Lost in Translation

Having the service translated this morning gave rise to a couple of funny stories about missionaries first learning that language here.  It doesn’t take much to really mess up.  You can be off just one little sound, but the meaning changes by miles.

First, when Bro. Daniel Schreckhise came here years ago, his first sermon was called “The Great Message”.  In Spanish “Grande Mensaje”.  Only one problem, he didn’t say “mensaje”.  He said “masaje” which doesn’t mean message; it means “massage”.  And he didn’t just say it once; he said it over and over.  Everyone needs the Great Massage.  Lawyers need the great massage.  Doctors need the great massage.  The rich and the poor equally need the great massage.  At the end, he of course invited all who wanted to receive the great massage to come forward.  LOL.  I guess that’s one way to build a church quickly.  Because of course the great massage is free.

Another story.  Shortly after Sis. Lycia first came to Honduras and was still mastering the language, the pastor Hmo. Benino got pretty sick.  At church one Sunday morning, she wanted to ask his wife if her husband was better – “Es su esposa mejor?”  But she accidentally changed the last word around a little bit and asked instead “Es su esposa mujer?”  Mujer means woman, so instead of asking if her husband was better, she asked if he was a woman.  Of course the pastor’s wife answers no that her husband was not a woman.  Sis. Lycia is thinking “Oh no, he’s not better” so she says “Oh, I’m so sorry.”  And it goes round and round “No, it’s OK that he isn’t a woman” – Sis. Lycia thinking “Why is it OK with this woman that her husband isn’t better?”  20 years later they still laugh about it.  Occasionally, the pastor will still come up and say “I’m not a woman.”

Similar things happen occassionally even with people speaking in their native language.  I once heard of a young evangelist who preached the entire sermon on having a "Lion's Grit".  When it was over, the pastor took him aside and kindly showed him that we are to have our loins girt about with truth (Eph 6:14), not a lion's grit!