When you say yes to being a missionary, you sign on to a life of saying goodbye. But not always in ways you expect.
You expect to say goodbye to your old life. To all your friends, your church, every person in your family. But what you might not realize is that once you get to your new home, you’d better get used to saying goodbye there too.
In an age where an year seems like a Really Long Time to live overseas, it’s rare to find those who stay three years, Or five. Or twenty. Of course, I’m not minimizing the contribution of those who stay a short time, because we need those people too.
Many, many people have come and gone from our mission team since we arrived in 2001. But there have always been the ones who stayed; the fixtures, the ones who were here before us and never left.
But now, this month, they are leaving too.
Steve and Carol Lyons opened this field for ReachGlobal. In many ways, none of the rest of our team would be here if it wasn’t for them. Betty Carlson joined them shortly after. All three worked here 20 years, but before that, they spent a whole other lifetime in Congo. They speak a bazillion languages (okay, just five, but that’s almost like a bazillion). They have been the grandparents and auntie of our team since the beginning.
Josiah and “Babu Simba,” 2010
Carol, aka “Bibi Simba,” who always cooked up something delicious
“Aunt” Betty and Grace, 2006
The Aiken family also got here before us. We’ve raised our kids together; we were a part of the same church plant for 5 years, and they’ve just always been a part of our lives. Now they are leaving too.
Aiken family in 2010
Everyone else came and went, but the Lyons, and Betty, and the Aikens always stayed. We create surrogate families on the mission field; we all are here without our extended families and so we cling to each other. But it’s times like this that reminds me that they too are transient.
Now there is no one in Tanzania with ReachGlobal who got here before us. We are the veterans. It’s kind of lonely, and sad. I’m tired of saying goodbye.
Okay, so I chose that picture for my last post because it was the most cliched missionary picture I could find. I suppose I could have picked a picture of myself with random African Orphans. I’ve got lots of those too.
Shoot. I even wear headbands made of local fabric.
In case you have no idea what I am talking about, White Savior Barbie has been going viral on social media. I’m not sure if she’s only popular in my part of the world, or if you have seen her too.
“Just taking a selfie amidst this dire poverty and need. Feeling so blessed!”
“Although children with flies swarming their faces are relatively rare here, it’s important to portray this as the norm.”
“Who needs a formal education to teach in Africa? Not me! All I need is some chalk and a dose of optimism.”
Thankfully, my total lack of fashion sense (and ownership of zero high heels) will never allow me to be confused with Barbie. But even as I am highly amused by the creativity of this account, it still makes me squirm.
And so it should, along with every other non-African visitor on this continent.
Am I White Savior Barbie?
Am I here just to feel good about myself?
Do I see myself as better than Tanzanian citizens, as having the answers that they don’t have?
Do I pity the local people? Do I see my life as so much better than theirs?
Is living in Tanzania all about creating a unique identity for myself?
As a 7th grader growing up in west Africa, I wrote in my journal, Liberia is me. I belong here. I loved the uniqueness of my life. My heart was torn by the poverty I saw around me. And I did want to grow up and make a difference.
So perhaps there is a bit of White Savior Barbie in me after all.
Or rather, perhaps there was. After living on this continent for half of my life, my idealism has been shredded by the reality of life. I’ve witnessed the damage done by those who went before me. I’ve come face to face with the complexity of poverty. I’ve experienced how brokenness breeds more brokenness. I have been beaten down by my own weakness, by my inability to live for a week without electricity, my lack of endurance in the suffocating heat, my discontented heart with the roads or the water or the bugs.
I’m quite certain I don’t have the answers. In fact, I’m no longer sure that I have any answers. I no longer worry about idealism clouding my thinking; instead I worry about cynicism preventing me from persevering. Am I even supposed to be here? Wouldn’t it be better if I just left?
