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You Had to Be There (But You Weren’t)

by Jessica Albers

I never come home from Africa alone. I come home carrying stories. Not just stories. Histories. Experiences. Faces. There is a burden of responsibility, a weight of which I am acutely aware, that doesn’t translate neatly into conversation. It’s a quiet, but persistent disconnect.

People cannot fully understand what they have not experienced. The rational part of me accepts that. It’s not a failure of empathy; it’s a limitation of being human. We can do our best to overlap our experiences in an effort to find commonalities, something similar to anchor our emotional responses to, but even then, we will never quite find a perfect point of “getting it.”

There is another part of me — less tidy, more honest, that doesn’t settle so easily. The part of me still holding what I saw, and heard, and felt, and feel. My spirit is restless, carrying this tension between the two sides of this experience gap. Why aren’t you asking better questions? Why aren’t you pressing in just a little more? Why does this feel so surface-level when it is anything but surface-level to me? What do I do with all of this?

I’ve been here before. When my sister had cancer, people showed up with kindness. They understood cancer as a concept. Cancer is serious. Cancer is hard. Cancer is bad. But they did not understand what it felt like to live inside of it. The constant recalibration of life around uncertainty. The exhaustion of carrying that reality while everything around you continues as though nothing has changed. Every moment. Every day. For years.

As a child, I knew the experience gap. They just didn’t get it. How could they? And yet, when they didn’t respond to my frantic attempts to survive my reality with patience or understanding, anger bubbled to the surface. Why didn’t they try to understand?

You learn very quickly how to sanitize your story. You package it into easy-to-digest pieces. When a question is asked, and your lived experience wells up inside of your throat, screaming to be let out, but instead you swallow it back down. You hold it there. You pause for a moment to let your body reset as you smile and share that neat, clean, palatable message packaged appropriately for general audience consumption. Packaged for people who will never get it.

That internal tension. Knowing that full understanding wasn’t possible, yet still wishing, sometimes desperately, that someone, anyone, would try to get closer. That someone would step into the heaviness with me and try to understand. That they would ask different questions. That I wouldn’t feel so alone in something that so many people were aware of, but so few truly grasped.

I find myself holding these two truths at once. The gap is real. And the weight of carrying something that does not easily translate is real, too.

This is part of the human experience. People walk through grief, trauma, illness, moments that reshape them in permanent ways, and then they attempt to articulate those experiences to others who simply do not have the same reference points. We want to be seen. We need to feel understood; known by someone. It isn’t a lack of care that creates the disconnect. More often, it is the absence of shared experience. Without that, there is only so far understanding can go.

I’ve started to call this the experience gap — the space between what someone has lived and what someone else can meaningfully understand. And I am coming to terms with the fact that this gap cannot be fully closed. No matter how carefully we choose our words, no matter how many details we masterfully weave into the narratives of our experiences, there will always be some distance.

Before every trip to Africa, I ask God to open my heart and mind to what He needs me to learn. My job bridges a chasm of understanding. Here and there. There and here. This space where I am standing is isolating. On one side, I am listening to and carrying stories that are not mine. I am acutely aware of the fact that I am the one who is disconnected by my own lack of experience.

Because of that I am constantly wrestling, seeking, and searching. Am I asking the right questions? Do they see that I am trying to understand? Can they feel how much I care? How do I transfer these sacred stories, stories that aren’t mine, to an audience even further removed from those experiences.

This realization has been both clarifying, and at times, deeply unsettling. I’ve wanted to believe that if I could just find the right language, the right storytelling model, if I could just do my job better — understanding would follow. That expectation places a burden on storytelling that it was never meant to carry.

So I am reframing the goal. Perhaps it is not full understanding that we are after, but movement.

Not: Now you get it.

But: Now you are closer than you were before.

This shift changes how I think about telling stories, about communicating experiences that others have not lived. It asks less of the listener, but it also asks something different of the storyteller. Not to transfer the experience, that is not possible, but to build a bridge for connection. One that is honest. Specific. Grounded in real moments. One that allows someone to step toward the experience, even if they cannot fully step into it.

I wish that I could say that this new approach has settled my spirit — that I feel better, content, at peace. I don’t. A part of me resists this whole idea. I wish people could see what I have seen and heard as clearly as I do, feel it as deeply, and carry it with the same weight. That part has not gone away. I’m not sure it ever will, and I am honestly not sure that I want to be totally relieved of this discomfort. I want these things to change me.

There’s also something deeper at work in all of this. In Romans, we’re told that suffering produces perseverance, and perseverance, character, and character . . . hope. We’re also reminded that God comforts us in our troubles so that we can comfort others with the same comfort we’ve received.

That doesn’t make the experience easier, and it doesn’t resolve the tension of carrying things others don’t understand. But it does give it purpose. The very things that feel isolating are often the same places God uses to draw people closer to one another — and to Him — through presence, through empathy, through a willingness to step toward someone else’s reality.

We need to keep sharing our stories. Not because they will ever produce complete understanding — they won’t. We need to keep sharing because they make movement possible. A shared step toward one another, toward connection, away from islands of isolation. A narrowing of the distance, even if it’s small. That movement matters more than we often realize. It can shift people out of indifference and into empathy, out of distance and into presence.

