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Whose Culture Anyway? 

Mission Frontiers

Whose Culture Contains The Real Communication Barriers?

by Dr. James O. Buswell III


God uses various ways to overcome cultural barriers--and a personal discovery about one's own culture may be one!

When my wife Kathleen and I were enjoying field work among the Florida Seminoles, a survey was devised to learn more about the preachers' backgrounds, their involvement and vision for the Christian church. Forty-eight questions were prepared and a questionnaire administered on a one-to-one basis with each pastor.

Because of the lack of Scriptures in their Mikasuki language and their difficulties with the English Bible in the church services, I thought the suggestion of a Mikasuki translation would be universally welcomed. After all, a couple from Wycliffe Bible Translators had been working on the language for almost twelve years. So, Question 43 was, "What is your feeling about the need for a Bible translation into Mikasuki?"

The first preacher interviewed had limited English speaking ability, so it took several promptings to this question before I received a muttered, "Mmm--it'd be o.k."

Puzzled, but still optimistic, I approached the question in the second interview, which again resulted in a passive shrug, "I guess it'd be all right."

When the third and fourth interview resulted in an exact repetition on Question 43, I knew I was seriously missing something.

By now I was eager for interview No. 5 with a promising, better- educated young lay preacher whose family we knew well. His answers contained the somewhat richer insights that I expected. But, to my surprise, his answer to Question 43 was a totally dispassionate, "I guess it would be a good thing."

His face showed troubled puzzlement at my now open questioning. Finally he remarked, "Well, if we did have it in Mikasuki, nobody could read it. "

I was stunned with the sudden realization of the great cultural gulf separating the working knowledge of reading which meant the difficulties of English, and reading letters representing the easy pronunciation of their own language!

Was it possible that for twelve years no one had successfully communicated the Wycliffe couple's ultimate objective. What would be my next step?

Phonetic word lists! I quickly dug out some of the Mikasuki vocabulary sheets left by the Wycliffe couple, spread them out on the picnic table before my young friend and his very capable wife. Pad and pencil in hand, I copied one word after another in bold symbols and carefully pronounced the phonetic sequences.

"That means 'tree,'" he said immediately. "That means 'tiger,'" she said with a grin. But after several more words, the wife's arm shot over my shoulder, her finger pointing at the paper as she observed, "But them aren't Indian letters; they're White Man's letters!"

I had met the second cultural gulf, that between recognition of letters in English words, and as symbols for Mikasuki sounds. It dawned on me, I was not so much baffled by their culture as we were both baffled with the presumptions of mine!

The sequel to the story is that this young couple became the Wycliffe translators' helpers who later had the thrill of assisting at the first reading of the Mikasuki scriptures from the pulpit. Its reception was dramatic as first the people listened in almost unbelieving awe, then in gradual recognition, and finally in joyous comprehension bordering on hilarity!


Dr. Buswell is currently the Vice President of Academic Affairs and Dean of Graduate Studies here at the university on our campus.

MF Behind the Scenes

by Rick Wood, Managing Editor

We Need a New Standard for Church Planting

Until recent times the need has been almost totally overlooked and ignored. It has been a devastating cultural blind spot that has often crippled church planting efforts around the world. It has taken us almost two centuries to recognize the need. I am speaking of the need to make worship indigenous to every people on earth in fulfillment of Rev. 5:9 and 7:9.

Making the Gospel indigenous to every tribe and tongue involves helping every people learn to worship God in a way that is natural and meaningful to them within their culture. Unfortunately, the common practice of the past of simply translating Western hymns like Amazing Grace into the local language still goes on today. This can no longer be the accepted standard practice in church planting if an indigenous and naturally reproducing Gospel within every people is our goal.

It is already generally recognized that translation of the Scriptures into the mother tongue of every people is essential for a church planting movement to be established and nurtured to maturity.  Likewise, it is now time for the development of indigenous worship music (ethnomusicology) and worship forms (ethno-worship) to become the widely accepted standard for all of our church planting efforts.  It must become a high priority along with the translation of the Scriptures if our church planting efforts are to have the full impact that we desire. An ongoing reliance on Western worship forms will not do.

In this issue of MF we describe the impact that worshiping through indigenous music and forms is having on church planting efforts around the world.  You will read many stories of how it has made a heartfelt difference in the lives of the people we want to reach for Christ.   See the section starting on page 10 with the interview with Dr. Roberta King of the Fuller School of World Mission.

There is a growing recognition of this need for indigenous worship on the part of a number of mission agencies and training institutions. See the list of training courses on page 27.

The choice of whether to embrace indigenous worship music and forms is an important one with eternal ramifications for those we want to reach. Not only will it affect whether the Gospel becomes indigenous and therefore understandable and available to people, but as Dr. King indicates in our interview with her on page 15, people can be drawn away into heretical movements like the African Independent Churches because these movements satisfy the hunger of these people for indigenous worship. Continuing to try to satisfy this hunger with translated western hymns or modern praise music will only exacerbate the problem.

In Rev. 5:9 and 7:9 we see all of redeemed humanity, represented by every tribe, tongue, people and nation, worshiping Christ because of the sacrifice He made to save us.  They are not a uniform mass of humanity but a diverse group of peoples that God has ordained to offer up the praise and worship that Christ deserves. John Piper in his book, Let the Nations Be Glad, says, "This diversity will not disappear in the new heavens and the new earth. God willed it from the beginning... When their diversity unites in worship to God, the beauty of their praise will echo the depth and greatness of God's beauty far more exceedingly than if the redeemed were from only one or a few different people groups."

By helping the various peoples of the earth develop their own unique indigenous worship we become partners with God in completing the international choir of worship that God has ordained from eternity to be offered up to Christ. This is indeed a task worthy of our greatest efforts.