But maybe that’s why I need to stay. Because I’m in that place of knowing I have nothing; I am nothing. I look up from the dust and I see that there is a specific need that Gil and I can fill, and that God has uniquely placed us to fill it at this time and in this way. So I stay. For now.
When I came to you, I did not come with eloquence or human wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness with great fear and trembling….so that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on God’s power. (I Corinthians 2)
So we limp on. And that would be my advice to all the other White Savior Barbies out there: Allow yourself to be broken and to be emptied. It will take a whole lot longer than weeks or months or even years. Sticking it out long term, with an attitude of humility, is how God just might be able to use you. And your pictures will never be able to tell that story.
I had looked forward to last week for a really long time.
Reach Global does their All-Africa conference only once every two years. Except that I didn’t get to go to the last one, because it was in Kenya and Lily didn’t have a passport yet. And the next one was supposed to happen last year, but got postponed because of Ebola.
So I hadn’t been to an All-Africa conference in five years. This time, it was held at a hotel only five minutes away from our house. So our journey was pretty short, even though others came from all over Africa and many more came in from the States.
It’s a filling experience, to be reunified with those from the National Office who care deeply for us and make us feel so supported. It’s wonderful to sing together in English, since I’ve only done that a few times this year. It’s encouraging to be part of an organization with so much wisdom and vision and humility.
I’ve tasted and seen the sweetest of loves
Where my heart becomes free and my shame is undone
But mostly, this week, I just felt small.
Maybe it was because it’s intimidating to be in a room with so much wisdom and experience and languages and churches planted.
Maybe it’s because I’m in the thick of the intensity of molding a three-year-old into our family.
Maybe it was just because I’ve been sick with stomach stuff and sinus stuff and pure exhaustion for the last three weeks.
Whatever may pass and whatever lies before me
Let me be singing when the evening comes
So I just felt small. And inadequate. And wondering what on earth I am doing here.
But the speakers, and the worship leaders, and the prayer team, and my colleagues….over and over again, they reminded me that God is Big.
Unstoppable God, let your glory go on and on
Impossible things in your name they shall be done
So if I feel small, then maybe that’s just a better opportunity for God to be Big. He usually likes to work that way anyway.
You’re a good, good Father
It’s who you are
And I am loved by you
It’s who I am
My identity is not in being a successful missionary, or a member of Reach Global, or as a teacher or even a wife and mother. I am loved by Him. It’s who I am.
How Johnny spent the conference sessions, since he was totally unwilling to join child care.
Hanging with the president of the Evangelical Free Church of America. Because we’re cool like that.
All lyrics are from songs we sang this week: Unstoppable God, Holy Spirit, 10,000 Reasons, Good Good Father
I wrote this post about six months ago, but decided not to put it up on my blog. The audience was really for missionaries, and that’s not usually who I am writing for. So instead, I submitted it to A Life Overseas….and they took it! It’s up on their blog today. Check it out here….especially if you are a missionary.
“I needed people, someone who could walk me step by step through my life. I was thrust onto a new team, and into a larger missionary community. I knew nothing about these people, and yet I needed them desperately. How should I navigate those relationships?”
Imagine what it would look like for an American church to hire their staff with the same priorities that they chose missionaries to financially support.
First of all, a Children’s Pastor would definitely be out. Not strategic enough; he’s only supporting the children of believers. Youth Pastor? Also out, unless he targets neighborhood kids.
How about a Music Pastor? Or Pastoral Counselor? Nope. Those are just a support roles. Not enough front-line ministry.
Administrative Pastor? Receptionist? Good heavens. We could never dream of paying someone for those kind of inconsequential support roles.
How about a Preaching Pastor? Well…..that’s if-y, but he probably doesn’t make the cut either. After all, he’s only feeding the Body. Most of the time, he’s not actually reaching the lost.
So that pretty much leaves only the positions of Community Outreach Pastor or Evangelist. Yet how many American churches even have those paid positions?
I’m not suggesting that churches go about firing two-thirds of their staff. I just want to point out a bit of a double-standard.