Full understanding may never happen. But connection still can. And sometimes, that is what matters most.

~~~~~~~

Jessica Albers is a writer, communications strategist, and ministry leader with more than fifteen years of experience. She specializes in helping organizations and individuals communicate with authenticity and bridge the experience gap. Her writing explores faith, leadership, and the human experiences that shape us, with a particular interest in the places where personal stories reveal God’s presence and invite deeper connection with others. She lives in Texas with her husband and two children.

Sobs of Joy: Surrendering the Grief of Singleness on the Field

by Emma Bell

A few years ago, I flew back to the U.S. from my home in Thailand to be a bridesmaid in my dear friend’s wedding. It’s a common missionary experience. Occasionally, if the moment is dear enough to us that we just can’t miss it, we might fork up the money to fly back for such an important event.

As soon as I landed in the U.S., delirious with jet lag, I was swept up into the flurry of the wedding: getting nails done, preparing the bachelorette party, sleeping on an air mattress, squeezing in a trip to Chipotle. After just a few days of craziness, I found myself all dressed up, standing to the right of the altar with the other bridesmaids and watching one of my best friends walk down the aisle towards her almost-husband.

At some point during the ceremony, we all sang the song “You’re Beautiful” by Phil Wickham. I was already failing to hold back the tears, but they really started to stream on the last verse:

When we arrive at eternity’s shore
Where death is just a memory and tears are no more
We’ll enter in as the wedding bells ring
Your bride will come together and we’ll sing
You’re beautiful

I wanted to think that I’m just a sentimental person, that weddings are so beautiful and I’m just so tender, so that’s why I couldn’t keep my composure. But now, a few years later, I’m trying to be honest with myself: that moment was not only beautiful to me; it was also deeply painful.

I resent that singleness could make me feel pain. It feels embarrassing to care. It feels anti-feminist. It feels weak. I have spent years learning the gifts and the beauty of singleness and have preached it from the rooftops. I shout to anyone who will hear me, “Singleness is a valuable gift! Jesus was single! Paul recommends it! Marriage isn’t superior to singleness!” And I still stand by these things. At the same time, in my own experience, singleness has caused me deep grief.

I’ve been seriously processing my singleness since I was about twenty-four. At that age, it truly felt like everyone around me was getting married. I had two roommates who were planning their weddings, and that same year I was discerning whether or not overseas missions would be my long-term career. I imagined going overseas and being the only single woman in a missionary community of marrieds and their kids. I pictured the isolation on Christmas when others would celebrate with their families, and I would be alone. I pictured the humility of it — being regarded as less mature or less of a leader because of my single status.

[Praise God, most of these concerns have not been realized in the way that I had feared. God has given me wonderful friends—of both the single and married variety.]

It was age twenty-nine that singleness struck a new chord with me. I was twenty-nine when COVID upended my life. I found myself stuck in America, my home and possessions left behind in a country I had no idea if I’d ever get back to. Perhaps more importantly, I found myself living far away from my overseas team. I experienced, quite dramatically and suddenly, what I knew would come for me sooner or later: having to say goodbye to my teammates and closest friends — alone.

Because friends don’t come with a “till death do us part” promise, I parted ways with the friends I had come to depend on like family. I’ll always remember when I chose to relocate to Thailand in 2021, and my favorite married couple decided to stay in America and work on getting pregnant instead. They told me they would be exiting this next chapter of my life over a Zoom call. We stayed on the call and cried, hardly saying a word, for probably an hour.

About a month later, I packed my bags and joined a new team in a new country. The missionary life is full of goodbyes — goodbyes on goodbyes on goodbyes. But for single missionaries, it is uniquely difficult because we do it alone.

I saw a statistic once that said of all the single missionaries on the field, women make up 80%. This means a couple of things for us single ladies. First, it’s hard to meet someone out here. The odds are not in our favor. Second, I am mercifully not alone in my singleness. In fact, I feel more seen and understood where I live overseas by other single missionaries and single Thai sisters than I do back in my church community in the U.S. where it feels like everyone was married by twenty-three.

Are we missionaries because we are single? Do singles have more freedom to go to the nations than those who marry? That’s at least partly true. I can think of a few people who had dreamed of being overseas before they married someone who did not share that calling. So, are we missionaries because we are single? Or are we single because we are missionaries? Would I have met someone and been married with kids by now if I had lived in the U.S. for the last twelve years instead of Asia? Maybe. Not necessarily. I know plenty of single people who live in their home country.

Yet I find myself in a situation where my obedience to share Christ in an unreached part of the world appears to be at odds with my desire for marriage. I could “try” to meet someone, but again, there aren’t many options where I live. I could get online, but then I’d likely be meeting men who live somewhere else, so I’d have to be willing to at least consider leaving the field. Is my ministry calling more important, or is marriage? If a simple answer popped into your head, I doubt you’ve walked a mile in the single missionary’s shoes.

Singleness is a strange grief. It’s a grief that increases with time. I process it. I mourn it. I put it away for a time, only to take it out again and realize it’s grown bigger and changed shape.

I’m thirty-four now. Some days, singleness hurts. It’s not having anyone to bicker with. It’s the social smallness you feel in comparison to a couple. It’s a lack of physical affection. It’s having to build trust from the ground up all over again with another new roommate. It’s when your age is getting older and your life stage is the same as a recent college-grad. It’s the feeling of rejection compounded over many years. It’s when the conversation turns to pregnancy or kids, and I have nothing to contribute. It’s when baby showers have a new twinge of sadness and shame.

One night, lying in bed trying to fall asleep, my overactive mind stumbled upon a thought: What if God really loves me? A few days earlier someone had been praying for me, and as she prayed, she said this to me: “He loves you so much, Emma. He would do anything for you — just ask Him.” Those words stunned me. They felt so personal and specific to me. Days later, they were still ringing in my ears. Is she allowed to say that? How could she even know that that’s how God feels about me?

Yet I couldn’t deny that it had to be true. God’s Word says so over and over. Jesus said to his disciples, “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). And a few verses later: “Whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you” (John 15:16.) Romans 8:32 says, “He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?”

The idea that Jesus deeply loves me and takes care of me wasn’t brand new information, but that night, the Spirit allowed me to believe it in a way I hadn’t dared to before. I sat up in my bed and started to cry. I started to really cry. Sobs. I had to get a box of tissues. Sobs of relief. Sobs of joy. Sobs where my walls of self-protection were being dismantled. Sobs I thought I might have if a man ever told me, “I love you, and I choose you.”

And ever since then, I’ve consistently found it much easier to believe God really loves me. His love is not theoretical. It’s not just for theologians to muse upon. He is near to us. He heals our wounds.

When we arrive on eternity’s shore
When death is just a memory and tears are no more
We’ll enter in as the wedding bells ring
Your bride will come together and we’ll sing
You’re beautiful

I may never ever have a wedding day. I may have to continue dealing with my ever-expanding, ever-changing grief for the rest of my life here. But I will be at that wedding — the marriage supper of the Lamb (Rev. 19:9). Because of Jesus, I’m invited to be in that marriage. The marriage of which all marriages are but a dim shadow — the eternal union of Jesus and His bride, His people.

At that wedding, rejection and shame will fall off my shoulders as I am welcomed by the King himself. To be included and chosen on that day will far outshine any loneliness I’ve ever felt. And I know that on that day, when I finally see Him with my own eyes and worship Him alongside people from every tribe, nation, and tongue, no part of me will regret trusting God with my singleness. Not one part of me will regret putting my whole life into His hands. When I hear Him welcome me home, I won’t have any more questions.

~~~~~~~

Emma Bell has loved doing evangelism and discipleship with the unreached for ten years now — first in East Asia and now in Thailand. If you’d like to respond to this article, Emma would love to hear from you. You can contact Elizabeth Trotter, and she’ll connect you.

An Invitation to Help Improve Member Care

by Andrea Sears

For too long, people care and development (member care) for cross-cultural workers has been operating with no shared guidelines to shape our field. But now, the Shared Foundations Initiative at MTI (Mission Training International) aims to gather the voices and wisdom of the Great Commission community to work together toward thriving for cross-cultural workers. We are currently accepting submissions for the Thrive Outcomes Project, and you are invited to participate!

[For more information on the Shared Foundations Initiative, scroll to the bottom of the article below the author bio.]

This project seeks to answer the question: What does it take for a cross-cultural worker to thrive? As cross-cultural workers yourselves, you know what helps you thrive and what hinders your thriving. We want to include your voices in this important research.

We believe the Thrive Outcomes Project has the potential to:

add depth and clarity to what member care is and does,
strengthen organizational conversations,
help practitioners access quality thinking on how to support cross-cultural workers well, and
lay strong foundations for collaboration.

