Now We Understand

00:00
Dr. Michael McGahn
When was finished and we discussed everything, I finally said, well, what do you think? What’s your opinion of the translation? And there was dead silence. And I was a little bit afraid, like maybe they didn’t know what to say. And all of a sudden one of them looked at me and said, now we understand. 

00:25
Rich Rudowske
Welcome to the centrally translatable podcast brought to you by Lutheran Bible translators. I’m Richard Dusky. 

00:30
Emily Wilson
And I’m Emily Wilson. 

00:31
Rich Rudowske
And as we roll through 2023, the more than words campaign for Scripture impact. We’re so excited that you’re listening in for your prayers and advocacy for Bible translation and partnering with those ministry entrepreneurs that are working at the ends of the earth, ready to put God’s word in their hands. And we’ll be talking today with Dr. Michael McGahn, a long serving missionary with us who is even after all those years, he himself is going to the ends of the earth to be with and equip some of those ministry entrepreneurs for the work of Bible translation. 

01:04
Emily Wilson
Dr. McGahn has served with Lutheran Bible translators since 2004, not only as a translation advisor in Botswana with the Kalanga language community, but also now as a translation consultant with various language communities in Tanzania. So we hope you enjoy this interview with Dr. Michael McGahn. 

01:30
Rich Rudowske
All right, we are talking with Dr. Michael McGahn today here on essentially translatable. Welcome to the podcast. 

01:36
Emily Wilson
Welcome. 

01:37
Dr. Michael McGahn
Hello. 

01:38
Emily Wilson
So you have been serving with Lutheran Bible translators a number of years, but your ministry on the continent of Africa, working alongside different language communities and partners has been since 1982, which is incredible. So what led you to pursue international ministry? 

01:59
Dr. Michael McGahn
That’s a very long story, but I can try to make it fairly short. First of all, I had always had an idea or desire to work in Africa. In fact, when I started college, when I was at the university, I was entered initially under zoology instead of primatology. And then the Lord called me into the ministry. So when I got to seminary, I found a lot of the international students always gravitating towards me. For some reason, whenever we had just time to talk or sit around, whatever, it was always international students that seemed to buddy up with me. And in my last year in seminary, there was a young tanzanian there who was having trouble with Greek. 

02:46
Dr. Michael McGahn
And since I enjoyed Greek and had taken it at the university and of course a lot of courses there at the seminary, I just helped him along, mentored him, and he graduated fairly successfully with his greek and others courses. When he was graduating, were in the same, said, you know, mcGann, you’re going to come out and work in Tanzania someday. I kind of pondered it a while and went home to my wife Joanne, and said, what do you think about going into missions? And I guess I can say in a very blunt way, she said, over my dead body. So I said, okay, we’re married, and we go together. And so we took our first parish down in southern, in south Texas, been there about ten years, and had decided that it was time to move on. 

03:34
Dr. Michael McGahn
There was great ministry, and we loved the people. We had a wonderful time, but just felt time to grow and go somewhere else and let them have the blessings of another pastor. So were looking around and had found a fairly large church that had really wanted me to come up there as an associate pastor, and we’re really considering it. Sitting in the kitchen one night, talking and praying together, and all of sudden a, I looked at Joanne and said, what about missions? And she said, oh, yeah, let’s try. I thought, you know, it was kind of a shock to both of us that just came out bluntly like that I had not conscientiously thought about it that much. So anyway, went on and applied, and after a while, weren’t hearing back. Weren’t hearing back. 

04:22
Dr. Michael McGahn
And so I was about ready to sign the call associate pastor when he got the phone call saying, we’ve accepted you to Tanzania. 

04:32
Emily Wilson
Wow. 

04:33
Dr. Michael McGahn
And I said, wow. Okay. And so went through the whole process and got all the visas and everything and got over to Tanzania and was met by the president of the Senate there, who happened to be that young man who I had mentored in seminary. So I said, I guess it’s God’s blessings and God’s call. And he laughed. He showed us our picture, group picture up on the wall. He pointed out to me and laughed, and we shared a lot of old memories and had a very good time. We told our children, after four years, we’ll make a decision whether it’s going to be career or we’re going to just go back to the states. And we came back after four years for kind of partnership development, kind of trips and things and see grandma and grandpa. 

05:20
Dr. Michael McGahn
And they were know, we want to go to states, we want to go states. And after were here about three weeks, they said, when are we going back home to Tanzania? And so that’s where we’ve been more or less all of our life. We’ve just found that kind of ministry. I learned the language as well. I love being in the different cultures. My wife also. So we just feel that’s been our calling since the beginning. 

