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In order to be effective in ministry in Slovakia, we must learn the language, and learn it well. Many of the young people will be able to speak English, but they may have trouble expressing more abstract ideas. Of course, it will be five or ten years before we will know Slovak well enough to help—but it is our long-term goal. In fact, I (Kris) hope someday to be able to teach the scriptures in Slovak.

As I said, younger Slovaks will know some English; those who finished school before the early 1990′s probably won’t. We want to be able to reach them as well, so we need to know Slovak. And another reason is simply that we want to enter into our host culture as much as we can. And is there anything more fundamental to a culture than its language?

Kristian and Ethan will learn Slovak quickly once we get on the field. Paula and I will struggle for months and years. So you can lift your weightier prayers on our behalf in this case.

We are studying the language at home together, and taking it slow. We know that we won’t be able to speak Slovak at the end of the year, but we hope to at least get a head start in order to make things easier when we get a real teacher in Trnava.

Pray for us!