We cannot build this project alone. Would you consider contributing your voice and insights for the strengthening of cross-cultural workers? This is an evolving research endeavor, and we have published preliminary results from initial submissions, which you can check out here.

See what ideas are still missing or need to be strengthened, and submit your ideas here. We’re looking not only for your personal experience, but also for evidence from books, blogs, podcasts, or published academic research (when available) to support your ideas. This helps us to ensure that the results are strong, evidence-based, and credible, which will increase their utility to organizational leadership and care teams.

~~~~~~~

Andrea Sears and her husband, Seth, spent thirteen years in Costa Rica, working in the largest immigrant squatter settlement in Central America, and founded the community development ministry giveDIGNITY. She now runs the ministry from the U.S. and recently accepted a faculty position at John Brown University, teaching Intercultural Studies, Humanitarian & Disaster Relief, and Bible courses. She previously oversaw a missionary attrition study, which was summarized in a series here at A Life Overseas.

Additional information about the Shared Foundations Initiative:

The Shared Foundations Initiative (SFI) exists to strengthen the health, resilience, and long-term thriving of cross-cultural workers from Global North cultures by cultivating shared language, fostering alignment, and hosting thoughtful, collaborative conversations related to cross-cultural worker care and development.

Rather than prescribing uniform practices, we seek to offer ideas and examples of practices that could be done, to help organizations and individuals translate shared values into a lived reality within their specific contexts (denomination, organizational culture, organizational size, cultural context, etc).

Our vision is a Great Commission community in which quality care & development for those sent is consistently understood and practiced, contributing to the faithful witness of God’s love both to those sent and to those they are serving.

SFI’s vision is shaped by the following guiding commitments:

Unity without Uniformity
We affirm shared values and principles while honoring the diversity of organizational models, theological traditions, cultures, and contexts.
Field-Informed Wisdom
Guidance emerges from the lived experience, research, and discernment of practitioners and organizations actively engaged in cross-cultural worker care.
Non-Prescriptive Influence
The initiative does not set standards, accredit programs, or enforce compliance. Its influence is catalytic, invitational, and relational.
Holistic Understanding of Thriving
Cross-cultural worker health includes spiritual, emotional, relational, physical, vocational, and communal dimensions across the life cycle of service.
Learning as a Shared Stewardship
Knowledge is held as a commons to be cultivated, shared, and responsibly stewarded for the good of the whole field.

The cornerstone of our approach is applied research into what factors are helping cross-cultural workers to thrive. This research is conducted by researchers and practitioners that have come together to form the John Powell Institute (JPI) at MTI.

Finding Identity While Crossing Cultures

by Rebecca Lebens

We define ourselves both to belong and to be set apart. We identify with a place, a culture, a language, an age group, a profession. By our personality, attributes and abilities, by our roles, relationships and religion, we declare who we are and where we belong and why we are special.

Maybe because God met me when I was only five years old, drowning, to show me a ladder and remind me how to crawl—I never thought about creating my own identity back then. I was God’s beloved daughter, rescued from death for now and forever.

I didn’t set out to be a missionary. I asked God if I should be, but I didn’t think I had the personality or the ability for it. I enjoyed traveling and had some ability to learn languages, was extraverted enough to want to meet new people and to share God’s love with strangers, but I was afraid to ask for help and disliked “standing out.”

I hoped He would send me to countries where the people look like me and where I could learn the language well, so that my foreignness wouldn’t be noticed. Maybe I could have a normal job and just moonlight as a subtle advocate for the kingdom of heaven.

When I had the opportunity to study abroad in France, it perfectly suited my preferences and skills. I thought that was the start of my journey, where I would become an undercover religious ambassador. And I loved the way of life that I found there, even though I was surrounded by non-believers and constantly made to defend my faith and challenged to uphold my values.

I made plans to go back after graduation, only waiting on a green light from above. Instead, friends, teachers, and a persistent prompting from the Holy Spirit pointed me in the direction of southeast Asia, specifically South Korea.

Do you ever catch yourself making deals with the Almighty? “Okay, God, but then back to Europe.” He is so gracious — three times He sent me to Asia to work as a teacher, to grow my faith, and to share my love of God with others. And every time He opened doors for me to spend time in Europe after, an irregular sort of furlough.

I am on my third such furlough, and I recently I had to face my fear of being sent back. Since coming back to Europe, I was refusing to cook non-European foods, avoiding using non-European languages, pretending I wasn’t missing Asian dramas and Asian music and my faraway friends. I didn’t want to be associated with anything other than Europe. Like a billboard, I wanted to advertise to God with my choices that I could give up everything I like that is outside of Europe.

In return, He asked me: Where are you trying to belong? Do you belong to a country? To a language? To a certain church?

As a child, I knew I belonged to the God who cared enough to save me. My identity was His daughter; my skills were His gifts. Nothing else mattered. As an adult, I learned to appreciate other identities — and the comfort that comes from fitting in.

Everything I love about Europe also exists in Asia, except that I can pass for a local in almost any European country. I didn’t like being stared at in Asia, just because I look foreign. I didn’t like people asking, “So how long will you be here?” and then deciding whether to be my friend based on the answer.

I didn’t like the smallest word being treated as amazing — wow, you can say hello? And the longest speech being treated the same — wow, you can say all that? I didn’t like being constantly made aware that I didn’t belong, that it wasn’t my language, wasn’t my place.

But do you know what is beautiful about belonging to God? That identity stays true no matter where we are in the world. No matter what languages we speak or what roles we take, we are His children.

And maybe, sometimes, it is in the places where we stand out that His light can shine through the most clearly.

I am re-embracing that identity. It was never forgotten, only covered by other worries and overlooked because of misplaced hopes and fears. More than being unknown, or being known for something else, I would rather stand out for my faith. If I cannot be bold already because of a worldly desire to belong, how will I be bold about God?

Wherever I am, I want that to be my first identity. I do not want to define myself by other roles or traits or interests, or by specific languages or cultures, or as foreign or not foreign, but as a Christian.

~~~~~~~

Rebecca Lebens’s passport country is the US, but she has spent the last decade living from promise to promise, following God’s calling across ten different countries where she has worked as a teacher, studied languages, earned a master’s degree, and grew in her faith. Now she is using the knowledge she accumulated along the journey for her PhD research.

Mercy for Moms Who Doubt

by Aylin Merck

Recently I found an encouragement I had written for moms seven years ago. As I read it again, I was struck by the confident tone in it. While I believe now every word I wrote then, I think what strikes me most is how the parenting job description then seemed so clear compared to what it seems like these days.

When our kids are young, it is so tiring but also straightforward what we are supposed to do:

Change diapers – check
Feed them 6 times a day – check
Make sure they are safe – check
Keep their closet stocked with the right kind of seasonal clothing – check
Play with them, read them a book, snuggle – check check check

But as they grow out of childhood and become teens, our job description becomes less precise. Discipleship moves toward coaching. Our kids’ needs in some ways also become more complex, and for moms of TCKs and neurodivergent children, that is especially so.