05:45
Emily Wilson
That’s amazing. When you were suggesting, what about missions, did you have any idea that it was going to be to East Africa that you were going to receive your call? 

05:57
Dr. Michael McGahn
Well, when we made our initial inquiry about missions, were given three choices. Two places in Africa, in Tanzania, specifically, one place in Asia, and one was a youth ministry in Holland. And were considering all three. But I just felt I wanted to teach the Bible school. I really liked teaching. And so I thought, well, the Bible school in Tanzania looked like the place that maybe we try, and that was where went, and everything worked out well. Then after we got into the Bible school, I was teaching evangelists, realized, well, I don’t know much about their situation, so I would like to be more involved in a parish. And then it just came through without me even really making a formal request. They transitioned me into a parish, so that became my ministry, mostly evangelism and parish ministry. 

06:53
Rich Rudowske
Now, as you were out there in Tanzania and the diocese was forming, or you were in a more outreach area, how did that experience sort of form for you the importance of gospel proclamation in local language and know eventually Bible translation, and that deeper scripture engagement as critical for mission? 

07:12
Dr. Michael McGahn
Well, it was kind of a transition. When I first got into Tanzania, they also were transitioning from the vernacular in most of the languages over to Swahili. So I actually learned Swahili at the time that many Tanzanians were learning Swahili. And I noticed that as were learning the Swahili, the church services were shifting over to Swahili, but they would always end up with about a 15 minutes summary in the vernacular. And I could tell that the people were waiting for that summary in the vernacular in their local language. And so even though I didn’t really learn their vernacular, that was up in the middle of Tanzania at that time. That was Kenya ramba, mostly. So I just went along with what the nation was doing. 

08:01
Dr. Michael McGahn
But I always knew that every time I went to visit people, they were not using Swahili, except when we did the formal worship. Then after a few years, we moved up to Samburu up in Kenya, and very few people even knew Swahili. They only used the vernacular all the way through. And most of the children don’t go to school there at that time. They’re doing more education now. And I realized I could not really effectively proclaim the word or disciple or anything like that. Without the vernacular, it just wouldn’t work. And that’s when I decided, well, hey, we’ll go back and learn about Bible translation in states and everything. We’d already been out in Africa by that time for over ten years. 

08:47
Dr. Michael McGahn
So I said, well, we’ll take a sabbatical and go back and see if I can do this Bible translation, because it just was key. It’s foundational to any kind of evangelism or discipling. And that’s when we came back and really enjoyed it at gial in Dallas and contacted. I was with world Mission prayer League at that time and contacted them and we talked. And I then called up Lutheran Bible translators and made the transition over and have real found this the most rewarding ministry that I’ve been in many ways. 

09:24
Emily Wilson
So you started serving in Bible translation ministry around 2004, and you actually moved to a different context entirely in southern Africa, and you’re now actually providing translation consultant work for multiple language communities in Tanzania. So what have you noticed as similarities or differences in your regional experiences throughout these decades of serving in ministry? 

09:52
Dr. Michael McGahn
I’ve seen a lot. I don’t know where to start on that one. But I think basically, though, there’s one similarity, and that is every place we have been ministering in or living or visiting, it is always getting down to the fact that if you as a missionary, are willing to learn their culture, learn their language, not just the national language, like Richard and others have learned Setswana, but also learning the vernacular that you’re working in. I can go back all the way, even to when I started, when I was at the Bible school. One thing I noticed that even though we taught in Swahili, I tried to learn at least the greetings of the language of each of the students, and that was about five or six different languages, but at least knowing the greeting. 

10:36
Dr. Michael McGahn
So I think that even though we have a sense in all these countries of a national sense, both as a church and as individuals, they also still very much appreciate their own vernacular culture. Very many people, when I visit, even when they’re in their, if I go over to Tanzania, like I’ll be doing next week, visit their homes, they will not use Swahili with me unless they know I don’t know their vernacular. They will automatically switch to their vernacular, and they only switch back to Swahili if I said, wait, I don’t know. So it’s an appreciation of their own cultures. They recognize that they, as individuals, even though they’re part of a national culture, also maintain some kind of a local culture. And I think the churches are aware of that. 

11:27
Dr. Michael McGahn
And that’s why we’re still getting calls for some kind of work, Bible translation, scripture engagement in the vernaculars in many of these countries like Tanzania. 

11:35
Rich Rudowske
So what’s unique about the context in Tanzania, particularly as Lutheran Bible translators, is engaging further there. From your experience, what’s unique about Tanzania? 

