The first foreign publications produced by the Apostolic Faith work after the move to Portland were newspapers in the Norwegian and German languages. These were printed in October of 1908, just a few months after the first English edition, and were soon followed by others.
In the early days of the work, many immigrants to the United States still spoke their native tongue. People attending the services who spoke a language other than English were able to assist in the translation and proofreading of materials for their homelands. This was a great help in producing a variety of foreign language materials. These people also often had contacts with family and friends in their native lands, and this provided a ready-made base of contacts for initial distribution of the Gospel in those areas. Over the years, Gospel literature has been printed by the Apostolic Faith organization in more than seventy languages and dialects, with translation and proofing assistance often given by members of the Apostolic Faith organization around the world.
Much of the translation work is done via the internet, with documents being transmitted across the world in a matter of seconds.
Working with translators and foreign language proofreaders became much easier with the advent of the internet. Today, most of the translation work is done through the internet, with documents needing translation and proofing being transmitted across the world in a matter of seconds. The most recently added translations are some of the dialects of India and Myanmar.
The production of a four-year Sunday school curriculum in the Spanish language is another recent venture—one that utilized help from Spanish-speaking individuals in several countries, as well as several states in the United States.
The value of the literature to readers around the world is impossible to fully calculate. One wrote from a missionary training school in Indonesia, a country with a large Muslim population: “They throng our office with requests for literature. Please continue to send us more. They will be placed in every house in the districts we work. Not a single tract will be wasted. . . . We have confidence in the sound and pure doctrines of the Apostolic Faith and assure you that everything you send will be used to the glory of God.”