Navigating our children’s insecurities, moods, dating sagas, depression that won’t lift, relentless anxiety, loneliness, and potential need for accommodations while also honoring their agency tests our confidence to do this job.

For someone who has historically found belonging through usefulness and emotional safety through not missing the mark, the ambiguity of parenting teens in really difficult waters can make me feel faint of heart. When my words don’t seem to help my child, when the transitions mount faster than we can process well, when my window of tolerance has shrunk, when I don’t have the answers to their deep doubts, I want steady ground beneath my feet, the kind that used to come from the confidence I was exceeding, or at least meeting, the standard. If I can’t have that confidence, am I even the right person for the job?

And is there joy for me here? When the wins are not easily obvious. When my kid is angry at me or feels terribly misunderstood by me. When the proverbial report card from my teen kid seems to be “E” for effort. In those times, can I still breathe in deep peace and exhale deep trust?

A few years ago, as I read Matthew, a little phrase in the Great Commission caught my eye:

Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” (Matthew 28:16-20)

The original eleven disciples had spent extended time with the Risen Christ by the time Jesus instructed them to meet him on this mountain. They had eaten with him (Luke 24:30-32; 42-43; John 21: 13-14), had touched his scars (John 20: 26-29), and heard him explain the prophecies made about him. He had opened their minds to understand Scriptures (Luke 24:45).

And yet, when they came to him in this scene, some doubted.

I will someday thank Matthew personally for preserving this. Even as some saw the Risen Son of Man with their actual physical eyes, they doubted. Thankfully, Matthew also preserves Jesus’ deep mercy offering them both his presence and power, inviting them to partner with him in the job of reconciling all things to himself.

In his gentleness and lowliness of heart (Matthew 11:28-30), he offers the same promise to all of them:

I am with all of you, always — when you are sure of me and when you are not, when you fumble in the dark and when you know exactly what to do, when you see me clearly, and when you don’t — I am with you always, to the very end of time. (Matthew 28:20, paraphrased)

Jesus knows that among those who follow him, there are some who doubt his presence, his nearness, his power and therefore question this mission to make disciples (or at least his mission as it is entrusted specifically to us). Yet while it is so easy for us to be moms (and disciple makers in general!) who doubt, this is the ground beneath our feet: we have been baptized into the Triune God. He has brought us into his life, deep friendship and mission.

Belonging to His kingdom does not come from usefulness or from meeting the standard but from existing in the world in his name. Our confidence comes from the certainty that all that He is is ours and enough — truly enough — for all that he has called us to.

Doubt easily becomes a staying friend, its voice loud, persistent. And while doubt is a needed part of faith, I am learning that there is a rock under my feet, a refuge that keeps me safe when the path is slippery, foggy and dark. That even when I doubt my usefulness, capacity, resources to do this job, I still belong among those who are called to make disciples and live in the name of the Triune God. This is the peace that is not like the world gives: knowing that somehow I am okay and will be okay no matter the outcome of my parenting efforts.

Our meeting the standard is not how Jesus fulfills his mission through us. His will is done in me when I throw myself at his mercy, and by faith and united to Him, trust him with each weakness, failure and sin so that he can live through me with all his authority, power and presence.

As we make disciples in our Jerusalem, right at home, our dear friend Jesus comes alongside us. He is our king, who commissions us to join him in his redeeming work, the work that reverses every impact of the curse, starting in us.

He enters each broken piece of our story, and by invading it with His resurrection life, His glory shapes us more and more, heaven comes to earth, and mercy gets the last word.

~~~~~~~~~

Aylin Merck is a soulful and contemplative human who lets those traits color everything she does as a wife, mama, writer, coach, and soul care and trauma care provider. A Dominican-Palestinian, Aylin holds a rich cross-cultural perspective, having not only immigrated to the US but also lived in the Middle East with her husband and family for almost ten years. Expat life in many ways fits her like a glove. She thrives in collaboration and mutual partnerships, in companioning others in their healing journeys and in experiencing friendship with the Triune God through Jesus Christ. Her soul grows three sizes whenever she gets to read by a lake, savor laughter and heart-to-heart conversations with kindred friends, and listen to rain with a Highlander Grogg latte at hand. You can find Aylin on Substack.

Learning to Stay (a TCK story)

by Sangita Shresthova

I never thought I’d be the kind of person who put down roots. Having grown up between Nepali and Czech cultures, I have always thrived on change — the desire to leave, to be open to new possibilities, and discover something new. For decades, I was always on the move. Colombo, Ahmedabad, Brussels, Frankfurt, Berlin, Boston, Prague, Kathmandu. I didn’t just adapt to transience; I sought it out. Home was wherever my suitcase landed. Rootlessness felt like freedom.

Then, somehow, I settled.

It didn’t happen overnight; it crept up on me. I fell in love. I had a son. I grew to care about my son’s school, the community around the church children’s choir he joined, the trails our family hiked together, the coffee shop that always got my order right, the streets I biked, the neighbors that waved.

Slowly, quietly, place began to matter. One day, I realized that I had somehow unpacked my suitcase in Altadena, California. Don’t get me wrong, I still sometimes imagined leaving, but for the first time, these desires didn’t rise to the deafening levels that had pushed me to move on before.

And then, on January 7, 2025, everything changed when Altadena (our Altadena) was destroyed by the Eaton Fire. Overnight, sixty percent of our town burned down, and the places I’d come to love disappeared. The coffee shop, the park, the trails, my son’s school and church. Though our home (thankfully) survived, we were not able to return for months, and when we did everything was different. I was overwhelmed and surprised by the depth of my grief. I had lost places before by leaving them, but this was different: the place itself had disappeared.

Through the pain, I felt my old instincts return. I was prepared for this moment, I told myself. My cross-cultural upbringing had taught me to adapt and move on. I know how to start over. I know that rootlessness can be a strength. And so, my first impulse was to do what I had always known how to do: leave and start again somewhere else.

But then, I also remembered what I had learned about the power of connecting (really connecting) to a place and committing to being shaped by geographies as much as cultures. I also thought about my now eleven-year-old son and his emerging Czech, Nepali, Indian, and American cross-cultural identity. I thought about how much his church choir community meant to him.

I realized that I wanted him to know that staying in a place is just as meaningful as having the courage to leave it. I wanted him to understand that resilience can take many shapes and that his cross-cultural upbringing does not mean that rootlessness is his destiny.

So, despite a strong urge to pack those suitcases, my family and I decided to stay (for now) and become part of Altadena’s long journey to rebuild. I committed to being part of the local community, to holding space for what Altadena may become. I make it a point to visit the restaurants and coffee shops that remain. My son composed a song about Altadena to perform at local events and wears his Altadena tee shirt with hope.

I have adapted and embraced change, while staying in place to grieve for what we have lost, knowing it will never be the same. Through it all, I have learned that living across cultures can teach us how to adapt, move on, and let go. But it can also teach us something I am still learning: how to stay.

