on their paper or the look of disappointment or even anger on their teacher’s face. Instead, Christians should evaluate ourselves by the standard that the Lord has given us: to be faithful with the time He has given and the tasks that He has appointed (Matthew 25:13-40). The only reason for embarrassment or disappointment is if we were not diligent in our preparation because we got distracted from the tasks given by the Lord.

The Lord is concerned with the individual believer’s success and promises to help when we pray to Him (Matthew 7:7-11). Therefore, we ought to pray. We ought to pray repeatedly about language learning. This is precisely the outcome that is expected if believers are humbled before Him, realize their need, and seek after Him. We can turn to our boss for help and work unto Him and for His approval alone. Believers need not look to man for approval in any area of life and especially not in the area of language learning.

This is closely related to the Christian concept of success in life. It is also related to why so many missionaries feel like a failure in regards to language learning and therefore become despondent and give up. It is absolutely foundational to language learning that believers always remember how to define success in the eyes of the Lord and not in the eyes of man. Success in God’s eyes asks these questions when evaluating the success or failure of a day:

(b) Did I love my neighbor as myself? (Matthew 22:39)

(c) Was I sensitive to the needs of the poor, the orphan, and the widow? (1 Timothy 5:3; Matthew 19:21)

(d) Was I diligent in what He asked me to do today? (Colossians 3:23)

His Lordship does not require mastery of the language in a day. Lordship requires having His priorities and keeping the basics basic with language learning in its proper perspective.

This may at first seem like an odd point to include in a theology of language learning, but some missionaries wreck their spiritual and mental lives by working seven days a week without a real rest. The Lord said, “Six days a week are set apart for your daily duties and regular work, but the seventh day is a day of rest dedicated to the Lord your God…” (Exodus 20:9-10a). It is often hard to find a day off when the missionary spends Saturday and Sunday with local friends (when they are off from work) and then attends formal language classes or works at his own tentmaking occupation the other five days of the week. Nevertheless, a day of rest must be taken.

It behooves all believers to make it a rule to set aside one day a week in which they absolutely, positively do not study, and try to avoid speaking the language as much as possible. Humans were physically made to need one day a week of rest. In modern parlance it would be said that human design specifications stipulate: Shut down one day out of every seven for routine maintenance. Especially when following the principle of diligence outlined above people will need this rest. Working seven days a week violates God’s basic commandments and only ends up being a disservice to ministry and family as a person become increasingly tired, cranky, and quite often sick from pushing too hard. If there is no down time, a learner’s mind will often become supersaturated with material, and they will find it increasingly more difficult to remember new vocabulary. One day a week is reserved for guilt-free play and rest time. What a wonderful God!

This paper has outlined four core values of language learning. It is hoped that these modest points can help missionaries maintain a healthy and Biblical perspective during the process of language learning. There are many techniques of language learning that can also contribute toward the success of the field missionary, but these techniques are generally well-known and widely available. In addition, I feel that language learning technique is not nearly so important as a strong theological foundation. I hope that field missionaries can study these principles, incorporate them into their worldview, and thus find themselves as more successful and motivated language learners for Christ. Perhaps these values can create a generation of missionaries that delight in their own weakness while maintaining diligence in both work and rest and evaluate their language learning efforts in conjunction with other aspects of life. Success in life or as a missionary is not dependent on immediately successful language acquisition but on those who trust in the Lord’s strength and follow His plan for every day. If language learning is kept in this perspective’ missionaries should be able to find more enjoyment and ultimately more success in language acquisition.