Recently, a friend told me, Oh, I could never consider taking a position at Haven of Peace Academy. I know my church would never take me on for a support role.
And from a current teacher at HOPAC, We love what we do at HOPAC, but we feel like our supporters just want to see pictures of the street kids ministry, even though that only takes up two hours of our week.
And from another teacher when hosting a short-term team: The team gets most excited about the ministry to the poor kids. They don’t seem to understand the importance of reaching HOPAC kids.
Let me introduce you to the class system among missionaries.
Who is on the A-List? Well, that would be the Church Planters. Among unreached people groups gives you A+ status. Pastoral Trainers and Bible Translators might be able to squeak by with an A.
The B-List? Doctors and other health workers, community development, poverty alleviation, ESL workers.
The C-List? Administrators, missionary member care, MK teachers, or anyone else considered “support.”
This is definitely not our imagination, and any missionary I know will confirm it. When trying to raise support for our years at Haven of Peace Academy, we called and sent information packets to over 200 churches in California. We heard back from two. Churches told us, over and over again, Sorry, but that ministry doesn’t fit into our strategy.
When our ministry changed to Pastoral Training, we had churches calling us. It was nice. But frankly, kind of frustrating.
We didn’t switch ministries so that we would become more popular with churches. We switched because that’s where God was leading us. But the truth is, we don’t consider Pastoral Training to be any more strategic, or any more exciting, than Haven of Peace Academy.
HOPAC is training the next generation of Tanzania’s leaders in a biblical worldview. Over 50% of HOPAC’s students are Tanzanian, most from influential families.
Perhaps equally, or even more important, HOPAC is enabling missions in Tanzania. Young Life and SIL/Wycliffe have established their East African headquarters in Dar because of HOPAC! Dozens of other organizations are able to minister here as well.
Oh come on, I can hear you saying. Can’t all those families just homeschool? Yes, if they had to. A lot of missionary families don’t have another choice. But imagine trying to homeschool your kids, and simultaneously, become fluent in another language, and learn to drive, shop, cook, clean, pay bills, play, and rest in an entirely different way. Without any homeschool groups or co-ops or craft stores. Sound fun?
Look at it this way. You can either financially support a missionary mom to (possibly reluctantly) homeschool her four kids, or you can financially support a missionary teacher (who’s called to it) to teach 25. It’s not like the mom is going to sit on her hands all day. She’ll be right out there working in ministry.
I’m particularly passionate about MK education, but I could say the same things for all the other so-called “support” roles in missions. I just wrote my last three posts about the often harsh realities of life overseas. Yet when Christians stand up and say, I’m called to missionary care! I’m called to teach MK’s! I’m called to missions administration!, the churches say, Well, sorry, you don’t fit in our strategy. We’d rather get behind the exciting church planters and the pastoral trainers.Except, we expect them to do it without all the other people they need to be successful.
I sit on the board of governors at Haven of Peace Academy. At almost every meeting, we bang our heads against the wall, asking ourselves, How are we going to get enough teachers? Every year, it’s a problem. Every year, we pray and plead and try to get more creative with recruitment.
But you want to know the reality? Churches are just not as interested in supporting teachers. Heck, even missions organizations are not as interested in supporting teachers.
Listen, I’m all about strategy in missions. But can we expand our idea of what strategy means? Missionaries, as an extension of the Church, must function as the Body of Christ. Could the American Church function by only hiring evangelists? I realize that missions has different goals–we are working ourselves out of a job; we are doing everything we can to replace ourselves with national believers. But to get there, we need the Body of Christ.
We, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another. Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them. (Romans 12)
The legs can’t do anything without the arms and fingers and neck. So go out today and find your nearest missionary accountant or counselor or MK teacher. Remind them they are never second-class.
For the next school year, HOPAC is still looking for an Operations Manager, an Elementary Teacher, a P.E. teacher, a Librarian, and a Special Needs Teacher.
