Allow me to paint a picture in your mind for a moment.

A young boy walks through the school gates for the first time, a fresh-faced 9 year old, with a thick foreign accent. His head full of thoroughly combed hair, and a pristinely ironed uniform - his mum made absolutely certain he looked respectable on his first day. The buzzing excitement saturated the air and yet filled him with equal parts happy anticipation and nervous dread. What if his classmates don't like him? Will they let him hang out with them at lunchtime? Will he get good grades or will everyone laugh at him if he fails?

An hour later, he's at his desk overwhelmed, the look of panic washing over as he listens to his science teacher and realises, he can't understand what she's saying. What's more, he seems to be the only one in the class that doesn't get it! She sounds so different from all the English teachers he had back home in his native country who spoke slowly as they taught the "Queen's English". To make matters worse, the barrage of new words and accents he'd never heard before, made his brain spin trying to translate on the fly! Put yourself in his shoes and allow yourself to imagine the thoughts, worries and anxieties running through his mind at that moment.

This fictionalised scenario was drawn from the actual experiences of real-life people. Yet it's surprising how much of this seemingly unrelated scenario translates to the experience many non-English people and families have, finding and settling into a church community in English-speaking countries.

Sometimes, we native speakers don't give ourselves credit for the mental gymnastics we perform so casually on a daily basis when it comes to language. We speak a language governed by strict rules on grammar and spelling, yet numerous exceptions to those rules. We converse daily with family, friends, neighbours, friends, work colleagues, store cashiers, etc, all with different speech patterns, impediments, speeds, regional accents and quirky turns-of-phrase and manage to understand them all. We have different sets of acceptable language for the office, the construction site, the bank, the home, the patient's bedside, and manage - for the most part - to compartmentalise each to avoid causing offence to the listener. And all this, before we cross the threshold of the house of God on Sunday, where Biblical, theological terms are used and understood by many of us with such ease, one would think we learned them from childhood.

I came to this realisation over time from listening to believers from a multitude of non-English speaking cultures over the years. Some of them were people often with a decent-to-strong grasp of conversational English and a real desire to connect with God's people, yet who struggled to fit in with their respective church community. Who could nod and say "Amen" at all the right places so well, that you might miss the puzzled look or furrowed brow as their brain searched for the right words to translate what they were hearing on the fly, in hopes to understand at least half of the sermon or Bible study conversation.

I'm sure we all remember that moment at school or in the workplace or growing up with older family members, where you belly-laughed at a shared joke hoping to share in the moment, all the while thinking "...I don't get it. Why is that funny?". You silently pray your fellow laughers are either so entertained by the joke or convinced by your laughter, that they don't single you out and assume you're somehow less intelligent because you didn't fully understand.

All around the world, there are beautiful church communities, created lovingly and painstakingly by pastors, elders and leadership teams, who teach, pastor and pray for those communities faithfully. And naturally, there are people in our pews of all backgrounds, desperate to belong and to gather around the Word of God with the rest of their church family. What would happen to our church communities if everyone who hears the Word of God, could understand it in real time, regardless of language or accent? What would happen to our growth, both individually and as the body of Christ? Could we see individuals who were once awkwardly on the fringes, walk into church with more confidence and eagerness to get involved? Could we see their walk with God grow from strength to strength, and our communities blessed by their presence?

These are the questions, and indeed the heart from which OneAccord was born. We at OneAccord don't just create products to sell to the local church, we are the product of the local church. We have been part of local churches of all different sizes, in multiple countries and languages, and have seen first-hand how the pastors and leadership teams have agonised, deliberated, planned and prayed about how to better serve all the cultures in their congregations.

Churches where we felt so at home, we could probably finish the pastors' anecdotes for them and churches where we felt like outsiders because we were new in the country and couldn't understand either the language or the way it was spoken. Churches where someone's cultural perspective has given our mid-week small group new insight into Scripture, and churches where conflict has arisen in our multi-ethnic serving teams due to misunderstanding and miscommunication.

The church is an institution that is both beautiful and complicated. Yet by design, it is a prism through which the light and power of the Gospel is refracted onto an unbelieving, divided and hurting world. We are inspired by the idea that our neighbourhoods, towns and cities can look at the church, a tapestry of imperfect people of different backgrounds and languages, united by a love for God and His Word and from the church, see the image of God in 3D.

You are here because you have the same heart for the church and OneAccord would love to be your partner in serving your congregations, so that we "can join together with one voice, giving praise and glory to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." [Romans 15:6]