Neurodiversity in the World of TCKs

You might be wondering why addressing neurodivergence in the context of ministry is an important endeavor. I get it — I’ve wondered too! The best answer I can offer is this: because neurodivergent children and adults live among us. Because they are cherished by God and worthy of our investment of time and effort. And because ignorance is not bliss — it can fracture God’s Kingdom with misunderstandings, conflict, and the withholding of empathy.

If only because it grows us into loving better and more thoughtfully, I believe that learning more about the humans around us is a spiritual practice and God-given privilege. 

NEURODIVERSITY IN THE WORLD OF TCKs

There is a particular kind of exhaustion many globally mobile families experience. The kind that feels linked—sometimes in obscure ways—to that third airport security line, that calendar-busting conference, that language-learning plateau, that brutal goodbye to friends we may not see again, that moment your child dissolves into tears because the cereal tastes different in this country, or that weather pattern that sucks the life out of everyday activities.

In the cross-cultural community, we tend to tell ourselves that it’s transition stress. Culture shock. Jet lag. Grief. And often, it is—or a combination of them all.

But there can also be something more complex happening beneath the surface. Something quieter, more deeply wired into the way a child experiences the world—or, in the case of MKs, multiple worlds.

What is neurodivergence?

In recent years, conversations around neurodiversity have become far more common. Current estimates suggest that between 15% and 20% of the population may be neurodivergent, so it’s no wonder that efforts to deepen our understanding are expanding.

At its simplest, neurodivergence means that a brain functions differently from what is considered usual or “typical.” Neurodiversity embraces the idea that everybody’s brain works uniquely and that neurodivergence is a normal variation.

ADHD, autism, OCD, dyslexia, sensory processing differences, dyscalculia, traumatic brain injury, and other neurological differences can all fall under this broad umbrella. Neurodivergence can show up in countless ways—from sensory overwhelm and learning differences to intense creativity, diminished executive function, or information processing that differs from that of brains considered more “typical.”

The Strengths of Neurodivergence

Though neurological differences were formerly viewed simply as deficits, researchers and clinicians now understand neurodivergence as part of the natural variation of human brains—producing unique strengths as well as unique challenges.

It’s important to remember that these same TCKs wrestling with layers of difference often possess extraordinary gifts.

In her article At the Intersection: Navigating Neurodivergence and Third Culture Kids, Dr. Kristen Williamson highlights the creativity, innovation, empathy, deep focus, and problem-solving abilities that frequently accompany neurodivergence. The child who notices details everyone else misses. The teenager who learns languages through patterns and rhythms. The young adult whose emotional sensitivity allows them to connect deeply across cultures.

Sometimes the very wiring that makes life more complicated also allows a child to experience beauty, excel academically, analyze complex data, and respond with empathy more naturally than the rest of us do.

The Relief of Diagnosis

Of the adult TCKs interviewed for this article and its accompanying video, most weren’t diagnosed until adulthood. Sometimes diagnosis came after burnout. After reentry. After struggles in higher education. Or after years of wondering why ordinary life seemed to require extraordinary effort.

For many neurodivergent people and their families, diagnosis itself is not the devastating moment they feared. Often, it brings relief—because there is finally language for their strengths and challenges. There is an explanation for why transitions feel catastrophic rather than merely difficult. Why noise feels physically painful. Why social interaction requires marathon-level energy. Why someone can appear perfectly composed in public and completely unravel at home.

Neurodivergence in Cross-Cultural Spaces

For Third Culture Kids, neurodivergence can create a particularly layered experience because so much of TCK life already requires constant adaptation. New schools. New languages. New social rules. New expectations. New relationships. New losses.

Indian writer and advocate Nanyadiri, who is autistic and has ADHD (AuDHD), describes the autistic TCK life as “a difference inside a difference.” The phrase captures something globally mobile families recognize in their children with neurodivergence: some are not merely learning to adapt across cultures; they are trying to navigate a world that may already have been unpredictable, confusing, or painfully loud—and now it is exponentially more overwhelming.

Transition is one of the greatest challenges for neurodivergent TCKs. Airports. Temporary housing. Shifting routines. New foods. Unfamiliar smells. Different classroom expectations. New cultural customs. All the unpredictability that globally mobile families eventually normalize can feel deeply dysregulating.

For some children, the adventure of it all feels exhilarating. But for others, it might feel more like being forced to stand in the chaos of Times Square at rush hour—with strangers yelling questions, street vendors selling unfamiliar things, friends pushing new foods at their faces, and a thunderous storm assailing them with rain and wind—all while realizing that everything familiar (people, places, routines, their own bed) is no longer within reach.

Now imagine trying to manage that 24/7—without protective filters, escape routes, or loved ones who understand how exhausting it is.

The Tangled Strands of TCKness and Neurodivergence

The challenges don’t end with transition. For those who love TCKs with autism, OCD, ADHD, and other forms of neurodivergence, distinguishing brain differences from cross-cultural traits can be difficult.

The impact of neurodivergence, trauma, and chronic stress can sometimes look remarkably similar. Frequent moves, unresolved grief, political instability, educational disruption, repeated upheaval, and abuse can all affect a child’s nervous system. Meanwhile, globally mobile life itself already looks unconventional.

A child who struggles socially may be assumed to be adjusting to a new culture. A child overwhelmed in crowds may be labeled sensitive. Executive-functioning difficulties may be blamed on transition stress rather than recognized as part of ADHD or autism.

Jenilee Goodwin, a fellow A Life Overseas writer, notes in How to Notice Neurodiversity in Third Culture Kids that neurodivergent TCKs often slip under the radar for precisely this reason. Sometimes what we’re seeing really is TCK struggle. Sometimes it is an expression of an underlying brain difference. Quite frequently, it is a combination of both.

This is why untangling the strands of TCKness and neurodivergence is so complicated. It takes time, learning, wisdom, and often an investment of effort and funds in professional evaluation. Understanding the “why” behind a child’s behavior is essential to providing support that addresses their actual needs rather than applying strategies that may exacerbate their struggles.

Knowing more can change the entire conversation from frustration to compassion—and then to appropriate action.

The Realities of Masking

Another reason neurodivergence gets missed in cross-cultural communities is that so many children become exceptionally good at masking. Especially TCKs. Especially bright, capable, adaptable children who are praised for maturity and flexibility.

Girls, in particular, are often missed because their struggles don’t match traditional stereotypes of neurodivergence. Rather than appearing disruptive or hyperactive, many become experts at people-pleasing, perfectionism, emotional caretaking, or quiet overachievement. They may look socially successful while privately rehearsing conversations, analyzing interactions, and becoming chronically exhausted from trying to make coping appear effortless.

In missionary and ministry environments, children who mask well may be celebrated as adaptable, mature, helpful, and selfless while carrying extraordinary levels of internal stress.

And boys can mask too—especially thoughtful, sensitive boys who learn early that emotional overwhelm or social confusion feels unsafe to reveal. But because many people still picture neurodivergence primarily as a loud little boy bouncing off classroom walls, quieter presentations are frequently overlooked altogether.  

So many neurodivergent TCKs are working tirelessly behind the scenes to appear “fine.” They study social expectations. They rehearse conversations. They observe peers and imitate what seems socially acceptable. They hold themselves together all day and then collapse emotionally once they reach home.

Psychologist Laura Mannucci captures this beautifully in Belonging in Translation: Autism, ADHD, and the Hidden Labor of Adapting Across Cultures: “When you have learned to mirror others to belong, the authentic self becomes hard to locate.”

The immense mental effort required to constantly decode cultural expectations while also navigating neurodivergence becomes, as Mannucci describes it, “an ongoing negotiation between worlds.” For many TCKs, that hidden hypervigilance becomes a way of life—and an exhausting drain on their energy.

What Neurodivergent TCKs Need from All of Us

According to the TCKs I interviewed, one of the gentlest shifts parents can make is moving from disciplining difference to approaching it with curiosity. Instead of asking, “Why is my child overreacting?” ask, “What might this situation feel like inside my child’s nervous system? What could be the reason for that?” Instead of rewarding the masking that allows children to appear more “typical,” invest time, effort, and funding into the kind of research and testing that might uncover liberating answers.

And then extend love—because there are far too many neurodivergent TCKs who believe their brain difference is failure, weakness, or even sin. We as a community need to speak—and be—the antidote to those destructive lies.

So what can we actually do?

Throughout ministry life, small changes can foster stability and safety: limiting social commitments, building in respite, creating quiet spaces and predictable routines, reducing toxic stress where possible, educating siblings and community members, and supporting activities that allow for regulation and expression—art, movement, writing, creating, organizing, inventing, or analyzing.

