Category: Missions Theory

Is a Call to Mission a Call to Abandon Our Families?

When we as missionaries visit our partnering churches on “home” assignment, people are enthralled by our stories, and we’re often lauded for all we’ve given up. But there’s a potential dark side to our sacrifice — one that we must talk about openly if we hope to avoid the mistakes of those who’ve gone before us.

The problems were there right from the beginning. As William Carey, the “father of modern missions” prepared to set out for India, he promised his wife that if she refused to accompany him, he would rip their eight-year-old firstborn son from her care and take him along, alone. Dorothy capitulated. After one of her younger sons died in India a year later, Dorothy began to suffer from paranoid delusions.[1]

Although a colleague sought medical help for his struggle with depression, William avoided seeking medical advice for his wife and instead confined her during her outbursts. Not surprisingly, this only seemed to aggravate her condition. She would die of a fever fourteen years after first arriving in India.[2]

More than two hundred years later, we’re still struggling to understand how to care for both our ministries and our families. Not long ago, I spoke with an elderly man who had been a missionary. He told wistful stories of how he brought his wife and children to the mission field, and then neglected them “for the sake of the gospel.”

“Did I do the right thing?” he asked. “I wonder sometimes. I told myself that I was doing it for God’s kingdom, but now I’m divorced and one of my daughters detests Jesus.”

I’m sure you, like me, have heard similar stories many times. Are we missionaries doomed to have bad relationships with our families? Is that the price of following Jesus?

THE INFLUENCE OF PSYCHOLOGY

Our human relationships impact our relationship with God more than we realize. We tend to project a variety of traits onto God — traits outside of the ones He shares in His word — based on our relationships with other people, especially our fathers. We may project our parent-child experiences onto God the Father, both the good and the bad. The results can be devastating. If our fathers have abused, manipulated, or abandoned us, we find it easier to read manipulation and abandonment into our experience with God.

This also impacts how we interpret our calling. Abandoning and neglecting our families becomes part of the “sacrifice” of becoming missionaries. We don’t like it, but we do it in the name of obedience, while misguided missionaries and churches cheer us on.

Soon, cognitive biases come into play.

  • Sunk cost. We have spent so long believing something is true that the cost of rejecting it (and potentially rejecting our own past decisions and behaviours) becomes too high to consider.
  • Confirmation bias. We most notice verses that appear to substantiate our beliefs while overlooking those that disprove them.

This isn’t intentional; these are natural biases we all possess, but we must combat them if we want to live in the fulness of grace and truth.

BIBLE VERSES THAT APPEAR TO JUSTIFY ABANDONMENT AND NEGLECT

We may use a few Bible verses to justify abandonment and neglect. And yet — is there more going on here than meets the eye?

1. Leaving Everything Behind

Peter exclaimed, “See, we have left everything and followed you!”

Jesus responded, “Everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life” (Matthew 19:29).

But what did Peter mean when he said he’d left everything? Peter had given up everything, and yet he went back home. He went back to his mother-in-law’s house when she was sick, and asked Jesus to heal her — and Jesus did (see Luke 4:38-39).

Incidentally, tradition holds that Peter lived in Capernaum. Jesus visited and stayed in Capernaum frequently. Could it be possible that He stayed at the houses of Peter and his relatives? In any case, Jesus frequently passed through Capernaum; Peter likely saw his family often.

2. Leaving the Dead

When a prospective disciple came to Jesus asking for deferred discipleship so he could bury his father, Jesus responded, “Let the dead bury their own dead” (Luke 9:60, NIV).

What if Jesus’ statement was not about skipping a funeral, but about challenging us to not delay following Him in favour of some abstract eventuality? If we’ve done any sort of fundraising, chances are good that we’ve encountered people who decline to donate because they’re saving up money, or perhaps they’re hoping to have a baby sometime soon.

Of course, it’s their prerogative whether they want to give or save their money. However, our futures have no guarantees. What if Jesus’ statement is really asking us not to put our potential usefulness for the kingdom of God on hold while we wait for an abstract possibility that may not happen for many years?

3. Hating our Families

Later on, Jesus turned to the crowds following Him and said, “If anyone comes to Me, and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple” (Luke 14:26).

Let’s keep in mind that this passage is directed not only to missionaries but to all people who call themselves followers of Christ. It’s a call to follow Jesus wholeheartedly, not just out of idle curiosity. It’s explaining the requirement to love Jesus above every other person.

