By Carson Foushee
Google Translate has become an essential tool for me over the years. Early versions provided quirky translations that were less than useful, but technology has caught up to the point where if I simply hold my phone’s camera over information I do not understand, I immediately gain a decent context of what is written. There are still some awkward translations at times, but the Google Translate app has helped me greatly in connecting with the wider world. It particularly saved the day at a dinner table in Incheon, South Korea in September.
I was there to represent CBF Global Missions at The Fourth Lausanne Congress, a gathering that featured 5,400 Christian leaders from over 200 countries. Participants came from church, nonprofit and university settings as well as from traditional marketplace working environments. While worship was a key part of the schedule, the primary focus was to learn and work together in addressing some of the most pressing issues facing the Global Church. These included a globally aging population, witnessing in the workplace, persecution, artificial intelligence and creation care. I was glad to be part of a working group focused upon global migration, a mission context many CBF field personnel and congregations engage and enjoyed learning about and discussing opportunities and challenges of God’s people on the move.
CBF colleagues and friends from other circles connected me with their colleagues and friends from places like the Philippines, Mexico and Germany. Each gathering was life-giving. I spent quality time with Jesús García, Senior Pastor of Church of the City, a CBF congregation in New London, Connecticut. I even reconnected with a pastor from Uganda who I met 15 years ago as a Student Serve intern when serving with now field personnel colleagues Jade and Shelah Acker. Conversations in hallways and over meals with these individuals educated me about the importance of collaboration within the Lausanne Movement. There were also unplanned encounters that helped to more deeply appreciate the beauty of the Global Church like the ones with a Pakistani engineer and a Hungarian accountant. And then there was dinner with Marco from Venezuela.
One evening, I made my way down the long buffet line in the conference center dining hall behind a man who looked to be around my age. After loading our plates, we each made our way toward open seats in the back of the warehouse sized room. Upon realizing he too was going to sit alone, I asked if I could join him. He hesitated momentarily, but then motioned for me to sit down in front of him.
All my encounters that week had gone smoothly in either English or Japanese; however, I quickly realized that Marco spoke little English and Marco realized that I spoke even less Spanish. That’s when Google Translate literally entered the conversation.
Marco got his phone out and pulled up the app for us to speak or type out anything we could not communicate in the other’s native language. The tool took down the language barrier wall and allowed us to share about similarities and differences in our family lives and ministries on different continents and even to commiserate about the toll aging had begun to take on us physically and mentally. I laughed out loud when he shared about how bad it hurts to hear young people on the street now call him “Señor”, which even in my limited Spanish I knew meant “Sir.”
What I found most inspiring about Marco was that he was not at the conference for himself, but to gather resources for the next generation of church leaders in his community so they can equip the generation after that. As we finished our meal, we said farewells and headed to evening worship. It was there that God provided another twist in our friendship.
In the expansive conference hall, I looked to my immediate right to find that Marco had been sitting about 10 feet away from me at his assigned table for days. If not for the dinner that night, we probably would not have never tried to communicate and would have missed out on a unique opportunity to know about God’s wider work in the world. On the last day of the gathering, we shared a long hug and prayed over one another in our native tongues as we prepared to return to the places God has called us to serve.
I am grateful for the opportunity to represent CBF at Lausanne 4 and to have engaged with people from so many nations and tribes seeking to share the Good News of Jesus Christ in the ways and places they have been called. Thanks be to God for both Google Translate and the Global Church.