Even adjusting family menus to accommodate intolerable textures and tastes can matter. For some autistic children, this isn’t simply a food preference; it is a visceral inability to get past the texture or taste.

Jenilee Goodwin encourages families in transition to build predictability wherever possible: visual schedules, familiar foods, comfort objects, advance warning before changes, recovery time after overstimulation, and small rituals carried from country to country.

These things may sound insignificant to people who function more typically, but to a neurodivergent child, they can feel like safety in the swirling center of threatening chaos.

Parents may also need to reevaluate expectations around pace and productivity. Many neurodivergent TCKs can technically endure crowded schedules, rapid travel, stimulating ministry environments, and constant social interaction—while paying an invisible emotional cost.

A child may be coping remarkably well on the outside while quietly unraveling internally. 

But there’s a huge difference between surviving and flourishing.

The Beauty in the Difference

Goodwin’s articles emphasize the importance of helping children understand their own brains with dignity and compassion. Neurodivergent children need language that frames their differences not as personal failures, but as part of their unique wiring. Dr. Williamson argues that when neurodivergent TCKs receive understanding and support, many develop exceptional resilience, intercultural awareness, empathy, and creativity.

When I speak with adult TCKs who received a diagnosis about what they wish someone had told them sooner, they point to the crucial importance of parents and loved ones affirming who they are—and rejecting the lies the world and their own inner voice might inflict on them.

Perhaps one of the most hopeful truths emerging from these conversations is that many neurodivergent TCK adults—with affirmation, care, support, and therapy—eventually come to see their differences not merely as obstacles, but as part of the very wiring that shaped their strengths. The sensitivity that once led to overwhelm becomes empathy. Hyper-awareness becomes emotional intelligence. The lifelong practice of observing cultures and decoding people becomes insight and wisdom.

The traits that complicated childhood can become part of what allows these adults to move through the world with unusual compassion, creativity, and depth.

Not despite their wiring—because of it.

And perhaps that is the invitation here—not to pathologize difference, nor to romanticize struggle, but to notice children more carefully. To listen more curiously. To create environments where they do not have to spend their lives pretending to be less sensitive, less intense, less observant, or less themselves in order to belong.

Because some of the children who experience the world most deeply may also be the ones most capable of helping the rest of us see it more clearly.

They are not broken.

They are not burdens.

They are unique, precious, created by God, and so very loved by Him.

 

Further learning:

— This version of the article does not include the profound and fascinating quotes collected from eleven neurodivergent adult TCKs. You can find the full article here.

— My entire three-part series on TCKs and Neurodiversity (including an interview with Jenilee Goodwin, an extended version of this article, and a videoed collection of personal stories from adult TCKs) is here.  

— Additional reading:

Belonging in Translation — Laura Mannucci
Different, Not Less — Chloé Hayden
Divergent Mind: Thriving in a World That Wasn’t Designed for You — Jenara Nerenberg
Driven to Distraction — Hallowell & Ratey
Embracing the Autism Spectrum — Dr. Stephanie Holmes
Lost in Translation: The Social Language Theory of Neurodivergence — Janae Elisabeth
Neurodiversity for Dummies — John Marble, Khushboo Chabria, and Ranga Jayaraman
Uniquely Human — Barry Prizant
Uniquely Us — Dr. Stephanie Holmes
Unmasking Autism — Devon Price

Will You Leave, Too?

We had just finished a rowdy dinner together with a lot of belly-laughing and story-swapping from our overlapping eight years in northern Japan. I remember sitting on the floor with our youngest, still a baby, while our older kids played upstairs together, content and full. Then these dear friends looked at each other, subtly nodded, and said something along the lines of, “We don’t know how to tell you this, but we sense that God is telling us that it is time to move back to the US.”

I felt like the top of my head was being squeezed by a too-tight swimming cap, like everything around me was slowly being drained of color and going grayscale. I was caught off guard and felt devastated, lost, deflated. In the following weeks and months, I felt as if someone had died. Perhaps this is dramatic and I shouldn’t have felt this loss so strongly. But this goodbye hurt with an intensity that previous and subsequent ones didn’t. 

Perhaps this is because this departure was coming after so many other goodbyes, perhaps because this friendship required work and repair and was therefore all the more precious to me, perhaps because I ached for a family with whom we could live our missionary lives together — knowing one another’s stories, living in close proximity, bearing with one another through good and hard and all the in between. We’d weathered miscarriages, births of our babies, language study, disappointments, transitions, growth, major culture mishaps, and celebrations — together.

Their decision to leave didn’t make sense to me. They had a great relationship with their Japanese partner church, they were doing good ministry in their community, their kids were thriving, and they modeled many things I hoped to be one day: easy to laugh, ready to serve, willing to work hard yet valuing play, strong in their faith. Yet shortly after this conversation sitting together on the floor of our house, they left — and I swirled through the stages of grief poorly for, I am embarrassed to admit, a couple of years.

Writing this now, there is still a part of me whispering quietly, “But why did they leave?”

I could understand other dear friends, teammates, and fellow missionaries’ reasons for leaving: aging parents, adult children needing help launching, younger children with disabilities or mental health needs. I understand those who leave for resources, systems, support, and treatments that are not available where they live. I still grieve these departures, but I understand them.

What are more difficult to process are the departures I don’t understand. Those who excelled in language study — surpassing most people I know in a few years with humility and hard work and humor. Those who served on an easier-to-adjust-to team. (We partner primarily with local churches. I sometimes envy those who work with international churches or on mostly international teams, perceiving them as having fewer barriers to cross and having to do less cultural bending.) Those who basically got to do the ministries they wanted in the location they wanted with the teammates they wanted . . . and now they, too, have left. 

I am not an expert in missionary attrition, nor am I involved in member care in a formal capacity. Yet what I have read recently has mostly been from the perspective of those who have left their countries of service to go “home” and how difficult of an adjustment that is for many. I am thankful for people writing and sharing their experiences with reverse culture shock, rebuilding their lives, and coming to a new understanding of their identity and calling.

Yet what about the experiences of those of us who stay, who are left behind? These losses add up and break our hearts, too. I confess that I have not always responded gracefully or as well as I would have liked. When meeting people new to missions, I occasionally find myself suspicious, guarded. “Will she leave, too?” “If I get too close to them and they also decide to leave, can my heart handle being broken yet again?” 

Sometimes I want to be someone who can say, somewhat perkily, “Oh, that’s too bad. We will miss you, and God bless you in this next chapter.” And then move on, looking toward the future with my heart and the top of my squeezed head intact.

Yet the truth is that ministry (anywhere!) is hard. Missions is hard. Feeling foolish and making thousands of mistakes — hard. Misunderstanding and being misunderstood — hard. Going to and living in spiritually dark places — in our case, where maybe 0.1% of our city is Christian and 1% seems like a dream — is hard. Partnering alongside and under the vision of national leaders is (often) hard. Dying to my preferences, not being funny or finding local humor funny for a long time, missing people/places/things from my home culture, culture stress that lessens but never goes away completely — all of this is hard. But the goodbyes, for me, are a different level of hard.

Yes, missions involves adventure, new experiences, and countless ways we and our perspectives shift and grow and expand. We get to notice and enjoy the beauty of where God has placed us: the people, places, things, and even pieces of culture that reflect the kingdom of God. It is a privilege and a blessing to be entrusted with this calling, this life, these relationships.

But this life involves so many (may I say too many?) goodbyes: to our extended families and dear friends in our home countries and to fellow missionaries who become like surrogate family in the countries we serve in. How I ache to be able to control outcomes. “This person is well-trained, well-supported, mature, on a good team, and has great member care. They will thrive and stay.” But it doesn’t seem to work like that. 

We have known many people who have left. People who have excelled at language learning and those who have struggled. People who were well-trained in missions and those with minimal training. People who partner with national churches and those who work independently. People who are underfunded and those with incredible funding. People with remarkable member care structures around them and those without. People who are single and people who are married. People still in the throes of culture shock and those who have ridden the wave and come out the other side. 

Many years ago, a TCK friend who grew up here told me, “My mom eventually stopped making friends. She held people at arms length to protect herself from the inevitable revolving door of missionaries coming and going and the heartbreak of goodbyes.” While I don’t want to follow this woman’s path, I understand it. 

Although my heart may look like a patched up, scrappy quilt with a few places in need of mending, I am thankful my life has intersected with these remarkable, hilarious, sensitive, curious, faith-filled, and faithful people. I learned about celebration and finding humor in mistakes from one, that hanging laundry can be a meditation rather than drudgery from another, about gratitude and rhythms of work and rest from another. 