~~~~~~~~

A Czech-Nepali mother, writer, former dancer, and current professor at the University of Southern California, Sangita Shresthova currently lives in Altadena, California. She recently published The Cross-Cultural Parenting Handbook, to share what she learned about parenting across cultures through her conversations with more than thirty cross-cultural parents and caregivers.

The Challenges of MK Re-entry

by Elina Placentino

“Look, it’s snowing!” I cried.

“That’s not snow, it’s sleet.”

The reply from the front seat of our family car was enough to dampen my enthusiasm. I was eight, and we had just moved back to Finland for the first time. And although I didn’t realise it at the time, that was when I discovered that I was a foreigner in my parents’ home country. Although my passport was Finnish, my perspective on the world around me was not.

For my parents it was a return to something familiar, but not for me. For me it meant moving to a new world where winters were white, children were independent, and the general culture was reserved.

Unsurprisingly, the move took a toll on me. It played out in various ways, including causing anxiety and disruption in sleep patterns. In fact, one night my parents caught me almost walking out of the house in my sleep!

Re-entry is a process that may look simple on paper, but there are multiple issues that complicate it. If a child has spent a lengthy period of time abroad and has no memories of living in the passport country, the stress of transition can be considerable. It can further be heightened by the degree of difference between the countries in question, due to very practical changes connected to climate, food, language, and cultural norms.

Re-entry is also a demanding process for missionary kids, since they are commonly expected to adjust to their passport country, to appreciate it, and to sense a heart connection to it. After all, they often grow up hearing their parents speak of their passport country with affection and even nostalgia. Thus, when returning to their country of origin, parents may experience a sense of delight and even relief, whereas a child is likely to experience enormous stress and even dread.

And there is plenty to be stressed about. Nothing is familiar. There is the question of schooling, with its new subjects, systems, and requirements. There is the issue of friendships, with a very real risk of becoming a social misfit or a social chameleon (ready to change one’s behaviour in a desperate effort just to fit in). What was once seen as perfectly normal and polite behaviour (e.g., avoiding looking an adult in the eyes) is sometimes seen as bizarre.

And, as I realised in my early adulthood, unlearning deeply engrained cultural reflexes is a time-consuming process, particularly for children who return to their passport country in their teens. It requires a high degree of self-awareness that can cause teens to live with constant self-evaluation and criticism, further contributing to heightened stress levels.

Missionary kids returning to their passport country frequently feel like foreigners while not looking physically different. This creates its own set of difficulties, as people around them expect culturally appropriate behaviour and fluent language from them. Thus there is simply less margin for mistakes.

And yet, no matter how much missionary kids try to adjust, it is unlikely that they will fit into their passport country after spending extensive time abroad. Accepting this may be challenging, particularly for parents or relatives — and these experiences can even create conflicts within the family.

These conflicts can, in turn, be further aggravated if missionary kids begin to drift away from their faith. After all, missionary kids returning to their passport country are often challenged by the different worldviews that they face around them.

This is where parents need to be aware of their children’s needs and strive to meet them ahead of time, where possible. Although missionary kids need to have space to ask questions and explore different worldviews, they also need biblically solid support, pointers, and encouragement in the process.

In an attempt to help missionary kids navigate the great questions in life, I recently published a lighthearted romcom about a seventeen-year-old missionary kid returning to her mother’s country, Finland. The Diary of…Who Am I Again? explores re-entry, apologetics, and questions of identity with humour. My hope is that it will provide young people with pointers for their own journey — and someone to laugh with. For, as most of us know, there is a good deal to laugh at in the blunders that missionary kids experience!

Re-entry guarantees a time of turmoil, and our children need to know that they are not alone, that there is space for their emotions, and that there are answers to their questions.

~~~~~~~~

Elina Placentino is an adult missionary kid, author, and homeschooling mother. She creates Christian worldview content for children and teens. In her free time, she enjoys being outdoors or snuggling up in an armchair with a book and a cup of tea. Her book, The Diary of…Who Am I Again? is now available on Amazon.

Looking for a Place to Call Home

by Val Robb

As our plane descended into Auckland, I stared at the arrival card: “Answer this section if you live in New Zealand. Otherwise go to 2B.” I glanced further down the card to section 2B: “Answer this section if you DO NOT live in New Zealand.”

The form blurred as my eyes filled with tears. At the moment, I didn’t live anywhere. Our family was returning to New Zealand after over five years in Beijing, leaving a home and life we loved. Moving out of our apartment just days earlier already felt like a lifetime ago.

Leaving hurt. My husband had thrived in his job at the university. We enjoyed deep friendships with both locals and expats. Ministry opportunities had grown. We loved our international church. However, for education and health reasons, we felt God was closing this chapter of our lives.

As the plane landed, I felt rootless and displaced. Originally from Canada, I had embraced New Zealand as home in the past, but five years away made it feel foreign to both me and my Kiwi husband. Coming ‘home’ to no physical home also felt strange. My husband’s parents were kindly hosting us for a few days, and then we’d be house-sitting while looking for a place to live.

Having sold our house before moving to China, we now faced the reality of Auckland’s sky-rocketing house prices. We considered buying but soon deemed the market out of our reach. Friends warned us that rentals were hard to find, especially large homes like we needed for our six children. My stomach tightened when I heard that multiple people vied to rent each house and sometimes even bid each other up.

Before searching for a rental, we took a brief break at a rural holiday home called Emmanuel House. The name reminded me that God was with us. As we strolled the nearby beach, the salty air and rhythmic, rolling waves soothed my restless spirit.

The Creator brought to mind the verse He had impressed on my heart in Beijing: “Oh, how abundant is your goodness, which you have stored up for those who fear you and worked for those who take refuge in You” (Psalm 31:19 ESV).

“Hey, Mom, here’s a gift for you.” My oldest daughter presented me with a bumpy purple and white shell. On it she had written, “Remember–if God so houses molluscs, will He not house you? Do not worry. Matthew 6.”

Smiling, I gazed at the shell. Its simple beauty encouraged me to trust the Shell Maker, and I thanked Him for His abundant goodness in the gift of a faith-filled daughter.

I reflected on God’s faithfulness to our family throughout our many international moves. Each one had involved enormous changes and emotional turmoil. Each confirmed that my “citizenship is in heaven” and that my true home is in the never-changing, ever-loving heart of God. Cupping the shell, I imagined the insignificant little mollusc safely housed inside amidst wild ocean breakers. Surely I could trust such a compassionate Creator with our family’s needs.

Back from our holiday, we scrolled online for five-bedroom houses for rent. Only three options came up. One looked dilapidated. The next exceeded our budget. After repeated failed attempts, we finally connected with the agent to see the last possibility. While waiting to view the house, we discovered several Asian supermarkets in the nearby shopping area. Chinese signs, the familiar sing-song sounds of Mandarin, and the aroma of Asian spices made us feel at home.

My heart filled with hope as we viewed the house. Despite a quirky lay-out and dated decor, it boasted an ocean view and convenient location. The kids were enthused about the spacious deck. We immediately filled out the forms. The next day, as we completed the paperwork to make this house our home, we heard another client had applied. We had signed just in time.

The transition still took time, and my emotions often lurched like a roller coaster, but we now had a place to call home. God’s kindness in details like the view from the kitchen window, nature walks nearby, and a heat pump for cold winter days moved me to tears.

After settling in, I put the treasured shell in a prominent spot on my dresser as a reminder of God’s faithfulness. Many years have gone by since then, including multiple moves. Still the shell reminds me of my kind and faithful Father whose heart is my ultimate home.

