If I speak the native language of the country where I work for God, but have no love, then I am the brass of the bell, or the sounding cymbal.
If I dress in national clothes, observe cultural traditions, all forms of etiquette and copy the manner of behavior of local residents in such a way that I can be mistaken for one of them, but at the same time I do not have love, then I am nothing.
If I give away all my possessions to the poor and spend all my energy without any residue on good works, but at the same time have no love, I will find nothing.
Love endures the test of long hours of language study, is kind and indulgent to those who make fun of your accent; love does not feel jealous of those who stayed at home, it does not exalt its national culture and is not proud of its national superiority.
Love does not brag about how we do all this at home, does not look for its own, does not easily fall into the temptation to talk about the beauty of its native country and does not think badly about the culture of the country where it currently lives and works.
Love endures any criticism of its native culture, believes in everything good in the new culture and confidently accepts the new place of residence as its home, enduring all the inconveniences.
Love never ceases, but it will inevitably cease where the emphasis is only on traditional features, or linguistic features, because in this case you only know one of the many parts of the new culture that you serve, neglecting many others.
However, when Christ reproduces Himself in this culture, all our inconsistencies and our dissimilarity are completely inconsequential and have no meaning.
When I was in America, I spoke, understood and thought like an American, but when I left America, I left everything American in the country from which I left.
Now we are awkwardly adapting to this new culture, but in all this He, the Christ, will live inseparably. Now I will speak with a strange accent, but He will speak directly to the hearts of men.
And there they are, these three components: cultural adaptation, language learning and love; but their love is great.