My life is richer from moments shared and memories made together, from watching them parent and lead and live beautiful, imperfect lives, from praying for and encouraging one another, and from walking, arms linked, in the same direction together for a season. I wouldn’t trade all of this to protect myself from the pain of goodbyes.

And so I pray:

God, give me courage to love. To welcome new people. To not fear their futures nor my own. God, help me be like my mom, who said to me when I was preparing to go on a short-term trip in my early 20s, “I want you in the center of God’s will for your life, whether He chooses to keep you safe or not.” And may I add, “Whether He chooses to keep you in my life here or not. Whether He chooses the path I want for you or not.” 

God, help me to release dearly loved friends, teammates, mentors, and mentees who have, who might, and who will move on. I don’t want to live guarded or hold people at arm’s length, so help me to trust that You will guard and uphold me. Help me to receive from You comfort, Your presence, and the reminder that someday there will be no more goodbyes. 

The Sacred Keeping of People We Will Leave

My husband, our friend Liz, and I recently began watching Ted Lasso’s newest season. In the first episode, Ted is faced with a decision to return to England after several years of resettling in the U.S. Torn between his life in the U.S. and his desire to be a part of building something meaningful in the UK, Ted refuses the job offer, stating that Kansas City is his home. His former boss, Rebecca, nods her head and graciously responds with, “Sometimes, home is just a state of mind.”

All three of us watching had relocated back to the U.S. within the last few years, from the same area in Africa. We have walked this road of repatriation — some of it apart, some together — and it’s been a deep gift to be near to each other again now.

That question of what is home or where is home has not ceased to feel complicated. I watch my daughters struggle with it when well-meaning people ask. My husband, an adult TCK, answers differently depending on the context of the conversation. For our family, so much of this past year has been about our physical settling — finding a house, furnishing the house, unpacking all the things, finding our new places to shop and swim and run. There was a good bit of processing for us around leaving a home we loved and learning to love a new place, of building home in a completely new part of the world.

For all we think about home as a physical place, however, there is the very real part of our lives done in proximity to other people. What does it mean to spend most of a decade learning to love people, to then just . . . leave?

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I think back to the summer before we moved to South Africa. It was filled with travel, many tearful goodbyes, and a sending party. It was a painful kind of leaving, and yet, we knew we would see all of these people we loved again. On home assignments, we would make the circuit to each of our churches, visit our friends, and spend meaningful time with our families.

We sent regular newsletters and kept up communication with many as a part of partnership. Being a twenty-first century cross-cultural worker meant, even in those hard goodbyes, there was not the finality of generations past; there was potential for many on-going relationships, and visits were to be (comparatively) more frequent.

Leaving this time, however, felt strangely different. There was no plan to return within the next few years. We do not have a newsletter for all of those people we built life with for the last nine years. There was investment in friendship, in discipleship, in formation. We built community with our church, our homeschool group, our Bible school campus, and within our small town. By the time we actually left, our networks were vast and overlapping. Though we have kept up with some people, the majority we have not had contact with since we left over a year ago.

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What is the significance of pouring our lives into others, just to leave? What does it mean to hold friendships dear, even if we cannot maintain them? Is our discipleship significant, even after we’re gone?

To be honest, our new life has required so much relational energy and pouring into new relationships that these questions are only now surfacing for me. We have all felt the loss of our closest friends, our dearest neighbors. Some days, the completeness of the relational starting over has been suffocating. Where are those lovely people who just knew me, with whom I had built so much relational capital and felt understood?

But these questions of purpose and meaning in the pouring in, and then the leaving, these remain, some days haunting over my shoulder as we pour out again in a new context. The faces of hundreds swim in my mind — and the completeness of leaving these dear people takes my breath away.

What must it have been like for Jesus, who poured His life into relationships, who truly poured Himself out completely for people? Did He, in His humanity, wrestle with questions of His investment in others? Did He wonder how His leaving would affect those He’d become close to? How did He embody his self-identified purpose that “the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45)?

Perhaps He, too, felt the futility at times. After all, His time physically with people was short too. In His presence, He offered compassion, friendship, healing, forgiveness, dignity, and love; and in His leaving, He sent His Spirit to remain in His absence. What have we left behind in our leaving?

By God’s grace, I can think back on dozens of good goodbyes before we left South Africa — tearful, poignant reflections on years of relationship with many dear people. And by God’s grace, we knew that we have eternity to share with many of these dear friends. But not all. Oh God, may your Spirit continue to be alive and active in our absence. And of course, He will.

He is the sacred keeper of people. And perhaps here is the goodness, the hope: in our absence, God is present. By necessity of circumstance, our tangible doing of life with these people has come to an end, and yes, it is painful. And yet, we entrust all of those we love and who loved us back into His care, into His hands. Our presence was only ever going to be fleeting, but His is eternal.

 

Read the companion piece from earlier this year, The Sacred Keeping of Places We Will Leave.

Reality TV and the Newly Arrived Missionary

by Brandon Jones

Here in Brazil, our family subscribes to Brazilian cable television, which features both Brazilian shows and foreign shows that are dubbed in Portuguese. Among our favorite dubbed shows is 90 Day Fiancé: The Other Way.

90 Day Fiancé is a produced, “reality” television series that follows the stories of several couples from different countries. But one half of each couple is always someone from the United States. These couples apply for marriage visas and often have 90 days to get married upon entering the country of the other person. The first versions of this show all featured people from other countries coming to the United States, but 90 Day Fiancé: The Other Way only includes stories in which the American citizen goes to the other person’s country.

While the Americans on the show are of different ages and backgrounds, their shared experience of culture shock in another country is familiar to me as an American missionary. Of course, moving with a family to another country is different from trying to create a new family with someone from a different culture while also moving to their culture. But nonetheless, here are some similarities I have found as a viewer between 90 Day Fiancé and being a new missionary.

Visiting and Moving Are Galaxies Apart

Multiple Americans noted in the show how they had previously visited their fiancé’s country in the past while on vacation for days or even weeks. But nothing can prepare you for buying a one-way plane ticket to another country. 

Quickly, even in their first days in their new homes, a lot of Americans found unease at the hassle of daily life somewhere else. Using the toilet is different, restaurants are different, and then there’s the biggest barrier of them all: language. 

Not one person on this show was fluent in their new host language, which did not bother them much on vacation. But all of a sudden moving and living became that much harder. Their capacity to get things done all by themselves dwindled while their reliance on their fiancé skyrocketed.  

One person even admitted that he thought that he could “skate by” using his English in a Spanish-speaking country. He figured out within days that would never be the case.

Be Our Guest

As much as it feels different to move to a new country versus visiting one, moving there doesn’t magically give you the rights of a citizen. So many Americans on this show did not bother using the internet to figure out if they could legally work in another country. When the time came to look for work, they quickly found out they had no legal standing to get a job, and oftentimes, even if they could get one through marriage, few jobs could accommodate them when they only spoke English.

One young man was shocked when he heard he’d need something other than a tourist visa to work legally in Colombia. He said out loud that he figured as an American it would be easy for him to work there.

Being a citizen is something that’s easily taken for granted when you never move away from your homeland. But when you live overseas, there is always a reminder that you are a guest in your new location. Things will be harder for you. There will be a process for everything. There will be limits. The sooner you can make peace with all of this, the better.

When Values Collide

Our cultures ingrain in us what we feel is normal, natural, right and good. We are rarely taught these things. Rather, they are caught. That is, we grow up within our cultures, so it is the very air we breathe. And we rarely, if ever, stop to think about what we’ve been breathing in all these years.

This can become a problem when we move to another culture, especially hoping to marry someone else from there.* We suddenly encounter or even collide against all the different values they hold. It is one thing when they visit the United States on “our turf” so to speak. But many Americans in the show flailed as everything began to feel abnormal, unnatural, wrong, and bad. 

These moments were the hardest for me to watch because cultures aren’t necessarily better or worse than others; they are simply different. One American woman had a baby in Ethiopia, and her fiancé was excited to bring her home to surprise her with a ceremony to honor her and their new son. The ceremony involved family members lighting candles and butchering an animal to eat and celebrate. 

The American mother was horrified, not feeling honored one bit. Her Ethiopian fiancé was shocked at this. It did not even register to him that he should have warned her before she arrived home to an instant animal sacrifice in her front yard. To him, it was not just normal, but good.

Even after several years in Brazil, I can encounter or collide with differing values, and I have to remind myself that what I am feeling in my annoyance is not right vs. wrong, but simply different vs. different. One time at a dinner I complained about “Brazilians doing the Brazil thing where they [insert cultural value/behavior that is just different, not necessarily bad].” 