11:45
Dr. Michael McGahn
I think what’s unique about Tanzania is basically what I’ve been just touching on now is that, first of all, many of our projects, I think, are very open to doing it as a local lutheran church project. In other words, we can partner directly with Lutheran Church for administration more than having to go to another partner like united Bible societies or for SIl, even though we partner with them in dialogue. But the Lutheran church is willing, first of all, to say, no, we’d like this as a Lutheran program. But when they do the program, they will include all of the other churches into the program, and the churches work so well together. 

12:28
Dr. Michael McGahn
I can sit down, I have people from every denomination, you might say, working in these community meetings and in the translators that they’re willing to say, yes, we’ll work under the lutheran church because we’re wanting to do the Bible for everybody. And the lutheran church is willing to say, yes, we’ll have these other people in and to help us so that we can get the Bible out. And nationally, they’re very open to having the local vernaculars done, at least for church, and getting the Bible translated, things like that. So I think that’s a context in which we as Lutheran Bible translators, can be very open and working very to many of these programs. The other thing is that the churches are still willing to really go out to the marginalized, the people that still have a strong tendency to be christians. 

13:24
Dr. Michael McGahn
We’re starting one in Tanzania, Datoga or Taturu. Majority of the people still not even Christian, but they themselves want to have the Bible, and the lutheran church and other churches want to give them the Bible in their language and do evangelism with them. So I think this is an openness that really helps the church growth and being able to reach out to those that still have not heard about Jesus Christ in any way. 

13:50
Emily Wilson
So when you began with Lutheran Bible translators, you served as a translation advisor working with the Kalanga language community in Botswana, southern Africa. But now you serve as a translation consultant. And a lot of us who have been in the Bible translation world know, like, okay, here are the differences, but can you break that down for our listeners of those nuances between advisor and consultant? And what is that difference that you’ve seen in your role? 

14:21
Dr. Michael McGahn
Well, I think as an advisor, of course, as an advisor, you’re basically underneath, you might say, or under, and a consultant, the advisor, or what we call the exegete advisor, basically was just concerned with the one language group and just working with that one language group, helping them through their Bible translation. As consultants, we have a broader responsibility. We have several language groups. For instance, in Tanzania, we are working with the Kareewe. We’re starting Kara, starting Sumwa, starting Taturu Datoga. So we have, that’s at least four different language groups and very different kinds of languages. The Taturu is a nilotic language, whereas the others might be part of the Bantu family of languages. So we have a broader sense, and we also have more responsibility as far as training exeges, mentoring newer missionaries, and just training the translators themselves. 

15:24
Dr. Michael McGahn
More responsibility of reaching out and dealing with the administration at the program manager level, working with the local diocese and their leadership. So it’s a broader and more diverse kind of ministry, and you have to be able to be open to the different styles and different languages of the different language groups. 

15:48
Rich Rudowske
Yeah. So as you’ve worked in those roles, and especially the consultant role more recently, how have you been challenged in that work? 

15:56
Dr. Michael McGahn
I think the challenge, of course, one of the largest challenges has been Covid, because a lot of Bible translation, especially when you’re going in to do this final consultation, double checking there and doing the training, there needs to be a lot more face to face contact. And so I think the travel as a consultant, because many consultants, not all, but many of us, live actually outside the countries, and we travel to maybe one or two different countries. I’ve been going to both to Botswana and Tanzania. So the travel has more complications during COVID having to go through all the different Covid restrictions and everything, and trying to work with them virtually. I’ll have a meeting sometimes with them virtually. Internets fail. You don’t really get eye to eye contact, facial expressions, things needed for really determining whether they understand. 

16:47
Dr. Michael McGahn
So it still needs the backup of doing the traveling. I think that, and I don’t know, it just takes more time to do the training, being in with them, training them, setting up the workshops. But I enjoy the fact that I do get to meet different groups, different languages, and therefore get different perspectives, because every time you go through the passage with a different language group and have to rethink it myself and then listen to how they’re understanding it and dialogue with them, I get a lot broader perspective on the meaning of different passages. That’s been actually a joy in some ways. 

17:24
Rich Rudowske
Yeah. In the midst of challenges. Those little lights of joy are wonderful. What brings you the most joy in your work as you reflect on the. 

17:33
Dr. Michael McGahn
Long career you’ve had, seeing people finally getting, like, light bulbs going on, saying, now we understand. One of my favorite stories is when I was with the kalanga, they had finished all the basic stages of doing the book of Romans, the translation and everything. We were preparing for the consultant. And so we had sat down and with a group of men and women who actually knew English. They knew Setswana, but their goal was to do the vernacular, the Kalanga translation of Romans. But they had all these years been teaching it in Setswana, in English. So we read through the translation of Romans in Colonga, and when it was finished and we discussed everything, I finally said, well, what do you think? What’s your opinion of the translation? 

