Adoniram Judson

I've been reading To the Golden Shore by Courtney Anderson. It's the story of Adoniram Judson. I've read about him before in the Christian Heroes Then and Now series, and last year I read My Heart in His Hands, the story of Ann Judson, his wife. This book is longer and more in-depth than the others and I'm really enjoying it.

There are two things that stand out so far. The first is how real this book makes Mr. Judson. Many missionary biographies gloss over faults and paint a beautiful picture of the man. This book shows the whole man, including his mixed reasons for becoming a missionary, his battles with himself, and his struggles with pride. Along with all of that, of course, are his joys and successes and his hard work. Showing the whole man is more honest than just showing the good parts, and it is encouraging for those considering missions (or any type of ministry) but don't feel "good enough".

The other thing was the challenges he faced in translating the Bible. There were no words in Burmese for many of the ideas in Christianity because they didn't have the same concepts. They had no concept of an eternal God, for example. His struggles mirrored how I sometimes feel when speaking with non-Christians: we don't always speak the same language (even we are at least using the same words). The solution people give is to stop using Christian terms, but I don't think that works. Sometimes the alternatives end up lacking. We can't talk about an eternal God without some ideal of eternal: not just a long time, and not just forever from some point, but eternally existing from before all time. Mr. Judson used words from a separate language, one that the Buddhist monks used, that had the ideas he needed. We use the words we have, explain what we can, and pray that they will understand.