Afterwards, my wife remarked, “Why did you say that to a Brazilian?” I had no excuse. It was a mistake. What else are Brazilians supposed to do other than act like Brazilians? 

Suppressing the Language of the Heart

Some of the Americans on the show could speak a little bit of their new country’s language, but none of them were fluent speakers. And even with fluency there remains the challenge of communicating emotions and feelings in a second language. The challenge is that it does not work very well, and that goes both ways. The fiancé on the other side of things also wants to share their heart in their own native language, not English. 

It’s no surprise, then, that when conflict occurs on the show, the person who knows English as a second language often switches naturally to their native tongue. It’s just easier that way because to speak another language fluently is to suppress our native language constantly, and it is hard to suppress anything in the heat of the moment.

Here, I lament the situations on the show and in my own life as well. As I continue to progress in acculturation and Portuguese, I want to share my deepest heart’s cry with Brazilians, but it just isn’t the same in Portuguese. I don’t speak it well enough to express such things elegantly or passionately. Perhaps one day that will change, but that day is not coming any time soon.

And this is where I marvel at the beauty of the Incarnation in which God was willing to send His Son to take on our human nature, to dwell among us, and to speak our language, even to the point of suffering and death. And His communication is universal to all of us: every tribe, tongue and nation. And so I share with Brazilians the Christ who shares with us all. 

No One Wants to Hear about Your Sacrifices

There is at least one moment for each American on the show when they express how upset they are that their significant other is not sufficiently appreciating all the sacrifices they have made to move away from America to be together as a couple. And without fail the other person doesn’t care. 

That sounds mean, and at some level I am sure they feel sorry for the discomfort of their fiancé. But in general the response goes like this: “Well, you decided to move here; this is what life’s like here. It’s my home. And besides, it’s not exactly a cakewalk for me either, trying to marry someone who doesn’t even speak my language or share my cultural values.”

My wife grew up in Kenya as a missionaries’ kid, and she has a different response to this than I do. She says it’s an American thing to talk so much about sacrifices. Maybe she’s right. Perhaps that’s part of the American cultural values we all breathe. But, American or not, as a missionary I need to realize that the people I minister to do not want to hear me bellyache about all the sacrifices I made to live among them. 

Once again, thinking of Jesus, He may have complained about others’ unbelief, lamented in the face of a loved one’s death, and cried out in his own pain and suffering, but the Gospels don’t include Him listing all the sacrifices He made to take on our flesh and dwell among us. Rather, Hebrews tells us that it was for the joy set before Him that Jesus endured the cross, setting aside its shame.

And that is the key. We have to think of the joys set before us when we move cross-culturally. Yes, there are sacrifices, but there are not only sacrifices, which leads me to my last point.

Consider the Cost

Considering all the challenges, especially if someone cannot work and is running out of money in their new country, many couples on this show don’t last longer than their 90-day or six-month visas. 

And to that I can relate because every cross-cultural journey is arduous. But where there is a team to work with, a support group to send, and a calling to answer, then there is also God’s grace, flowing deeply to all those difficult nooks and crannies that even fatuous love, and especially reality television, shudder to enter. 

And to that I give thanks to God!

*In this article I’m referring only to those on the show, not workers throughout the world who are married to nationals or who are in a cross-cultural marriage.

~~~~~~~

Brandon Jones grew up in Kansas City, married a missionaries’ kid from Kenya, and with her has raised three children both off and on the mission field. He served as a professor and pastor in the States for several years before becoming an international missionary in Brazil in 2018.

The Tyranny of Transition: How to Stay Awake for the Journey

by Rachel Allord

It’s all about the journey. At least that’s what we’ve been told.

Is it though? Anyone who’s bounced between continents, countries, or even cities may testify that sometimes we just want to get there. Move from point A to point B. Skip the hard stuff, the demands of packing and nausea and opportunities for personal growth. I’ll take the Dramamine, earbuds, and an uneventful journey if you please. And if I miraculously manage to fall asleep in transit, wake me up when we get there.

We are leaving London. After nearly eight wonderful, challenging, transformative years of ministry, we’re heading back to our home state of Wisconsin. We’re happy. We’re sad. We’re every emotion in between and a little off kilter because we’ve entered that ambiguous season of both belonging and not belonging to two worlds, of wanting to reside in two places which, of course, as limited flesh and blood people, is impossible.

I still love London; this wasn’t a casual breakup.

And we’re still here, carrying on in our little ground floor flat and walking our noisy neighbourhood, but we’re currently in the process of buying (by London standards) a roomy house with quadruple the storage space. We’re zipping along on public transport here whilst a recently purchased good used Toyota waits for us there. I get choked up when I think of leaving family and friends here, yet can’t wait to see family and friends there.

Here to there, there to here. Transitions can be brutal, demanding physical and mental energy that ordinary life does not. Some of that comes down to logistics.

Our aim is to cram life into nine bags or less, just like we did when we crossed the pond in 2018. Every little thing we own must be handled, assessed, and categorized: pack, pitch, sell, or give. We’re preoccupied with a game every pilgrim who’s set off for a new place has played: What’s it Worth?

Do we have room for all of those books? Is the teapot more valuable than the pub glass? Should we go for broke (hopefully not literally) and pack both? Space is limited. Every item needs to earn its spot, and that’s alright. Pilgrims are meant to pack light.

This transition season will end, of course. Packed poorly or brilliantly, we’ll eventually board a transatlantic flight and move ourselves from point A to point B. Realistically, we’ll enter a new season of transition because that’s how it goes. One transition bleeds into the next. But by definition, the word transition implies something temporary: a shift, a change, an invisible, interim tyrant that takes over our lives and emotions and resources. If only for a time.

The tyrant isn’t all bad. Change can be life-giving. New chapters are exciting. Parting with possessions can be liberating. Even so, after jostling along on ambiguity and adrenaline for a while, most of us long to land on solid ground, set up camp, and establish routine. Let our stomach and emotions settle.

In London, when your train reaches its destination, an automated voice on the loud speakers announces in no uncertain terms that the journey is over. “This train terminates here. All change.”

Get up, get out, grab your stuff and go. We’ve transported you successfully, now leave. No one is meant to live on the Northern Line.

Real life seasons tend to blur together. Pages stick. It’s up to us to pay attention and tribute to our endings and beginnings, to call out griefs and joys, satisfactions and disappointments. Scribble a journal entry. Mark the calendar. Toast a victory. Mourn a failure. Curate a prayer. Set a stone.

Jobs, addresses, roles, relationships, finances, health — it’s all up for grabs — can shift like sand, and getting through to the other side, going from this to that, comes with a unique brand of exhaustion. Change rumbles in like a roaring train, ready or not. It’ll take its toll as it sweep us along for a crazy ride.

So I am owning it. We are in transition. We’re preparing to transport ourselves transatlantic-ly, to transfer from a big European city to a small American town, to transplant our lives.

To strip it down to the root prefix: trans, meaning “across.” Crossing from here to there. Going from this to that, from point A to point B. In our case, from London to Wisconsin.

Across. Funny how adding one little space changes everything. Presto, you have a new word. A word that also points to change, to the ultimate story of transformation: a cross. Once there was a cross that changed everything.

We were stuck in our sin, far away from God, until Jesus’s arms stretched across those rough, wood beams and died in our place. Humanity had incurred an un-payable debt, and although that moment was transient, it was also final. For those who trust Him, our sins were transferred fully onto Christ and dealt with for good. He became the mesitēs, the mediator, the one standing “in between.” The bridge between us and God. Now sinner could be saint, orphan could become daughter.

His death led to our life. The veil tore, Jesus rose, and nothing was ever the same. The cross stands taller than any other event in history, the most consequential stake in the word’s timeline. But that moment, when our sin was transferred to Him? It didn’t come easily. Remember how Jesus prayed in the garden? How sweat dripped from His head and He begged God, Might there be another way?

Our struggles may be incomparable, yet our response to our own dark nights can be the same as His. Whether we’re facing a life and death situation or not, God says come to Me like Jesus — raw prayer, real emotion, hard questions, big fat tears and all.

Come to Me instead of falling asleep, instead of checking out, instead of wallowing in pity, instead of pretending it’s nothing.

Life is fleeting, and our afflictions might not seem light or momentary, yet for now we’re meant to be here, clinging to Him as He leads us through the unsettled in between, until He carries us there.