This has nothing to do with hate. After all, the Bible tells us the second greatest commandment is to “love your neighbour as yourself” (Mark 12:31). Instead, this has everything to do with the magnitude of love we have for Jesus. This does not mean that we are indifferent to our families; this does not mean that we are indifferent to their suffering or their pain. This does not mean that we abandon or neglect them. This means that we subject our love and care of our families to our love of Christ.

We obey Christ, yes, but we make sure we provide for our families as well. We may have to get creative in how we go about it. Providing for our families may require us to give up some of our dreams or forgo some of the ministries we would have engaged in if we were single. But we trust that God will use our limitations to showcase His glory, and we don’t treat our families as an impediment or a grudging afterthought.

BIBLE VERSES THAT EXPLICITLY TEACH AGAINST ABANDONMENT AND NEGLECT

There are also quite a few areas of the Bible that actively disprove the idea that we should abandon or neglect our families.

1. Jesus’s Behaviour

When Jesus was on the cross, dying, He gave His apostle John the responsibility of taking care of His mother (John 19:26-27). This was the oldest son’s job in Jewish culture, and Jesus had passed it on to John. The implication is that Jesus had been fulfilling His familial duty up until that point.[3] No one can take care of our spouses and children the way we can. They still depend on us, not just financially but emotionally and spiritually. Following in Jesus’ footsteps, we cannot ignore or dismiss their needs.

2. Paul’s Admonitions

In the act of becoming spouses and parents, we sign on to a set of obligations: the obligation to care for, to cherish, to protect, and to nurture our loved ones. These precious people have been entrusted to us—by God. We are their family. No one else can care for them the way we can.

The apostle Paul remarked on this in one of his letters to the Corinthian church:

I want you to walk free from worry about these things. A man who is not married can give all his time to please our [Lord]. But a man who is married will have to give more of his time to the things of this world in order to please his wife. It is the same for a woman who is not married, or for a young maiden. They are able to give all their time to our [Lord], to keep their body and spirit holy and pleasing to him. But a married woman will have to give more of her time to the things of this world in order to please her husband. (1 Corinthians 7:33-34, First Nations Version)

The Bible does not make these responsibilities optional. It takes for granted as a foundational assumption that once we are married, we are obligated to please our spouses.

Paul later goes on to say, “But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever” (1 Timothy 5:8). Dare we go out to proclaim the gospel as missionaries while simultaneously denying our faith and embracing a status “worse than an unbeliever”?

3. Teaching on Corban

Looking at the apostle Paul’s biblical teachings on marriage and family, it’s clear that God expects us to attend to our families and spouses with great care. If we use our calling as missionaries to avoid doing this, we are engaging in the practice of Corban: treating our obligations to our family as having instead been donated to God. The Pharisees engaged in this practice, and Jesus castigated them for “invalidating the word of God by your tradition which you have handed down” (Mark 7:11-13). Jesus would castigate us, too.

MESSENGER AND MESSAGE

In the West, we’ve grown accustomed to our mentalities of taxidermy and classification. We feel that we can separate and categorize different actions and behaviours. For example: how I treat the church is different than how I treat my family.

In the Majority World, however, this does not hold. The Majority World sees people and relationships much more holistically. The people we’re witnessing to watch our interactions with our family, and this becomes part of our witness. I can’t tell you how many times our Japanese friends and acquaintances have exclaimed in surprise when my husband Peter gets up after a meal to clean the dishes.

I continue to be startled by the number of Japanese women who come up to me privately and whisper the question, “Do you and Peter ever fight?” Of course we do, and I tell them so. But the harmony in our relationship seems to have a significant impact on the people around us.

Over our past fifteen years of ministry in Japan, we’ve come to realize:

The messenger is part of the message.

What we do with, and to, our marriages and families matters. Jesus told us this Himself: “By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35).

Our love for our families as well as the family of God is one of the strongest witnesses we can have. As my Japanese language teacher recently said to me, “We Japanese are not convinced by arguments. We are convinced by how we feel.” If they are not attracted by our love, they will certainly not be attracted by our logic.

THE FINAL QUESTION

Dorothy Carey has been derided as “weak-minded” and “deplorably unsuited” to be William Carey’s wife,[4] but we do the world of missions a great disservice if we disregard William’s coercive tactics, abuse, and neglect towards her. These things mattered — to Dorothy, and to God.

