Working in a fixed Grothendieck topos Sh(C, J C ) we generalize $${\mathcal{L}_{{\infty},\omega}}$$ L ∞ , ω to allow our languages and formulas to make explicit reference to Sh(C, J C ). We likewise generalize the notion of model. We then show how to encode these generalized structures by models of a related sentence of $${\mathcal{L}_{{\infty},\omega}}$$ L ∞ , ω in the category of sets and functions. Using this encoding we prove analogs of several results concerning $${\mathcal{L}_{{\infty},\omega}}$$ L ∞ , ω , such as the downward Löwenheim–Skolem theorem, the completeness theorem and Barwise compactness.