~~~~~~~

Rachel Allord currently serves in London, UK, and is the author of several novels including The Addie Brown Books, young adult fiction that explores all things related to TCK life. After eight years of living in London, she and her husband are transitioning back to the United States. She’s processing the transition through writing at The Laughing Pilgrim. To follow along, peruse her books, and explore how Rachel could connect with your book club, ministry, or event, head to rachelallord.com.

Riding the Tides of Cross-cultural Life

Rwanda, the country I’ve called home for the last ten years, is known as the “land of a thousand hills.” It’s become common amongst my expat friends to extend the name to fit our experience: “the land of a thousand hills and a thousand emotions.” It often seems that the stunning highs and paralyzing lows of this life echo the landscape around us, sometimes even in the course of a day. The tide-like quality of frustration and favor can disorient even the most steadfast amongst us.

This experience is far from unique. Life is unpredictable and dramatic in its range; life in Christ can make that spectrum even more pronounced. The life of following Christ to serve in a culture that isn’t your own? Buckle up, buttercup. 

In my work as a spiritual director, I am always on the lookout for metaphors that help me (and my directees) give language to the ways we relate to God and one another. A few years ago, I was stopped in my tracks by a beautiful poem on Instagram, and it has called me back periodically ever since:

Until I Thought of Myself as the Sea

“I used to separate good days from bad until
I thought of myself as an ocean. I used to
split times I felt strong from when I felt weak
until I imagined myself as the sea. Calm and
rocky, wild and soft, still and powerful and vast
and more than any one thing. In the ocean it’s
hard to divorce one mood from another, one wave
from the next. Now on my worst days, I think
of how good life is too, how I can still greet joy
while swimming through grief. How fragile
strength feels. How I’m not any one thing in any
one moment in any one day. I’m all of it and
All of it is me.”

-Hannah Rosenberg, Instagram Post

While not expressly Christian, Hannah’s words invite the reader into a sacred level of introspection and awareness through the metaphor of the sea. We can ask ourselves: Do I see myself this way? Do I afford myself this grace? Do I allow for the coming and going of the tides, as the Lord sees fit? Can life contain all of this, at once, and still be blessed?

Rosenberg’s poem has invited me to allow space for all of this to be a part of the life I’ve been called to: good days and bad days, greeting joy while swimming through grief. Days when I feel strong and days when I feel weak. Days when I feel like I am really making a difference for the Kingdom and days when I can barely get out of bed. Calm, rocky, wild, soft. When I think of myself as the sea, I can be all of these things, I can experience them fully, and they can all be sacred. 

A few weeks ago, I was once again left breathless by a short poem I found on Threads — and reading the two together leaves me deeply encouraged. 

The caption reads: I don’t name the ocean anymore. I just know the water is holy.

“My relationship with God
Is the tide
High. Then low.
Sometimes a dolphin shows up
Sometimes a shark
And yet — the water is always holy.”

-John Roedel on Threads

I’ll be vulnerable here: these days, I feel like I’m swimming in waters with sharks and dolphins. It can sometimes be difficult to tell which is which. One distracts me from the other. Joy and sorrow, grief and gratitude, all swirling about in water that sometimes feels murky and other times feels crystal clear. Is the water always holy? On my best, most steady days, I think so. On other days, I am disoriented and overwhelmed by it all. 

But this language, of sea and tides and dolphins and sharks and swimming through the contradictions, has become very dear to me. 

When I feel lost in a wave of culture stress and lack of clarity in my calling and career trajectory, I can take a moment and remember that this is but a wave, and it will recede. 

When a prayer is finally answered in a way that feels nothing short of miraculous, I can gaze in awe at this “dolphin” and praise what the Lord has done. I can embrace the playfulness and relish this fleeting gift.

When I feel attacks coming from all sides, and I know the enemy is seeking to destroy the good the Lord is doing, I can name the shark and punch it in the nose. (And ask others to help me!) 

When I find myself in a season that seems too good, too sweet, too blessed to last, I can take some time to float on my back and enjoy it all before the next wave comes in and knocks me off balance. 

How we experience God, how we move through this cross-cultural life, is rarely static or predictable. But, as John Roedel says, the water is always holy. Our Lord is working all things for our good. 

So friend, I invite you: take some time this week to pray about your life through this lens. Ask the Lord to teach you how to navigate the tides you are facing. Ask Him to show you the dolphins and sharks.

Spend some time floating on your back in the graces and gifts you find present in this season. And if the water feels treacherous and you can’t find the shore, remember: the tide will eventually change, and the Lord is always with you. 

Holy Disorientation: Partnering with God as He Transforms Us through Cross-Cultural Transitions

Reflecting on over two decades of cross-cultural transitions as a mission worker has shown me that whilst my family and I can endure complex moves across cultures, we thrive most in the settled season that follows them. We are well-versed in the all-consuming planning and packing for a cross-cultural move, the stress and anxiety of leaving behind the familiar, the uprooting from established relationships and rhythms, the upheaval to our house and hearts, and the complex logistics of flights and arrivals — in addition to various other cross-cultural changes and events that are equally disruptive and disorienting.

Cross-cultural transitions mean living in the ambivalence of both grieving and celebrating, endings and beginnings, living in hope in the midst of chaos, and rebuilding whilst in a state of holy disorientation. We endure transitions as a necessary evil, longing for the routines and stability that come months, or even years, later as we finally make the new life and culture our home. 

Writing with another cross-cultural transition on the horizon, I acknowledge that it is often only on the other end of the upheaval and disorientation of transition seasons that I notice that the Lord has been at work in me. It is in the chaos and disorientation of transition that I have drawn closest to him. 

Reframing Transition as God’s Instrument for Christlikeness

Rather than viewing cross-cultural transitions merely as a burden or a tiring journey to navigate as quickly and smoothly as possible, let’s also recognise their potential as sanctifying seasons. The Lord often uses cross-cultural transitions to grow us and shape our character to be more like Jesus in our everyday lives. Through transitions we are ‘being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory’ (2 Corinthians 3:18). Instead of willing the transition to end as quickly and painlessly as possible, let us name and accept the season we are in and seek to encounter Christ in it.

This grating iron-sharpening-iron of transitions can be God’s instrument in forging us into Christ-shaped new creations. Like other suffering or difficulties, transition friction can serve to refine our characters. In stripping away our self-sufficiency, transitions give opportunity for us to grow in dependence on Christ and others. In seasons of transition we are often required to surrender our preferences, desires, and knowledge as we integrate into a new culture. They require an emptying of ourselves, humility, and a teachable heart, making us open to His work. In the vulnerability of our transition grief, as with other times of suffering, we can be drawn into dependency and closer intimacy with Christ. 

Just as the Israelites grumbled against God in the desert—romanticising their time in Egypt and rejecting His daily provision—we often look back at the familiarity and stability of non-transition seasons through rose-tinted glasses. In our desperation to escape the upheaval and heat of times of transition, we miss the blessings of our current season. The forty-year wilderness journey was God’s instrument in preparing the community to trust in Him as they entered the Promised Land. As you navigate your current transition, what old habits, mindsets, or securities is God stripping away from you, and how are you learning to depend on His daily provision? 

The Spirit is at work, moulding us throughout the transition journey; our role is to posture ourselves with a receptive heart, ready to collaborate with Him.

Posturing Ourselves to be Shaped by God during Transitions

Spiritual practices for cross-cultural transition are the intentional holy habits, or spiritual disciplines we adopt, as rhythms that orient us towards Christ. When we think about spiritual practices for cross-cultural workers, what often comes to mind are Bible reading, prayer, and church attendance. Some might include fasting, hospitality, evangelism, serving, lament and fellowship, although there are many more. 

We can seek to co-operate with the Spirit’s work in us by practising these spiritual habits—and new ones. These habits have the added benefit of anchoring us in times of transition, offering routine and structure to a disorienting time of chaos. Their impact on our transition season, and beyond, as well as in sculpting our faith, depends on the spiritual exercises being practised regularly (daily, weekly, every time that…), intentionally, and consistently. Sometimes the encouragement and accountability of a church group, or a family member, can help us persevere.

I also want to suggest a few lesser-known spiritual practices for cross-cultural transition:

Examen: A daily prayer of reflection to look back, review the good and difficult of the day, and give thanks. In his book How to Pray: A Simple Guide for Normal People, Pete Greig suggests four steps to this prayer (with my clarifications added in brackets): Replay [review your day]; Rejoice [give thanks for its blessings]; Repent [confess sins and failings]; Reboot [learn from it as you step into tomorrow]. Writing these down in a journal, processing and looking for patterns over the transition season can reveal a lot about ourselves and help us to see God at work in the midst of the chaos of transition. Families and couples can also share the Examen together. 