~~~~~~~

Val Robb met her Kiwi husband in Canada while completing an education degree. Their family moved to Auckland in 1994, the first of 13 international moves so far. Homeschooling six children while living in New Zealand, China, Canada, and America has provided plenty of material for her to write about! Val has taught workshops for parents and writing classes for children on three different continents as their family travelled for her husband’s university job. Now that she’s completed her 25-year homeschool journey, Val offers coaching and workshops to encourage homeschooling parents. She blogs at www.inspiringwriting.co where she loves helping parents strengthen relationships with their children while growing their kids’ writing skills. Val is the author of the upcoming book, Walking Together: Grace-filled Guidance for your Homeschool Journey.

TCKs and the Power of Presence

by Brandon Jones

I’m at a theatre in Brazil with my daughter, Monica, who is just a few months away from finishing high school here in Brazil and moving away to start college in the United States, a country that does not really feel like her home. But, then again, neither does Brazil. At least all the way.

Our afternoon movie was Rental Family, which features a man named Philip who is an American actor that has spent the last seven years in Japan. During that time he’s picked up enough Japanese to get by, booked some gigs, and settled into an apartment from where he can watch so many neighbors. But all the time he’s alone.

For my daughter and me, this movie was quite the experience as we are in our eighth year in Brazil, have picked up enough Portuguese to get by, have settled into an apartment from which we can watch so many neighbors, along with their dogs. But we’re also kind of alone.

In the movie Philip often has conversations that mix English and Japanese as he fits in quite often in spaces and places, but yet he also always stands out. The cross-cultural stuff, however, is in the background of the movie. What stood out more to me was the theme of presence and how as humans we were created to be in the presence of others and gift those others with our own presence. There’s power in our presence, and the business Philip begins to work for, the rent-a-family business, cashes in on this power for better or for worse.

In some ways Philip is perfect for the part. Of course, he’s American, so he’s asked to fit western roles. For seven years he has also been trying to figure out how to be present in another culture that he will never fully understand. But above and beyond every culture is the same, universal human nature that creates it. And above and beyond us humans is the God who created us for presence, no matter how many apartment buildings or norms exist to keep us compartmentalized and apart from one another.

As the movie goes on this theme of presence collides with the question of honesty. Is physical presence all that powerful when it’s based on an act or a lie? Yes and no. The movie does well in letting us see Philip’s journey, introducing us to fascinating characters, and at the end letting us sit with the ambivalence of how presence, honesty, and relationships all intertwine, whether that be in Japan or any other part of the world.

Sitting there with my daughter, I realized the movie wasn’t just telling a story about Japan or rented relationships, but was gently pressing on something deeper within me.

Rental Family is not a Christian movie, but its characters and themes reinforce the Christian doctrine of the Incarnation. There is power in God’s presence with us. And that power would certainly be diminished were it based on some lie, were some of those ancient heresies true after all that Jesus wasn’t really God and really one of us, but some imposter merely playing a role—our Rental Savior.

As cross-cultural missionaries our whole family has dealt with feeling like imposters from time to time. Our passports say one country, and our Portuguese accents confirm it, but our hearts are torn. We may never truly feel what a Brazilian feels, but we’ve lived here long enough to talk like they talk and even think like they think às vezes (sometimes). And while this is true for my wife Marci and me, it’s even more true for Monica and her little sister Olivia, who have spent a majority of their developmental years in Brazil.

Monica is present in this humid, densely populated place, and its emotive people have shaped who she is. But she’ll never be Brazilian, even if her Portuguese accent is better than mine. Yet as she preps to “return” to the States, she doesn’t feel all that American either. Sure, she’ll look and sound the part, but the contours of her character have been permanently pressed by Brazil.

There’s a phrase for kids like Monica and Olivia: Third Culture Kids (TCKs). In a way they can “mostly belong“ in more than one culture, while not fully belonging in any of them. And so they are really their own third culture that is a mix of the two. Their mom was also a TCK from Kenya whose heart, in her own words, “always beats to the rhythm of an African drum.”

Philip, the movie character, and I are different from them. We grew up in just one culture and were formed by it before moving abroad. He’s from Minnesota, and I’m from Kansas City. Yet, culture has its way of seeping in through the cracks, so even though guys like us take on things from our new culture, it’s different than being formed by it — we can keep things more compartmentalized.

Toward the end of the movie Philip opens up about his regret in not going back to America for his father’s funeral. He never says why he didn’t go, even after showing up to the airport with his ticket in hand. There’s complexity to such things. His relationship with his father was not great. But there’s also ambivalence about “going home” for guys like Philip and me. There’s familiarity there, sure. But there’s also the heartache of familiar strangeness (or is it strange familiarity?) as well as the difficulty of yet another goodbye.

As our family looks ahead to prepping Monica and even Olivia for their re-entries to the States, a temptation is to let the laments of future losses pile up and rob us of our full presence here in Brazil. We must guard against it. We must also guard against giving our daughters the message that the culture they are returning to is worse than Brazil or just plain wrong. As we learned before coming to Brazil: cultures are neither right nor wrong, just different.

Marci and I have hopes and prayers for our daughters as they re-enter that they can come to peace with “mostly belonging” while they are in the States, and, looking back to Brazil, will see their unique journey as a bonus instead of a detriment.

Monica was recently asked to reflect on her experience as a TCK, including its pros and cons and said this:

Being a TCK is very difficult. No matter where I am, I am missing something from my other world. No matter how much I have in Brazil, I still miss my family in the US, and I still know that I will always be a foreigner in Brazil. I have dealt with jealousy of people who stay in the same place their whole life, but I moved past that, as I would never give up my life for the world.

Being bilingual is definitely one of my favorite things about being an MK [missionaries’ kid], as I have unlocked a new way of expressing myself. I have also learned valuable lessons about how to lose, grieve, grow, and thrive. I find my experiences of learning how to create my belonging in unfamiliar places very useful. I also like the uniqueness of my story.

Even though people who aren’t TCKs can’t understand me, I still value my unique experiences. To have your own third culture that’s a mix of both worlds is priceless. To mix languages and cultural norms from two distinct places is fun, and it’s a part of me. Looking back at all the hardships, I find what I’ve gained to be more than what I’ve lost.

