It was during a season of uncertainty, when God had John and Jennifer Hanger’s full attention, that he used this fact to reveal their giving passion: Approximately 1 billion people do not have a Bible in their heart language. Now, the Hangers want to use all God has given them to reach the unreached with the gospel.
John has spent his career as a serial entrepreneur in the software industry. But he and Jennifer have always prayed God would reveal his plan to use John’s skill set for something bigger than growing successful businesses.
In 2020, John stepped out of the software world to care for Jennifer, who had just been diagnosed with stage-four metastatic breast cancer. This was the moment God used to reveal his plan for greater kingdom impact.
At first, he was caring for Jennifer around the clock, but her doctors soon figured out how to make Jennifer’s day-to-day reality a little more manageable. Soon, John found himself with spare time on his hands. “A serial entrepreneur with spare time is never a good thing,” John jokes.
In the midst of John tracing their family trees back to the Mayflower and digitizing all their photos, God directed John’s attention to the greatest project of all time: The Great Commission.
A divine lunch
John and Jennifer became givers with NCF when their four children (now in their 20s) were in middle school and, with the help of Boyd Bailey and Maureen Starr of NCF Georgia, immediately set up a Giving Fund for each child.
The Hangers had always valued generosity and had a desire to bless others as they had been blessed. They’d been giving to causes they loved for years, Jennifer says, and NCF allowed them to better strategize their giving.
They’d been relying on NCF for simple giving and as a tool for raising generous kids for 10 years when a more complex giving situation arose. Following Jennifer’s diagnosis, John wanted to sell shares of the publicly traded company he worked for, which had a unique Up-C structure.
“For the first time, we really took advantage of some of NCF’s more sophisticated services in terms of how to deal with that complex structure,” John says. “NCF was great in working with us, and we’re forever grateful for that.”
As always, they trusted God to use their treasure to expand his kingdom, but they never guessed how he would use their time and talent as well.
The lightbulb moment came when John reconnected with an old friend over lunch. Todd Peterson, whose kids went to high school with John and Jennifer’s triplets, had retired from a 13-year career in the NFL and become a powerhouse for encouraging radical generosity, especially in the space of Bible translation. It was during this lunch that Todd introduced John to the problem of Bible poverty.
“It’s shocking!” John says. “The Bible is the most translated book in the history of the world, yet almost half the languages of the world still have no Bible. That meeting was a turning point for us.”
The translation bottleneck
As John explored the cause of Bible translation, he learned there was a major bottleneck in the process. The reference materials translators need to create new translations are available almost exclusively in English.
“There’s a misconception that Bible translation is this rote exercise of taking this word in English and translating it to this word in fill-in-the-blank language,” John says. “That’s not really how translation is done.”
In reality, it’s through teams who know the unreached language – the heart language – but are also fluent in a more common trade language, which often is not English. The translators familiarize themselves with Scripture using the trade language – like French, Mandarin, or Swahili. They read or listen to the Bible in that language, then internalize Scripture by talking about it in a small group.
“The translation process starts with a Bible study,” John says. “You have to understand the Bible in the trade language before you can articulate it and translate it into your heart language.”
This is where reference materials like maps, images, dictionaries, and study notes are crucial. Translators who have never been off the island of Papua New Guinea would have a hard time picturing and understanding camels in the Judean desert. And if they can’t understand it, how can they translate it to a new heart language?
Since almost all reference materials are written in English, over the history of Bible translation, almost everything has been driven by English-speaking westerners. Reference materials have always been critically important. But until now, translation often had to go through a native English speaker who could access reference materials.
“There’s nothing wrong with the way it’s always been done, single-threading everything through English,” John says. “However, it’s going to take an awfully long time. It’s taken thousands of years to get to where we are, and still only about half the languages of the world have a Bible. So, let’s think of some ways to empower the global church and accelerate the process.”
A consistent strategy for giving
At the end of each calendar year, John and Jennifer revisit their strategy for giving. And while they have many giving passions, the theme that stirs their hearts most is evangelism.
“We use that as a measuring stick for any opportunities,” John says. “We focus on organizations whose mission we’re really bought into, who are consistent with evangelism, and where we have an opportunity to potentially move the needle.”
For years, John and Jennifer had prayed God would use John’s gifts in software for his kingdom. After the meeting with Todd, it became clear to them that God was answering that prayer. God was calling John to use his software experience and expertise to accelerate the work of Bible translation.
After his lunch with Todd, John learned as much as he could about the work of Bible translation, giving to the organizations he saw making the biggest impact. But he realized he had more to give to the cause than financial support. He noticed that many of these organizations were lacking the software needed to expedite their process. And he knew just the tool to help.
An answer to prayer
John’s most recent software company, Car360, had used early AI capabilities to automatically identify cars and even parts of cars with computer vision. This piqued John’s interest and provided him with a baseline understanding of how AI can be leveraged in positive ways.
“AI is very effective,” John says. “It’s high-quality, and, coupled with a human reviewer, it’s just the more-efficient way to do things.”
John saw the opportunity God was providing to use his business acumen, software development skills, and the power of AI to accelerate the translation of reference materials, breaking the bottleneck, and giving thousands more Bible translators the tools they need.
In 2023, he created BiblioNexus to assist existing Bible translation organizations with their software development for translating non-Scripture content: study notes, maps, images, dictionaries, and other types of reference materials.
“As we’re translating this content, we leverage AI heavily to reduce the cost and accelerate the speed at which we can translate,” John says. “However, everything we use AI for, we then have a human review the output, because God’s Word is too important to take a chance on the machines getting it wrong.”
Living by giving
A few years ago, Jennifer read these words from Winston Churchill: “We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.” That’s how she says they look at things now. “Yes, we have to work to make a living, but, really, the life we’re living is about giving.”
For John and Jennifer, the work of leveraging AI to assist Bible translation around the world is an answer to prayer. In his perfect timing, God revealed a way for them to make use of every gift God had given them – every talent, every skill, every opportunity. God had entrusted John and Jennifer with resources for the purpose of expanding his kingdom, and they’re so glad to be using them for his glory.
Photo: Hanger family