Another way to practise Examen is to ask the same questions of ourselves each day over the transition period, such as: Where was God at work today? What brought me closer to God today? Where or when did God seem distant? What can I thank God for today? Asking these questions of our todays helps us to know how and where to re-orient ourselves towards Christ in our tomorrows, whatever phase we are at in the transition.

Simplicity: When making decisions about what to pack, what to leave behind or gift to others, and the way we want to live, we can choose to live simply, perhaps below our means. This is not only as a way of identifying with local believers, reducing our environmental footprint, resisting consumerism, or for incarnational living—although these are all very important to consider—but also as a spiritual practice of limiting ourselves. This could mean living simply and travelling lightly, buying local rather than filling up more suitcases, being content with an uncluttered house and lifestyle, and limiting ourselves as a practice in abstinence and self-control.

Celebration: It is a choice to recognise, remember, and rejoice in the fullness of all that God has done. Throughout the Old Testament the Israelites were commanded to celebrate as an expression of their faith and a way of keeping community (Leviticus 23:4). Thanksgiving services, celebrating milestones, and leaving parties are all important throughout missionary life and especially in ending well. We might feel embarrassed to draw attention to ourselves or our own achievements publicly. However, the spiritual practice of celebration is about magnifying the God who sustained us and His work through us. Teams can even help keep track of important dates and arrange celebrations.

Finding a Spiritual Accompanier (Director): Meeting through a time of discernment ahead of a cross-cultural transition with a Christian trained to listen and help us pay attention to God’s presence, discern the Holy Spirit’s leading, and grow in intimacy with Christ. Cross-cultural transition can stir a ‘holy disorientation’ in us by dismantling long-held understandings of our faith and challenging cultural assumptions about ourselves and God, as well as our role in what He is doing in the world. 

A Spiritual accompanier can help us reflect on a transition season by drawing out our responses to the following: When job titles, ministry successes, and cultural familiarity are stripped away, have I/am I truly placing my identity in Christ? Do I find my home and satisfaction in Christ, even when I am not in transition? Is my theology of suffering robust enough to sustain me when the initial excitement fades and grief, disorientation, and deep loneliness set in? While deeply disorienting, asking questions like these when reflecting on transition seasons forges Christlikeness in us by exposing our desire for self-reliance, revealing hidden weakness and sin, and leading us to see our need for absolute dependence on Christ. 

By practicing holy habits, we choose to look for God amidst the chaos of transition, posturing our hearts to receive from Him. When we intentionally seek his presence in the disorientation, we are drawn closer to His heart and likeness — and transition transforms from a dreaded cross-cultural shift into a sanctifying season to sit with and grow from.

Suitcases, Sacrifices, and Sending Well (reflections from the author of the new book, For Those Who Send)

by Heather Fallis

For Christmas during my senior year of high school, my parents bought me a set of luggage. I hadn’t asked for luggage, and honestly, I wasn’t quite sure what to make of the gift. My parents were probably thinking I’d take the suitcases on vacations and trips that always included a return ticket back home. And for many years that was the case — until 2015 when I boarded a plane with my husband and three children that would take us to our new home abroad.

Although we didn’t understand then how appropriate their gift to me on December 25, 2001, was, I look back at that moment and think how grateful I am that, even then, my parents were preparing to send me well. We just had no idea how far.

The Christmas of my oldest daughter’s senior year of high school, we followed in my parents’ footsteps and gifted her a luggage set. This time, however, we knew exactly how far we would have to send her. The gift was given with tears and a somber understanding that we would soon be living oceans apart. A few months later she packed those bags, and the day after her high school graduation, with a one-way ticket in hand, flew solo across the globe.

Having experienced both being sent and being the sender, I can honestly say the latter was harder.

I knew it wasn’t easy for our families to watch us pack up our lives in our passport country and move to the other side of the world, but until I had to do it myself, I had no idea how painfully difficult it really is. Becoming a sender gave me a new realization of what our loved ones had experienced.

When my family first left home to move abroad, we had attended training, studied, and prepared for this new career and step of faith. When we landed in our host country for the first time, we had teammates waiting to welcome us and help us navigate the new country and culture. When we had hard moments, we had a prayer team that was faithfully lifting us up and bearing our burdens with us. While it was just the five of us who got on that plane with passports in hand, we never felt alone.

I can’t say the same for our loved ones who sent us.

There was no training course to prepare them for sending their loved ones overseas. There was no team or community to come alongside them with understanding and experience, ready to help them navigate this new way of being. When they had hard moments, there was no group of supporters waiting for prayer requests and updates in order to bear their burdens with them. And though they did have friends and family who cared and knew it was difficult for them, as senders they did not have the same support and resources as we did, the ones being sent.

My parents’ gift of a suitcase was a tangible expression of their permission for me to spread my wings and soar. When I bought the suitcase for my daughter, I was giving her the same thing. It’s a noble and beautiful and right thing to gift to our children. And yet, I’ve learned that giving them that permission will cost you dearly.

I’m grateful for what my experience of sending is teaching me, and how it’s given me a deeper understanding of what those who have sent us all these years have sacrificed. As I’ve learned about the cost of sending, I’ve recognized that there are very few resources for those who send that validate their grief, affirm their sacrifice, and celebrate their role that is vital to global kingdom work. Since I couldn’t find the book that I wanted to be able to gift to the senders in my life, I decided to write it.

I know that one book is not enough to encompass the many facets of being a sender, and it won’t dull the ache of the airport goodbyes and the miles between loved ones. What I do hope is that it will be a companion in the grief and a guide in the vital role of sending and praying for those we send. Whether the reader is a parent, child, family member, friend, supporter, pastor, or acquaintance of the one they are sending, I believe they will find comfort and confidence that sending matters — and that they matter.

My Christmas suitcase showed me the joy of going and the sacrifice of being sent. My daughter’s Christmas suitcase showed me the grief of sending and the sacrifice of being a sender. What I’ve learned through it all is that we cannot be sent without a sender, both roles are essential to the Great Commission, both are infinitely harder than we think, and both are worthy of compassion and care as we live out our callings — sent and sender — for the glory of God.

For Those Who Send: Prayers for Those With Loved Ones Serving Abroad provides senders with a practical and applicable tool for expressing the challenges, losses, and sacrifices that come with supporting those we love as they settle in far-away places. Parents, siblings, friends, supporters, and all those who love and send global workers will find these liturgies to be a source of encouragement, as well as a way to cultivate communion with Christ in the joy and sorrow of sending.