I suppose the only question that remains is: do they matter to us, too?

 

NOTES

Unless otherwise indicated, all scriptures are taken from the NASB.

[1] This might have been attributable to adult cerebral malaria (which can cause cognitive impairment, dementia, and neuropsychiatric symptoms) as easily as to a mental illness. Malaria is most prevalent in children up to 5 years of age. The son who died was 5 years old. Cerebral malaria is contractable by adults who have not built up an immunity to it, including those who have recently moved between continents. (See https://www.cell.com/action/showPdf?pii=S1471-4922(25)00040-6)

[2] Simonetta Carr. 2022. ‘Dorothy Cary and Her Struggle with Mental Illness,’ Place for Truth, https://placefortruth.org/dorothy-carey-and-her-struggle-with-mental-illness/#_ftn5 [accessed 29 August 2026]

[3] A nuanced look at how we can take care of our parents while engaging in mission is a discussion for another day.

[4] Carr 2022: Dorothy’s Legacy.

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Originally from Canada, Valerie Limmer lives in Okinawa, Japan, where she’s served as a missionary with her husband since 2011, partnering with the local church to focus on outreach and discipleship. Their Japanese pastor calls them “bridge-makers,” facilitating relationships with the community. Valerie is the author of Captive Set Free: How to Find Freedom Through Forgiving and On the Potter’s Wheel, a memoir of disability on the mission field. To learn more about her work or to read more of her articles, visit peterandvalerie.com/OurBlog.

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.

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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.

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.

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.

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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:

  1. Unity without Uniformity
    We affirm shared values and principles while honoring the diversity of organizational models, theological traditions, cultures, and contexts.
  2. Field-Informed Wisdom
    Guidance emerges from the lived experience, research, and discernment of practitioners and organizations actively engaged in cross-cultural worker care.
  3. Non-Prescriptive Influence
    The initiative does not set standards, accredit programs, or enforce compliance. Its influence is catalytic, invitational, and relational.
  4. Holistic Understanding of Thriving
    Cross-cultural worker health includes spiritual, emotional, relational, physical, vocational, and communal dimensions across the life cycle of service.
  5. 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.

Why Do People Follow Jesus?

When I was nineteen, my mom converted from Christianity to Judaism. This sent me on an intense, all-consuming search. I wanted to know the truth, no matter the consequences. Was Jesus the Messiah or not?

My search was long and exhausting as I scoured the Old Testament, read books, and prayed. But my journey was worth the work when it finally led me to a deep and abiding faith in Jesus. 

So when I sat down to interview Sovath, a former Buddhist and Khmer Rouge survivor, I thought I was ready. He too had diverged from the religious path of his mother. I thought in some small way I could relate to his journey.

It was Sovath’s wife who had originally asked me to write his family’s story as a narrative nonfiction book.

“It’s just too miraculous not to be a book,” she had told me. So, with her initial notes in hand, I traveled, interviewed, and read about the Khmer Rouge genocide. Despite the trauma of remembering, Sovath and his siblings recounted their amazing story. 

Everything was going great. Until we came to the very question I thought I could relate to.

“Why did you decide to follow Jesus?” I asked. Ever humble, Sovath mentioned that he had been initially attracted to the extra food and clothing the church distributed. He was taking guitar and English lessons at the church. There was nothing else to do in the refugee camp.

Then he stopped talking.

Knowing Sovath is deeply religious, I tried other questions. 

“What really convinced you?” “How did you know it was true?”

Sovath described the meaningful discussions they had at Bible studies. The agony of knowing he might hurt his mother if he followed Jesus. The way Jesus appeared to him in a vision at the very moment of his greatest confusion.

I wrote furiously. Yet I still wracked my brain for the question that would help me tell the more important story: Why did Sovath choose Jesus?

We ended our interview without an answer. Over the coming months, I prayed about how to write Sovath’s story. I thought back to my years as a missionary in India. For many Hindus, truth is seen as an illusion. This sounds like fancy philosophy, but it trickles down into the worldview of many ordinary people, too.

Buddhism came out of Hinduism, I remembered. What if Sovath’s struggle to follow Jesus was very different from mine?

The next time we met was one year later, and I had a new question: “What made choosing to follow Jesus difficult for you?”

I learned that Sovath’s deepest question was not about the truth at all. In fact, he believed what the Christians taught was true long before he accepted Christ as his personal Savior.