As our family continues to split further into two hemispheres, the power of physical presence will remain a sore spot in my soul. Like Monica, I too feel that pull of longing to be with family in the States and treasuring my time there. But, at the same time, my home is not there. It’s here in Brazil. And it’s familiarly strange for me to be here, even after seven years. And that’s okay.

Hebrews has long been my favorite biblical book, and even more so since I moved to Brazil. Although there aren’t a lot of people who can understand my daughter or me, Jesus can. And Jesus is enough. I’m thankful for His presence. It’s beyond powerful. And it’s no act or lie. The family of God is not for rent.

~~~~~~~

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 Great Unknown: The Risks and Joys of Cross-cultural Marriage

by Hannah Blankenship Herrera

I remember singing the lyrics to Hillsong United’s “Oceans” in my middle school chapel, begging the Lord to “lead me where my trust is without borders” and “take me deeper than my feet could ever wander.”

“You call me out upon the waters / The great unknown where feet may fail / And there I find You in the mystery / In oceans deep my faith will stand,” I sang, probably acutely aware of the pleated uniform skirt hugging my waist in an unflattering manner.

I imagined this “great unknown” to mean some exotic mission field, perhaps an unreached people group on a desert island, where He would call me and I would bravely go.

There has since been controversy over Hillsong’s theology, and I’m in a faith tradition that doesn’t use that song for corporate worship. But young me meant those words with all her heart.

In college, deeply burdened by the stark racial divides in my American Deep South upbringing and university life, I prayed earnestly to “be a part of unity in diversity in the church.” I meant those words too, and years later, God answered me—in a far more literal way than I ever could have imagined.

In August of 2025, I married my husband David, an Afro-Latino Colombian I met on a mission trip in high school. We had no idea the Lord would weave our cross-cultural friendship into something more, but it’s been the adventure of a lifetime.

Our wedding was a transcendent celebration — guests of all colors and ethnicities praising, dancing, and singing side by side. Raindrops mixed with flower petals as we walked back down the aisle, and a breathtaking double rainbow graced our exit. It felt like a taste of heaven.

Before getting married, we carefully weighed the costs. We knew we would face challenges other couples wouldn’t. There is so much unknown in any relationship, but especially a cross-cultural relationship. There are millions of experiences that shaped his childhood that I will never understand. He grew up taking a cart to a water hole in the mornings, and I grew up in the suburbs.

There are values and understood norms that we stumble upon and learn only by crossing. Even though we speak each other’s languages, there are still references, jokes, and nuances that are hard to grasp. I’ve had people tell me they don’t think they could be in a cross-cultural relationship for all those reasons.

Visiting my husband’s rural coastal hometown is a perfect visual of these differences. The simple task of arrival is no simple task for me. On one recent occasion, I threw up three times in his backpack on a ten-hour overnight bus ride. Then, to get back, we had to cross the river in a handmade wooden boat that carries vehicles and people across through a pulley system. (Quite literally I was out upon the waters, praying the barge wouldn’t fail with a massive van, motorcycle, and us on it.)

But once we are there, it’s always worth it. His church friends have embraced me as their own. His mom delights in serving us the most wonderful home-cooked Caribbean food. We walk fifteen minutes from his house in our chanclas to the coast, and we are often greeted with the most stunning, fuchsia-infused sunsets spread across the entire horizon, throwing vivid oranges and pinks onto the waters below.

Normally, the vastness of the ocean and the mystery of its depths feel frightening to me. But on one of these occasions, as we stood hand-in-hand gazing at the sky, I was struck with a thought: the unknown can be beautiful. The vast mystery ahead of me was breathtaking, stunning in its splendor.

I realized that was my life, our marriage. God had called me into a great unknown where my feet could easily fail, but in His mercy, it was far more beautiful than I ever could have imagined. And as the song says, His grace abounds in deepest waters, and His sovereign hand will be my guide — every step of the way.

David and I have our differences. There are things we work through that other couples don’t. Sometimes it’s frustrating. Sometimes there are tears. Overabundant communication is a must. We’ve already faced challenges, and I’m sure there will be many more.

But his infectious exuberance, his perceptive wisdom, his unwavering support of my dreams, the energetic dancing he sweeps me up in, his huge smile, his kind eyes, his soft heart, make it all so very worth it. Despite our drastic disparities in upbringing, ethnicity, and culture, I have always felt known, seen, and safe with him. In fact, I feel that our similarities far outweigh our differences. Because above all, our primary culture is one we do indeed share — our faith.

I work in university ministry in Colombia, and when students find out I’m a gringa married to a costeño, their curiosity has no bounds, paving a path for me to share about the covenantal love of Christ towards His church. Hearts open to me in ways they never would have if I weren’t married to someone from their culture. And if or when we do move to my hometown, I pray our relationship will be a quiet statement of hope for racial unity amidst so much division.

My message is this: The unknown can be scary, and you do need to carefully consider the risks of walking out upon the waters. But don’t let that prevent you from seeing how breathtakingly beautiful it is.

His sovereign hand will be your guide.

~~~~~~~~

Hannah Blankenship Herrera is a university ministry worker and freelance journalist living in Medellín, Colombia with her husband, David. She is a regular contributor to Christianity Today where she covers immigration and Latin America. Her most recent article for The Dispatch focused on cross-cultural couples separated by the U.S. travel ban. For more of her writing, follow her on Instagram @hannahherrera or X @HannahReneeB.

The Price of Integration

by Stacy Eubanks

A few days ago, I stood in the middle of my pineapple patch just above the equator, tears of grief streaming down my cheeks as I gazed over the wall of our compound and reflected on the last few years. The grief was over my impending departure from a land and people I have grown to love.

When I arrived in Cameroon, full of hope and eager anticipation to get started on the mission to which God had called me, I had no idea the journey on which my Lord was taking me. The first six months were rough. For eight weeks I did not have a car and had to rely on teammates for every single outing. It was then that this independent woman began to learn dependence.

Next came culture shock in its various forms, the most difficult of which was realizing that I am “without honor” as a mature single woman in a culture where honor comes to women solely through marriage. A search for significance ensued, but I was not competent in ways valued here, and my areas of competence seemed null and void.

Then came the heart-shaking reality that the national church was not interested in the primary ministry in which I was sent to engage. Perhaps I had missed God? But He had given too many confirmations to conclude that. It was suggested to me that I consider requesting a transfer to another country where I could be more useful. I thought about it. Cameroon had been the last country on my list, and I only reluctantly agreed to come after some encouragement to trust God in this placement.

I decided to stay, to set down roots, and to bloom where I had been planted. It was then that God gave me the strategy for my first missionary term, the strategy that He would use to open hearts, melt barriers, and grant me favor that would eventually turn into honor despite my marital status. “Be with them,” He said. I understood that to mean that I should “be with” them in every way possible. And so it began.