With prayers for topics such as saying goodbye, missing their presence, reading a newsletter, making a video call, giving sacrificially, and spending holidays apart, every sender will be reminded that their role matters and that their sacrifices are seen and cherished by the Father. Now available on Amazon in paperback and ebook.

~~~~~~~

Heather is the creator of Liturgies for a Life Abroad, where she writes and publishes prayers for global sojourners. She and her family have made their home in the remote mountains of Southeast Asia since 2015. Heather co-authored Liturgies and Laments for the Sojourner, Volumes 1 & 2 and authored Crafting Liturgies for Life Abroad: A Guide to Processing Cross-Cultural Life Through Written Prayer. Her full author bio and other resources she has written can be found at www.liturgiesforalifeabroad.com

In Pursuit of Meaningful Memories During Home Assignment

As our family prepares to “cross the pond” for our next Home Ministry Assignment (HMA), we are experiencing all the familiar stress of transition: packing the house, packing the bags, saying goodbyes here, anticipating hellos there, and managing all the expectations on both sides of the world.

It’s a lot for a heart to hold, and a lot for the brain to process!

Amidst the necessary components of every HMA (such as speaking engagements, fundraising, attending meetings, etc.), we are also committed to prioritizing the pursuit of what is fun and memorable as a family, especially things that will help our children enjoy their passport culture as well as acclimate to a home country that is still somewhat foreign to them.

Our goal is to create meaningful memories during HMA: memories that are meaningful because they carry moments we treasure and/or because they help us navigate life in our passport culture.

During past HMAs, when our kids were younger, we pursued this goal in a variety of ways and discovered some amazing resources along the way which we plan to take advantage of again. This time around, as our kids are getting older, we’re also considering other priorities in addition to the familiar opportunities we’ve enjoyed in the past.

Here are five types of memory-making activities we’ll be pursuing—perhaps they’ll be helpful to you also as you plan your next home assignment.

1. Museums and Zoos

In the past we’ve made an effort to visit museums—art museums, science museums, natural history museums—for the sake of enjoying ourselves and learning at places we have little access to in our country of service. We learned that some museums are free while others have free days here and there, which requires some scheduling on our part but which makes it easier on the pocketbook for taking advantage of such offers.

During past HMAs we’ve also discovered that many museums and zoos are part of consortiums that offer free entrance or discounts at other institutions if you have a membership at one. It’s always worth asking what they offer. One year we bought a membership at a local children’s museum and discovered we had free access to several other institutions across the country because of it, which made for extra fun as we took advantage of the free access while traveling in between visits to churches and supporters. We fully intend to see what options are available to us this time around, too.

2. Public Libraries

Another vital resource has been the public library. Not only do we make regular visits to the library for the masses of free books at our disposal, but we also take note of what else they make available. Most libraries organize and offer free events on location, but they also occasionally partner with other institutions to offer even more. For example, we have sometimes gotten free tickets to museums (not only on the aforementioned free days) because the library loaned tickets to local museums, similar to checking out a book. Every location will have different offerings, but it’s good to ask what’s available!

3. Nature Centers and National Parks

Nature centers are another perennial favorite for our family. As we are home basing in a different location for this HMA, we are prioritizing the exploration of new nature centers and reserves that can provide the outdoor escape we all need.

Perhaps my favorite discovery which has created impressionable family memories when we’re in America is the National Park System’s 4th grader pass. Every Kid Outdoors offers families with a 4th grader (or homeschool equivalent) free access to national parks. As the National Park Service website says, “Every Kid Outdoors allows U.S. fourth graders and family members free access to over 2,000 federal lands and waters so you can discover our wildlife, resources, and history.” It’s so simple. Our family has already taken advantage of this opportunity twice during previous HMAs and has saved money while enjoying national parks as we traveled in between ministry responsibilities.

4. Sports Games and Concerts

This HMA we plan to take our kids to a football game—an American football game, not soccer, which is the sport they know and understand best growing up in Africa. As Americans, however, we come from a culture that highly values football and we feel like our kids would not only enjoy but also benefit from knowing more about the sport. At the very least we want them to understand the basics of the game and be able to participate in watching football with family and friends in a meaningful way. And so, in addition to gathering around the television to watch some games during NFL season, this HMA we’ll take them to a football game or two.

We’re also planning to take our kids to their first concert, which will not only be a fun experience for them but will also foster an ability for them to connect with peers about such things. Our kids have phased out of the children’s museum stage of life and are fully into a season of sports, music, and movies. We’re aiming to create experiences that will help them track with peers in our passport culture so that, someday, they’ll be better equipped to live and socialize in our passport culture if God leads them there.

Some of these examples are specific to our American context, but I recommend researching what resources are available to you in whatever your passport country is.

5. Establishing Regular Rhythms

It’s worth considering what’s worth investing in for the sake of taking care of your children (and yourselves) during a home assignment. Regular rhythms are of equal, if not greater, importance to establishing lasting memories. Things as simple as taking my son out for hot chocolate at a favorite coffee shop can go a long way in deepening our family ties in the midst of everything else demanding our time and attention. Investing time in catching up on particular movies and music will allow all of us to have socially intelligent conversations with people on that side of the world.

We will face the expectations and responsibilities of HMA no matter what, but we can choose how to spend our time in between ministry engagements and hopefully create meaningful memories along the way.

Instead of viewing it as a project—because maintaining a foothold in our passport country admittedly requires some work—we are focusing on the fun that awaits and the increased family time during a season when our kids have fewer friends on this side of the world.

There is time to walk around a nature center. There is space to visit an art museum. There is room to watch a football game and experience the hype of being in a cheering crowd.

There are meaningful memories within grasp. Our priority is to seize them.

Photo by Jessica Rockowitz on Unsplash

Embracing New Chapters, Trusting the Same Author

Hidden under a canopy of outstretched branches, I pause for a moment to take in the view before me. Layers of green intermingle as they nestle the banks of a gurgling creek. The rhythm is steady and reassuring as the cool water rushes over smooth stones on its way downstream. This is the first moment I have felt a sense of calm flood my thoughts and body in a while.

This week, my husband is the missions speaker at a summer camp he attended as a child and worked at as a teenager. He’s taken us for a walk to see the wooden bridge he helped his grandfather build when he was a boy and has shared many memories of his time growing up here. Our own boys are attending as junior high campers, and it’s been a stark reminder that a lot has changed in our lives.

It’s been over five years since I’ve been able to travel back to Pennsylvania and the first time our family has traveled back together. Spending the majority of the past decade ministering in Northern Uganda and journeying through a lengthy adoption process is where most of our story has been lived. And now that we are back “home” on our first furlough, embracing this space of unsettledness has been very overwhelming at times.

I have known the Lord and experienced His faithfulness in the wilderness of waiting, but in this season of transition I’m learning to trust Him in new ways. So, while enjoying an unexpected moment of quiet, a quote by Aljean Anthony dances around my mind as the water ripples along its merry way: “He’s carried you this far, hasn’t He? Don’t you think He could carry you even further? Trust in Him.”

It’s as if it has been bookmarked in my thoughts, a reminder for moments when I feel the unsteadiness of this land in between. I wasn’t expecting such a chaotic re-entry after spending so many challenging years abroad. My bucket list did not include three unexpected trips to the emergency room or a mad search for medication to treat a tropical parasite that’s not available in the USA. Then there were two weeks of sickness that hit our whole family, travel plans derailed, and the celebration of homecoming delayed.

After all I’ve experienced living a life overseas, I should be more accustomed to life not going according to my plan, but here I am again, wondering why.

I can list every time the Lord faithfully provided and carried us in our waiting season just as the Lord provided for the Israelites in theirs. He led them through the wilderness with manna, quail, sandals that didn’t wear out, water spilling from rocks, a pillar of fire, and the covering of a cloud. Yet, the story of the Israelites crossing the Jordan River in Joshua 3:15-17 offers encouragement to me right now.

The crossing of the Jordan River represented the transition from wilderness into the Promised Land. I’ve watched the Lord dry up the rising floodwaters in our life and allow us to walk through to the other side. But that doesn’t mean the next season will be perfect to make up for the former one.

For the Israelites there would be more battles to overcome, with plenty of challenges awaiting and numerous adjustments made for a new lifestyle — for their dependence on the Lord still needed to deepen. Yet even though the manna stopped falling as the Israelites entered a new land, the Lord’s presence, guidance, comfort, provision, and love never did. It just looked different.

The Lord promises to continue the journey with us, just as He declared to the Israelites in Isaiah 43:2, “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze” (ESV).

Maybe you are walking through your own Jordan River or standing at the edge of your “Promised Land” — whether it’s preparing move to a new country, transitioning back “home,” experiencing a big life change, celebrating ministry goals met, overcoming obstacles, or straddling a new wilderness of uncertainty. God’s presence is steadfast even when we waver in the challenges that come our way.

On the fourth morning of summer camp, we awake to a thick layer of smoke hiding everything, the blue skies overcome with heavy haze from fires burning elsewhere. It’s another reminder that while we may not know what’s coming or can’t see through the unknown, the Lord remains the unchanged, and the story He is writing is a good one. I can have peace as I enter this new chapter because I know the author.