Instead, Sovath’s questions were all related to identity and loyalty. Is Jesus just for Christians, or for all people? Who am I if I’m not a Buddhist? How do I relate to my family and society as a Christian? Is it more important to be loyal to my parents and my country, or to my Creator? 

Once I realized identity was such an important piece of Sovath’s story, I understood the conversion of two of his siblings, too.

These siblings asked the Highest God for a miracle. And He answered. Not only by saving them from certain death, but by giving each of them a new identity. 

Chantana felt she had no voice when the Khmer Rouge treated her like an object to be destroyed. But Jesus heard the cry of her heart and called her His daughter. 

Vudh and Nary, defiantly loving and caring for their young family under a dangerous and brainwashing regime, later found themselves blessed and beloved in the family of God. 

Sovath was torn from his family at eleven years old and forced to work. He almost starved. But God brought him back to his family in time to escape death and ultimately showed him the way to eternal life.

In the end, searching for the right question helped Beyond a Thousand Shadows to represent a little less of my worldview and a little more of Sovath’s. And it reminded me of the importance of understanding the Most Important Questions of others — especially of those who are engaged in the agonizing search for an answer.

 

Read about what God did to save Sovath, Chantana, Vudh, Nary, and their family in my newest book, Beyond a Thousand Shadows.

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.

Stop Burning Out for Jesus

by Valerie Limmer

Jesus once told a parable about ten bridesmaids — five wise and five foolish. I’ve often heard the parable taught in church as a lesson in being prepared to wait for Jesus’s return and not becoming complacent in the waiting. But is that really what it’s about?

All of the women fell asleep. There was no difference in their level of activity — only in their preparedness. One set literally burned themselves out and didn’t leave anything to replenish themselves with. The other set also fell asleep, but when their lamps ran low, they had brought extra supply. 

Which brings me to a new conclusion: This parable could just as easily be about not burning ourselves out as it is about waiting.

People in ministry love Jesus. They often dedicate their lives, their hobbies, their energy and resources to sharing the good news about Him with others, serving people in the name of Jesus, and advocating for the weak and helpless. This work can be all-consuming. We do it “for the sake of the Gospel.”

But is that what God really asks of us?

I’ve written before about how giving up more than God asks of us can be just as bad as giving up less than He asks. When we do more than what He asks, we risk a different type of disobedience. After all, if a farmer asks me to plow a certain field, and I plow both that field and the one beside it too, am I being helpful—or did I just destroy a crop that wasn’t ready to be harvested?

Missionaries and pastors seem particularly susceptible to the lie that working ourselves to exhaustion is somehow a demonstration of godliness. It may be a demonstration of dedication to our work, but not of our dedication to God. So what does this parable tell us about the right way to approach our work? 

  1. We need to be prepared for Christ to take longer.

He is not — and never was — going to come according to our schedule. He is our leader. We are not His.

If God has called us to ministry, it may be for a lifetime, or it may be for a season. If it’s for a season, He will redeploy us somewhere else when we’re done. In either case, we cannot afford to pour an entire lifetime of energy into only a few years before we burn ourselves out.

Once we burn out, there’s no guarantee we will ever come back. Some people’s personalities and mental health are changed forever.

  1. The things we do may look similar to what others do.

The work of a Christian advocate for the poor might look very similar to that of the work of someone who’s not a Christian, but the nuances will be different. The motivations will be different. The spiritually-holistic approach will be different.

If we anchor our sense of accomplishment and well-being in Jesus rather than the results of our work, our mental and spiritual health will also be different. Jesus can give us the stamina to keep going, to live an entire lifetime of faithfulness. It’s that longevity that often stands out more than anything else to the people who observe and come after us. 

Our testimony doesn’t just consist of what we do. It consists of our faithfulness in doing it. Not just for a few years, but for a lifetime.

  1. We need to leave ourselves enough resources to last, so we can keep burning.

Our lives and ministries should consume those resources at a sustainable rate. In other words, we shouldn’t be constantly edging towards burnout, even if we don’t quite get there. We should always be engaging in self-care practices and rest that replenish our resources.

This “leave enough resources” principle isn’t just intended for the person in ministry, but for their family as well. If we don’t leave ourselves enough to take care of our spouses and families, then, as Paul says, “Anyone who does not provide for their relatives, and especially for their own household, has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever” (1 Timothy 5:8).

