Tag Archive - mission

Rebuilding Babel – three tools for translating text

August 11, 2010 in Christian Living, for Churches, Pastors

Now the whole world had one language and a common speech…Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth.” But the LORD came down to see the city and the tower that the men were building. The LORD said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.” So the LORD scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. That is why it was called Babel —because there the LORD confused the language of the whole world. From there the LORD scattered them over the face of the whole earth. Genesis 11

The place was named Babel because that was where God dismantled our common language, and now with tools of the same name, we are reversing this action.

Babel Fish from Yahoo! was the first online translation tool that I heard of – allowing you to type in text or a web address, and the ‘to’ and ‘from’ languages, and bingo – your text or web page is translated into a language you can understand.

Google offers a similar tool with Google Translate, that offers four times the number of languages to translate to and from. Both Google and Yahoo! also provide free tools to translate your website into other languages. This means that your website can be intelligible to people to who don’t speak your language. Think of the possibilities, for example, for church websites in regions of Sydney where a wide variety of languages are spoken.

babelwith.me was developed by LifeChurch.tv “to communicate with people around the globe…everyone from international church partners to individuals attending our Church Online.” They’ve made this tool available for free.

babelwith.me allows users to ‘chat’ (using text) online with people who don’t speak your language. 45 languages are supported (it appears, using the technology of Google Translate), and as you and your conversation partners type, your words are translated. Pretty nifty, don’t you think?

Imagine the possibilities here for mission – a family is preparing to do mission work in France, but their French is still very basic. They’d like to get to know the people they’ll be working alongside, so they have a conversation online, without the need to invite along a translator.

Can you think of any other ministry opportunities for these Babel-reversing tools?

Help Desiring God expand overseas

June 14, 2010 in Christian Living, for Churches, Pastors

The Desiring God website received more than 3.2 million visits last year.

About 350,000 people use the site monthly.

Less than one tenth of one percent of the people who use the site per month, support the ministry financially.

If 1% more of Desiring God’s followers gave $5 a month, Desiring God could sustain their work (currently facing budget cuts), and expand into more countries.

Join the 1% campaign.

A bold mission demands bold living

March 4, 2010 in for Churches, Outreach

Avis car hire has a bold mission statement (or tagline). I’m sure you’ve seen it:

Churches have mission statements too.

  • College Park Church has the mission: “Igniting a passion to follow Jesus”.
  • Church by the Bridge has the mission: “Living for Jesus. Loving like Jesus”.
  • Redeemer Presbyterian has the mission: “Seeking to renew the City Socially, Spiritually and Culturally”.
  • Covenant Life Church has the mission: “to build a community of gospel-centered people.”
  • Emmanuel Church has the three-fold mission: “to glorify God – Father, Son and Holy Spirit by listening and responding to God’s word obediently;
    loving one another practically; and proclaiming Christ boldly”.
  • St Andrew’s Cathedral has a slightly longer mission: “To glorify God by proclaiming our Saviour the Lord Jesus Christ in prayerful dependence on the Holy Spirit, so that everyone will hear his call to repent, trust and serve Christ in love, and be established in the fellowship of his disciples while we await his return”.

These are mission statements set big expectations.

What’s the mission statement for your church?

The challenge for us (and for Avis) when we set and then promote these mission statements is to actually live up to them.

Too often, corporate mission statements are dreamt up in board-room meeting of the marketing executive, who forgot to tell the staff that they should actually try harder. (Avis – this hasn’t been my experience with you – you just have a mission that’s easy to use as an example!)

My point is, too often the behaviour doesn’t come close to matching the mission – there is a disconnect between the bold mission of the company, and the people who have face-to-face contact with the customers (i.e. the people who actually need to implement the mission).

And as a result we cause harm to our brand, or more importantly in our case, tarnish the reputation of our God.

We need God’s help to live out these missions. We really need God’s help. But, by God’s grace and with his power at work within us, we can live up to these bold missions.

And when we miraculously do, all the glory goes to God.

6 ideas for Christmas mission

December 2, 2009 in for Churches, Outreach

Earlier this week I shared with you the latest poster by Outreach Media:

2009-12_notavailable

I’ve now put together a list of 6 ideas for using this poster to engage with the local community. Whilst most of the ideas are inspired from the poster, the principles could be applied to many different church situations.

More resources for engaging with JAAL advertisement

September 23, 2009 in Christian Living, for Churches, Outreach, Pastors

Dominic Steele and Christians in the Media have produced a DVD and booklet called ‘Connections for Life‘. It’s a short course that is “an attempt to spell out Jesus’ answers to the questions raised by Jesus All About Life.” It can be used in a group, or on your own, and takes the participant/s through questions based on the book of Revelation. I’m planning on spending more time reading through the booklet, but I wanted to post this now, before the ads hit our screens, to give you some time to read and prepare. You can also view some promotional videos over at Vimeo, and purchase course materials from the Christians in the Media website.

Are you aware of any other resources that would be helpful for Christians to make the most of this campaign to speak about Jesus? I’ve also put together a list of resources for responding to questions on suffering – this has been a big theme in the comments I’ve been reading online. It’s good to be prepared for these tough questions – they’re not easy questions because many of them flow out of the pain we have experienced in this world – but Jesus does have answers.

Get set – the advertisement will be appearing on our screens this Sunday.

Poster: Too brainwashed to read the Bible?

September 4, 2009 in for Churches, Outreach

This month, Outreach Media has released a poster that is sure to raise a few eyebrows and cause a bit of a stir. The poster questions who has and is forming your opinion about Jesus and Christianity,  and challenges the viewer to read the Bible – the reliable, authoritative, God-inspired best-seller – that’s all about Jesus. The poster will be displayed outside 100 churches across Australia.

Here’s the poster (click on the image below for a larger view):

Poster - Too brainwashed to read the Bible?

A couple of additional resources accompany the poster:

  • Notes – explaining in detail what the poster is about. Check out the notes…
  • Resources – a page of resources that respond to some of the critical claims made about Christianity. Check out the resources…
  • Media release – distributed to national media. Download the media release…
  • Banner – to be used on websites to promote the poster and campaign. Please let me know if you’d be interested in displaying the banner (125 x 125 pixels).
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