18:20
Dr. Michael McGahn
And there was dead silence, and I was a little bit afraid, like maybe they didn’t know what to say. And all of a sudden one of them looked at me and said, now we understand. And, boy, when you can say, I’ve picked up my Bible and I’ve read it in my language, and now I understand something I’ve been reading, thinking about for years, but now I finally understand that. And I’ve seen also in the local villages, just the changes in people’s lives as they come to know Jesus Christ. They finally hear the gospel, the good news, finally hear it in their language. And I’ve even seen whole villages, small villages, where people come in at the first, were not very strong in their faith or were not even faithful. 

19:09
Dr. Michael McGahn
But after went in there and worked and taught with them, they were even buying new clothes and coming to church on Sunday and just had a joy in their life. And that, to me, that’s what it’s all about, bringing the good news to people, setting them free so that they experience the joy of Jesus Christ. 

19:27
Emily Wilson
So what is it that our listeners and the church in North America, what can we learn or be encouraged by our international colleagues in Bible translation ministry? 

19:38
Dr. Michael McGahn
I would like for all of us to know how appreciative many of the people in the countries that I’ve worked with, the leadership and everything, have just appreciated the work of Lutheran Bible translation coming in, working with them. It’s developed great relationships. They know that when we support, when we go over there, that we have supporters behind us, we have the church behind us. That just makes them feel part of the universal community, the universal church of Christ. 

20:10
Rich Rudowske
That’s awesome. And as you mentioned a little bit ago, so you’re into 41 years now of ministry in the mission, part of your ministry, plus that parish experience before you’re getting ready to go back to Tanzania here again, how can we be praying for you in your ministry? 

20:25
Dr. Michael McGahn
I think, first of all, pray is the main thing. I’ve always believed in prayer. That’s why were part of world Mission prayer league for so many years, praying for my family, especially my wife, because she can’t travel with me. And even if she could travel, it would be, should we say, boring because I’m out working and she’d have to just sit around the hotel. So she’s staying here. She’s very supportive of it. But it would be also good to remember that we do leave our families and our spouses when we do this traveling, and they should be held up in prayer. 

21:02
Dr. Michael McGahn
Also my safety, both physically and spiritually, because it is a very tiring or emotionally very tiring experience sometimes the first few days of getting over jet lag and all and just lifting us up in prayer and of course, finances, it’s not cheap, but I always tell people, Jesus salvation, he poured out of his blood, which is more precious than silver and gold. So it’s going to cause us silver and gold for people to hear about that good news. So, yes, financials is also very important. 

21:39
Emily Wilson
We’ll definitely be keeping you in prayer and encouraging others to lift you up in prayer with our various colleagues and the growing ministry in Tanzania with language communities there. And we just. Thank you so much for joining us on the podcast, Dr. McGahn. We look forward to hearing more about your travels coming up. 

21:59
Dr. Michael McGahn
Thank you very much. 

22:05
Rich Rudowske
Well, I’m really excited about the work that Michael’s doing with the church in Tanzania. As the work expands into different language communities where the church has for some time been saying, if people are going to understand the gospel in this generation, if we’re going to have effective outreach, Bible translation is what’s needed. And we’ve been blessed to be able to answer that call and to have Michael to go from all those years of experience and really work with the folks and teach them and guide them. So what a blessing to hear part of his story today. 

22:33
Emily Wilson
Yeah. And we want to encourage you that you can join in God’s mission right where you are in prayer and advocacy. If you’re interested in praying for the language communities that Dr. McGahn mentioned and others, we want to encourage you to sign up to receive our monthly prayer calendar. So if you go to go lbt.org, you’re going to scroll down to the bottom and you can sign up to receive our monthly prayer calendar by email. If you want to do old school and sign up to receive it in your mail, just contact communications@lbt.org and we can get you signed up. But we do appreciate you partnering with us in prayer so that God’s word might be made known and in the hands and hearts of people around the world. 

23:20
Rich Rudowske
Thank you for listening to the essentially translatable podcast brought to you by Lutheran Bible translators. You can find past episodes of the podcast@lbt.org slash podcast or subscribe on audible, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Follow lutheran Bible translators social media channels on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter. Or go to lbt.org to find out how you can get involved in the Bible translation movement and put God’s word in their hands. The essentially translatable podcast is produced and edited by Andrew Olson. Our executive producer is Emily Wilson. Podcast artwork was designed by Caleb Rotewald and Sarah Rudowski. Music written and performed by Rob Weit. I’m Rich Radowski. So long. For now.