This Wild Journey

“In this world you will have trouble, but take heart! I have overcome the world.”

John 16:33b

What is a real missionary? I’ve been asking myself this question for years. And I’ve given a real missionary many different, unrealistic faces…someone who has no running water or electricity most (or all) of the time, one who makes their milk from powder, someone who faces real persecution for their faith and has to use ‘code’ to talk about the Lord in their emails or posts, someone who drives themselves on the tenuous roads in their country, someone who deals with major insects and exhausting heat, and someone who is just joyful all the time, despite the hardships of living overseas, facing many challenges and oppositions.

So you decide, do any of these descriptions constitute a real missionary? I don’t know if I really know, but maybe God is leading me away from this question entirely and to a new question. Am I being faithful in what He has asked me to do? Am I playing my part? Do I believe I really have a part?

It is so tempting to compare. It is so tempting to doubt. Jesus came to earth as a babe all those years ago for the whole world. For everyone. We ALL have a part in His story of redemption. No matter how troubled my soul feels, I can have confidence that God is always at work in me and in the world. Maybe all He’s really asking is for me to say a simple yes. Yes, Lord, I’ll take the next step of faith. I’ll draw near to that child who’s actively repelling me. I’ll have that conversation…

“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

Acts 1:8

Jesus doesn’t list out the qualities of a good witness or missionary. He simply says we will be his witnesses when we have the power of the Holy Spirit living in us. In loving God and loving others, albeit imperfectly as I do, I can move forward the kingdom of God.

So I’m asking the Lord to reshape my perspective on being here in Kenya, to remind me that I have a part to play, even when I might think it’s not that great.

Make my faith stronger, Lord. Help me to give you glory for my life and work, no matter how it compares to anyone else’s. Help me walk each day, fully trusting that You are able and You are good! You are Emmanuel, God with me, always.

“If I must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness…”

-2 Corinthians 11:30

Transition is a very stretching time. Change is not comfortable. I like comfortable. I like routine. I like predictable. A friend I was recently talking with at church equated my description of mission life and transition as an orange being squeezed in a juicer…

Yes! We are in the juicer! The Lord knows the stress, the discomfort, the many questions in our minds and hearts right now. We are fully in a time of transition. We’re preparing to leave the US in two weeks, saying many hard good byes, and Lord willing, picking up life again in our community in Kenya, for His purposes and His glory.

It feels like a time of weakness. I need God desperately all the time, but I really feel it heavily in this. I need him to navigate these waters, to meet each one of us in our crazy roller coaster of emotions on a day to day basis, to guide us in packing, to provide the time we need for good good byes, to give us health and strength. I need Him to show us His power made perfect in our weakness!

Praise the Lord, He is faithful. I have seen that He can be trusted. Church is typically started off in Kenya with these words, “God is good…all the time. All the time…God is good.”

We’d appreciate your prayers as our family departs on this journey for our next term in Kenya. And may the Lord show himself perfect in your weakness today too.

“If you splash me before I’m wet, I won’t get in!” These are familiar words that come from my mouth when enjoying a day at the pool with my kids. They love when I get in and swim with them, and I do too…but they know I take my sweet time to do that. I’m a wimp and I’m ok with it! I may have delivered 6 babies naturally, by God’s grace, but I do not like cold water, and I have never been one to just jump in.

The Webster’s dictionary defines courage as “the quality of mind that enables one to encounter danger and difficulties with firmness, or without fear or depression of spirit.” I don’t think of myself as one who exemplifies this definition. I don’t think of myself as especially brave. But I guess there is a way that courage does become vital to what we’re about to embark on again in moving our family of eight back across the ocean to Kenya at the end of the summer.

I’m a person who likes routine and comfort. Two things that are not very plentiful in this life of missions, I’ve discovered. As many people plan for the start of next school year, I just hope we’re there in time and have enough go-power to get started before they want a fall break. Somehow, He will work it out. As many people settle into a house that they can decorate and truly live in, we have had a pile of framed pictures leaned on the wall of a bedroom in our house for almost a year. We were never sure what we should put up, only to turn around and take down. This life of uncertainty and much moving can be wearisome, though it does help me lean into my Provider, and remember my one true Home. 

And then there’s sickness. Why does it just feel easier to be sick here? Am I more certain that everything I need would be at my disposal in mere seconds should things turn bad for me or a family member? Do I have that much trust in the “system?” Am I sure there wouldn’t be a shortage of a necessary medicine, or that the time it takes an ambulance to reach us would always beat the time it would take to run or drive up that hill at Tenwek carrying one who needs help? Don’t I trust that God is my true source of Help? Not a first-world medical system?

When I feel like I’m heading toward a wilderness, toward some things I have very real fears about, I’m learning to thank Jesus even for that. I’m learning to be still before Him and remember that He is still God. 

“Every wilderness holds God’s tenderness, and the driest of deserts can be the holy of holies. Deserts aren’t places to fear: Deserts are trust greenhouses. Rest in today’s pasture, and fret not about tomorrow’s provision.”

Ann Voskamp, waymaker

Maybe that’s what true courage looks like. Even though I sometimes feel overwhelmed with fear and overcome with weariness, Christ is my anchor, and I can keep moving forward, clinging to Him. He knows. He sees. He cares. He provides. The only true courage I find is found in Him.