Three Januarys ago I started going to 6 a.m. prayer service at the church I had only recently decided to regularly attend. I left at 5:15 every single day for three weeks, driving into town and quietly listening to exhortations from pastors and elders who were leading prayer each day. That caught the attention of the senior pastor, who pulled me aside one day to remark about it.

Prayer is a high priority for African Christians, and let’s just say that American Christians aren’t known there for our prayer prowess. I simply told him that I wanted to be with the church and with Cameroonians, in prayer and in everything. “On est ensemble,” he said. “We are together.” It was not the first time, nor certainly the last, that I would hear that phrase, and I was yet to discover the deep meaning it carries.

Being with people means doing life with them. It means traveling together when, where, and how they travel. It means riding in cramped public buses and cars with my luggage on my lap for ministry trips, learning to negotiate taxi fares from throngs of competing passengers shouting on busy city streets, and even riding motos to places cars cannot access.

It means eating what they eat, sleeping where they sleep, and speaking at 3 a.m. in all-night prayer meetings. It means learning how and what they celebrate, learning and using their languages, and wearing their clothes. It means attending birthday parties, weddings, and funerals, dancing with them and mourning with them.

“Being with” means not being in a hurry but willing to sit outside and crush leaves and palm nuts or wash dishes in the sun while repairing cultural misunderstandings or talking through life’s challenges. All these things say, “I am with you, on est ensemble.”

Being with people in these ways opens their hearts to you. They see that you want so much to know them that you are willing to become like them. It’s unusual and curious to them, and it makes them want to know you, to know why you are driven to integrate in this way. Paul said, “I have become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some. I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share with them in its blessings” (1 Corinthians 9:22-23).

There is a price to pay for integration, though, and you must count the cost. It can alienate you from your colleagues who may not do it to the same degree or in the same ways. It can result in nationals making unhelpful comparisons, and you must guard your heart and become deaf to these. Integration opens doors to places you may not be prepared to enter where cultural traditions and rites intermingle with Christian practices in a cauldron of syncretism that can challenge your interpretation of Scripture and send you back to your Bible to sort it all out.

Integration also means that your life becomes closely connected with their lives, and your heart with theirs. It means you love and are loved, and that these people become your people. It means that the way you perceive and think changes; it becomes less like your birth culture and more like your host culture.

It means that when it is time to go “home,” you feel instead like you are being ripped from your home and community. You realize that it might mean you don’t fit anymore in the place you came from. It means that a few days before you depart you could find yourself standing in your pineapple patch, shoulders heaving, tears streaming because you are leaving home to go . . . home?

You know, as you gaze over the wall and observe your neighbors carrying water in large buckets on their heads from oldest to youngest, that nothing is the same where you are going. You know that the people you left behind years ago will have gone on with their lives, as you have also had to do.

The climate, food, sounds, smells, driving, clothes, customs, and rhythms of life will be different there, and you will have to learn to reintegrate without losing what you have gained on this side of the ocean. The truth is that people are lost in darkness on both sides of the ocean, and that means you will need to again become like those you are going to, in order to save some.

This is the price of integration.

~~~~~~~

Stacy has lived in Spain, Peru, France, and now lives and serves in Cameroon, Africa. She works in the areas of theological education, compassion evangelism, women’s ministries, and discipleship.

Crossing Cultures for Love

by Ruth Potinu

“Where you go I will go,” our pastor read on our wedding day. “Where you stay, I will stay. Your people will be my people, and your God my God.”

I hadn’t yet been to my husband’s homeland. We’d met while both doing cross-cultural work outside of our passport countries. I was excited to meet his family and start the work that we felt God calling us to. Once my visa came through, two months after our wedding, we left for a two-year commitment that has since turned into living in my husband’s home country for the last eleven years.

The honeymoon stage got me through language learning, adjusting to cultural differences, and being the only expat living in his village. It can be isolating at times, and yet I am so grateful for my husband’s family who are now my family. The gift of being accepted and protected through marriage is something I don’t take for granted, especially in a country that is not my own. We ended up settling in the capital city, and my husband’s church accepted and welcomed me there as well, becoming family away from family.

As an MK who never knows how to answer the question, “Where are you from?” I love that my kids can say that they are from the country where we serve. They have cousins and a grandmother here. I love that my husband’s village has now become my village, and while that can come with its own pressures and expectations at times, it also comes with so much support and a safety net that allows me to live in this beautiful, but often complicated country.

But while cross-cultural marriage comes with so many blessings, it can also hold heaviness. There was a moment when covid-19 was ravishing the globe that travel restrictions became so intense that I wondered if we would ever be able to travel again, as a family, to my home country.

I watched many cross-cultural workers boarding planes arranged by the US government to get them out of a country known for a having a weak medical infrastructure. For me, getting on one of those planes wasn’t really an option as it would mean leaving my husband behind. In fact, even our scheduled furlough didn’t happen that year when the airline contacted us to say the flight we had already booked would now not be happening.

I cried ugly tears one day as restriction after restriction made it harder and harder for non-citizens to enter the US. Would normal travel ever open up again? Was I really ready to give up the opportunity to see my biological family? That felt like too big of an ask.

I love the work that we are able to be a part of. I love my family in country, but I also love my family who live oceans away. Jesus words in Luke 14:26 suddenly held so much more weight: “If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—such a person cannot by my disciple.”

It’s easy to say you’re willing to give up your family in theory, but a much different feeling to actually come to a place when you might actually have to live that out. “Help, me. I don’t think I am strong enough” was and often is my silent prayer.

Eventually doors for normal travel did open again. Relief comes, and you savor every minute that you can with those who live far way. There is sacrifice as grandparents on one side of the planet get to spend quality time in person with their grandchildren while those on a different side of the globe do not get that as often. Missed milestones like baptisms, school programs, and birthdays hold such a mix of joy and hard. I’m thankful for technology, but only so much can be experienced through a screen.

Covid is in the rearview mirror now, but just last month our host country was added to a list requiring high bond fees for non-citizens to travel to the US on a visitor visa. I already heard of one friend in a cross-cultural marriage whose visa application was denied after this new requirement, and their planned furlough is now in jeopardy. Constantly changing visa rules and restrictions have a way of adding stress to so many cross-cultural marriages.

And yet, here we are thankful for the love we have that reached across borders. I am thankful for a love that gives our children identity in some areas even though it can give confusion in other areas. We have a love that comes from opposites attracting, and now we must daily figure out how to live a life together. I’m thankful, and it tests me. I’m grateful, and it’s hard. I love getting to live such a culturally rich life, and I pray often for God to give me the strength to live it well in spite of the heaviness that it can hold.

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Ruth Potinu works alongside her husband in his homeland of Papua New Guinea. There they seek to minister to the vulnerable, especially widows and their children. She is the author of Permission to Mourn: Engaging with Culture, Story and Scripture in a Quest for Healing with Hope. Ruth loves watching her four kids grow up, connecting with friends (preferably over a good cup of chai), and writing whenever she can carve out the time.