Recently, I’ve been leafing through the stack of journals I’ve lugged back across the ocean. These journals hold the struggle, the worries, the laments, the prayers, the joys, and the praises over the past number of years. But mostly they declare the Lord’s faithfulness in my life. They serve as a reminder of how the Lord has provided in seasons of hardship and struggle.

How He restores what has been lost.

How He revives what is hopeless.

How He redeems what is broken.

How He rewrites our pain into His promise of an abundant life.

God’s glory is in the gold lettering of our story, chapter by chapter. And oh, how He has written and woven such a testimony of His goodness and grace into our lives. His purpose was penned long before I was born, and when I don’t understand or when all seems lost, still I believe that the Author of Life is at work redeeming my story and yours.

In each and every delay.

In each and every disappointment.

In each and every heartache.

The battle may be great, but God is far greater. All these years of wild words planted, hopes deferred, dreams surrendered, and in the promises restored, the Lord is faithful. I’m slowly beginning to make peace with the understanding that I may not feel as rooted during the next few months as I had hoped.

But in acknowledging that, I know that I am rooting deeper in the One who steadies my heart when everything seems unsteady. I am tethered to an anchor far more secure than any house, or person, or thing that brings comfort. He has indeed carried me this far, and He will surely carry me further.

Your Labor Is Not in Vain

Your labor is not in vain
Though the ground underneath you is cursed and stained
Your planting and reaping are never the same
Your labor is not in vain

There is a story in our family about my dad. He and my mom were on a home leave, having just finished their second four-year term in Pakistan. They were at a Christian retreat center where my dad studied during the day, taking required linguistic and Bible courses, and my mom took care of five children aged one to eleven. It was a lot.

My dad was tired and deeply discouraged. He and my mom had been living in Pakistan for ten years. They had come with one child and now had five. The toll of life in a remote area of a Muslim-majority country had caught up with him. The heat in the summer, living in what was at the time the hottest recorded area in South Asia; the absence of family and an English-speaking church to be a part of; the sense that no matter how hard you tried, you would never truly belong. There were team conflicts and cultural misunderstandings, dysentery, and children with broken bones.

But more than all this were the overriding questions in his mind: Does this matter? Are we here for nothing? What is the point of all this? Of missionary service? Of leaving all that is familiar? At heart, perhaps, he was asking, “Do I matter?”

My dad was ever the optimist. He was a stick-to-it, big-hearted, generous man. But his optimism had failed him. It was dead, somewhat like the desert ground where we lived in the Sindh region of Pakistan, brown and barren where nothing could grow. His heart felt the same.

It was during a morning study time while deep into examining the book of Acts that he experienced a breakthrough in his heart, soul, and mind. As he was reading about those missionary journeys so long ago, the ones that ended in shipwreck, hunger, and letters to tell about it, he suddenly saw himself as part of a bigger story, a story that began thousands of years before and would end in something so impossibly wonderful that no human could begin to describe it.

Yes, he was small. Yes, from the world’s perspective he was woefully insignificant. But his labor was not in vain. More than that, small as his work might be on the world stage, he knew without a doubt that he was beloved by a God who knew him.

Your labor is not unknown
Though the rocks they cry out and the sea it may groan
The place of your toil may not seem like a home
But your labor is not unknown

It’s this that comes to mind as I think of all of you. Sure, there are a few of you who might claim the word “influencer,” but overall, you are laboring without a lot of recognition. You may feel recognized at the occasional church while on home leave. For a brief hour you might feel famous even — your picture on the bulletin board with your kids looking halfway decent. Maybe you occasionally speak during the service when a pastor magnanimously gives up his spot, talking about the work, calling to mind God’s faithfulness even as you doubt all that you once knew.

Your work in Kuala Lumpur, Bangalore, Chittagong, Karachi, Bangkok, Shanghai, Jakarta, or a thousand other places may be filled with small, irritating difficulties or with major challenges. Divisions in your team, open hostility in your workplace, and insurmountable cultural differences may have you defeated. You may, like my dad, be thinking, “Why does any of this matter?”

Wherever you are, you are a small part of a massive universe.

Yet this is truth: you are a small part infinitely loved by God, and your labor is not in vain. Maybe your work is in Bible translation, and for weeks you’ve been stuck on three sentences as you translate from English to Greek to Brahui. Maybe you are a mom raising five kids, your hard-earned master’s degree languishing on a shelf while you pour yourself out trying to keep bugs out of the flour, humidity out of the house, and kids out of the hospital. Maybe you are a nurse working in the developing world wondering how on earth you can continue to function with so few resources. Whatever your situation, know this: your work matters, you matter. Your labor is not in vain.

The houses you labored to build
Will finally with laughter and joy be filled
The serpent that hurts and destroys will be killed
And all that is broken be healed

I write this piece from a place of transition — one of the many I have had through the years. My work in the Middle East ended abruptly with little warning, leaving me with dead dreams and deep grief. Since that time, amidst family crises and a global pandemic, I have slowly built a new career and a new place. All of that is now changing with budget cuts and family needs.

But whether in my passport country or overseas, throughout my life, there are times when I, like my dad, wonder if any of these matter. When doubt over the goodness and presence of God overwhelms me, threatening to control all I do and think. Yet, repeatedly, I have seen His goodness, His mercy, His grace in unexpected ways. In the dark, I have come to know it as God’s quiet whisper reminding me that nothing is wasted, that what I do, and more importantly who I am, matters.

So, as we wait for all to be made right, for our broken world to be restored, Christ at its center and evil defeated, may we know that the God who called us by name is with us, that our labor is not in vain.

For I have called you, called you by name
Your labor is not in vain

   

All lyrics © The Porter’s Gate “Your Labor Is Not in Vain.” Based on 1 Corinthians 15:38.

Humility Is Not a Doormat

“Apology not accepted.” 

It was the dumbest, most unreasonable email I’ve ever sent. It was 2010, and I hardly remember what happened, but I know I was fuming. The National French Exam hadn’t mailed my tests on time, and my students were at risk of losing something they’d worked so hard to achieve. Every year, they’d placed in the top ten regionally, and twice nationally, for French. Hence my venomous three-word email to whichever customer service representative had been assigned to Anna Danforth that day. 

There is no way forward with “apology not accepted” people. Conflict resolution becomes a dead end, and hope for forward movement dims. That day, I was the problem.

That email is a window into the beast that comes alive in us when we feel cornered. It’s when that fearful question creeps in, “What happens to me if this doesn’t go my way?” Maybe you’re not fuming at a customer rep—maybe it’s your teammate who took credit for your work, your organization that increased your fundraising needs (again), or your director’s endless conflict avoidance. 

The instruction to “live charitably” is a truth God knew that we needed spelled out. Whether in three-word emails, cold shoulders, or unexplained relational disruptions, He knew the arrogance we’d battle in our hearts. He knew the way we would destroy each other when the things we hold dear are threatened. 

Why is it so hard to live charitably when the direction of your program is on the line? To live in unity when your teammate is causing friction? To assign best motive to the person who pulled from your donor team? To let love cover a multitude of sins—not abuse, but annoyance—when that person interrupts you in every single meeting? Humility goes hand in hand with unity (Ephesians 4:1-7), but how do we get there in a broken world, in a broken church?

I was confronted with the why last week as I prepared for a Bible study on Philippians 2. Words I’d memorized in high school suddenly became distasteful. Have one mind? Count others more significant than yourself? Paul’s call to humility and unity grated on me, and for good reason.

What if the person demanding my humility is the one abusing power? 

I have my own scars from misuse of power by several in positions of authority in the church or Christian organizations. I know the feeling of being told not to “gossip” about leadership when addressing concerns and of cowering at the thought of losing someone’s support for speaking up when people in their care were being wronged. Before I knew how to be “innocent as doves and wise as serpents,” I worked hard to maintain humility, peace, and harmony at high costs—staying long past the point of harm to myself and others.

What, biblically, am I called to do in these situations? I had to know the answer. If you’re bracing yourself because you’ve been told that your resistance is a spiritual problem, here is what I learned.  

  • Humility does not call me to ignore evil (Ephesians 5:11, Isaiah 1:17).
  • Humility does not call me to be a doormat (Matthew 23, John 7:1-10, Luke 4:30, Acts 9:23-25).
  • Humility does not call me to trust without discernment (Proverbs 26:24-25, Proverbs 25:19).
  • Humility does not call me to preserve false peace (Galatians 2:11-14).
  • Humility does not call me to stay in abusive relationships (John 10:39, 2 Timothy 3:1-5). Dear missionary, this applies even if you’ll lose your entire ministry or half your support. 
  • Humility does not call me to enable manipulation (John 2:23-25, Titus 3:10-11).
  • Humility does not call me to accept spiritual coercion (Matthew 23:4, 1 Peter 5:1-3, Galatians 2:4-5).

Wrestling with what humility is not became a crucial step to understanding what humility is.

Humility is reasonable. Paul goes on to say, “Let your reasonableness be known to everyone” (Philippians 4:5). It’s the mark of someone rooted—someone who trusts in their core that God will supply all our needs (Philippians 4:9). 

Reasonable people aren’t easily threatened. They still face threats and loss, but differently. Their peace is staked on something bigger than a customer service rep’s reply or the appeasement of a self-preserving leader. 

Humility is caring. The patient unity we’re called to creates space for growth, for grace, and for mirroring our Father to each other. Caring people are patient with mistakes. They understand life is full of the curveballs—the twists and turns that shake us but also grow us.

Humility is confident. It’s remaining firm on core truths and holding things in tension. Confident people don’t need center stage. Their worth isn’t set in specific outcomes but in being grounded in truth while considering new angles and being curious about different approaches. 

Humility is discerning. That’s something I lacked both in my email and in every fight for false peace. The customer service rep who missed a deadline isn’t the same thing as your leader silencing your concerns. You may be fuming at both. But one deserves grace. The other deserves directness. 

That’s the humility I’m after—not a doormat, but a balance of grace and truth in the sticky situations of our lives.