This may mean that as we age, our activities diminish somewhat, apace with diminishing energy. 

It also means that we make rest a part of our rhythms of ministry. Depleted, we may be able to put on a good show for a while — perhaps falling back on old journals and moments of learning during times when we were less worn — but eventually our depletion will show itself in our ministries. 

This could be in the form of ever-decreasing nourishment in the things we teach. It could also be in the form of a fall into sin. Depleted people are more likely to stumble and fall. Rest is not just required for our own refreshment. It’s required to sustain godliness.

If our rest is insufficient, we won’t have the energy to pursue God—really pursue Him in devotions. Sitting in silence takes focus and energy. Meditation takes energy and creativity (another thing that turns off in fatigue). Intensive prayer takes loads of energy. 

Is it any wonder, then, that taking a Sabbath rest is one of the Ten Commandments? That commandment is a fundamental undergirding, a support for our obedience in every other dimension.

In contrast, how many people have become shells of their former selves, have lost their faith, or caused their families to lose their faith because of their obsession with serving with no thought to wisely stewarding their time, efforts, and energy so they’ll be sustainable through the long haul? 

I now think that Jesus’s admonition at the end of the parable of the lamps in Matthew 25 to “keep watch” (“be on the alert,” the NASB says) is actually an admonition to take care of our own resources so that we can keep burning — no matter when He comes.

Originally published here; reprinted with permission.

~~~~~~~~

Originally from Canada, Valerie Limmer lives in Okinawa, Japan, where she’s served as a missionary with her husband since 2011, partnering with the local church to focus on outreach and discipleship. Their Japanese pastor calls them “bridge-makers,” facilitating relationships with the community. Valerie is the author of Captive Set Free: How to Find Freedom Through Forgiving and On the Potter’s Wheel, a memoir of disability on the mission field. To learn more about her work or to read more of her articles, visit peterandvalerie.com/OurBlog.

Preventing Burnout with a Theology of Surrender

I’ve seen more dead bodies than I ever thought I would in my life.

I’m not a coroner or an ER nurse. But there’s something about living in a developing country, with fewer safety protocols and less health infrastructure, that puts you just a bit closer to death on a daily basis. It’s less frequent now, but it used to feel like about once a week I would see someone dead on the street. It’s always felt closer here than in my home country.

Hardship often stops short of death, though, and that’s nearly always just outside my door. Brave child-headed households, beloved disabled individuals begging for even the most basic of care, preventable disease still rampant in our communities. It’s safe to say we are well acquainted with suffering. Perhaps this feels familiar to you, too. Perhaps you can name other sufferings more present in your own context.

Developing a “theology of suffering” is a topic I find being discussed more and more, particularly in global ministry circles, and I’m grateful for it. Particularly in the realm of pre-field training and early deployment support, the idea of tending these ideas is paramount to success. It takes a strong theology of suffering both to hack it in global work and to continue to engage in it well.

But I think it’s only one half of the conversation. 

A theology of suffering, when it exists in isolation, can be a fast track to burnout. But when balanced with a well-developed theology of surrender, we can forge a path to sustainability. 

A theology of suffering is two-pronged for the global worker: it first compels us to enter into the harsh reality of the lives of those in our community, and it secondly asks us to stay and be present even when it negatively affects us and requires major, daily sacrifice. It is a theology of holy self-abnegation, of forgoing our tendencies for comfort and safety to become the word made flesh to those around us. We will suffer, and we will witness suffering, and these facts have no bearing on the goodness of the Lord.

Because of this unchanging goodness, we are invited to go a step further in developing a theology of surrender. Learning to give up control to the only One who has ever really had it anyway. A theology of surrender reminds us that, while we are called to live lives of radical obedience and presence and generosity, it is not our job to fix all the suffering in the world. We abdicate, rightly, that duty to God, and we trust Him to bring the healing needed in the situations that surround us. 

Theology of suffering motivates us and helps us stay present. Theology of surrender grounds that motivation in the reality that God is in control of it all. 

Without a theology of surrender, it’s all too tempting to run ourselves into the ground being the hands and feet of Jesus. To extend ourselves far past the points that are healthy or necessary in obedience and put our own well-being (and likely those around us) in harm’s way. More than tempting, it can easily feel like an obligation for the sake of the kingdom. If we don’t fix this, who will? Is it not my job to exact this change, to heal this situation, to soften the effects of this evil?

Questions like these can easily become the ever-present internal monologue of the global worker, a constant stream of doubts and worries and questions floating up to our Father. We can be comforted to know that He welcomes this! He wants us to come to Him with our raw, vulnerable questions and fears. To unburden ourselves.

In exchange, He invites us to take on HIS load: the yoke that’s easy and the burden that’s light. He invites us to surrender all we carry to Him and to rest deeply, knowing that He can care for it all better than we ever could. We simply cannot fix every evil or right every wrong in our communities. We cannot heal all suffering and pain. But, praise the Lord, He can. 

A healthy theology of surrender, though, must accept the reality that the Lord’s healing and handling and provision don’t always look the way we’d like. Surrender, in its truest form, isn’t just a forgoing of duty, but a full embrace of our own inability to know what is truly best. Sometimes loving-kindness looks harsh. Rock bottom might be the necessary next step in someone’s journey to wholeness. Sometimes healing comes fully in death. Surrender recognizes that this, too, is the work of the Lord and that His hand is in it all.

An essay makes this all sound easy. “Don’t burn out, just give it up to God!” In practice, we know that this is arduous work that requires a tedious, time-consuming rewiring of our hearts and minds. The process of teaching our hearts and minds to rely on Christ’s wisdom to discern our part in the work of the Kingdom in the communities around us is a continual journey of sanctification and grace.

But when we ask, and truly seek His guidance and discernment from a posture of humility and obedience, He is faithful to meet us there—shaping us to be more like Him, to be His hands and feet in our countries of service. 

Confronting Risk and Managing Fear in the Uncertainty of War

by Anna Hampton

The uncertainty and danger of war, along with the threat of conflict, often trigger deep fear. Armed clashes, devastating strikes, and expanding regional involvement have made fear a daily reality for millions. Seeing weapons in the sky, cities battered by disruptions, and chaos spreading through economies and families stirs strong emotions. Images of smoke, evacuation orders, and increasing volatility activate our natural instinct to protect what we hold dear, reminding us how little we truly control.

Fear, though natural, need not freeze us. History shows that Christ followers in war have found ways to face risks without succumbing to dread. How do we recognize today’s dangers—strategic escalations, humanitarian suffering, financial shocks—while building resilience to handle them? The difference between failure and endurance often depends on how we respond to fear, assess threats, and develop a mindset that allows Christ followers to act wisely during chaos.

Threat Regulation and Neurobiology of Hope

In war, our brains activate alarms. The amygdala floods us with stress and worry, urging us to avoid danger. This survival system works in real emergencies, but when threats feel endless, it can leave us overwhelmed.[1]

While feeling fear is part of being human, it doesn’t have to define us. Hope travels through different brain pathways, especially the prefrontal cortex, which manages planning, motivation, and thinking about the future. Hope encourages us to set goals, find solutions, and believe we can take meaningful steps even during difficult times.

Research shows that people with stronger hope have brain patterns that support action and motivation, including changes in areas linked to turning intentions into concrete steps and focusing on positive possibilities. The prefrontal cortex also helps calm the fear response, making it easier to think and act wisely.[2]

Here’s the encouraging truth: hope is not the opposite of fear — it is its powerful partner. While fear yells, “Danger!” hope quietly says, “You still have a future.” By focusing on small, manageable actions — like daily routines, helping others, or taking one step toward daily responsibilities — we actively train our brains to shift from panic to purpose.[3]

Fear is a natural part of threats, so it’s normal to engage in both fear management and threat analysis. While fear may come easily, hope is something we choose to pursue, especially when chaos and suffering feel overwhelming. Hope requires practice. Often, it’s a moment-by-moment effort to hold onto hope. Choosing to focus our minds on hope in Christ instead of our fear is an act of righteousness. Even amid conflict, Christ followers, with God’s help, can choose courage and take action. Moving forward involves choosing hope—one thought, one prayer, one step at a time.

How to Manage Fear in Uncertainty

A helpful tool for managing fear during war and uncertain times is the NAME acrostic.[4] First, clearly identify and write down your fears, ranking them from least to most intense. Then, ask yourself: if this fear came true, what would be the worst part, and how would it affect you emotionally and physically? Next, reflect on Meaning and Imagination: visualize where God would be in the situation, how He might bring purpose from the pain, and imagine Jesus interceding for you with compassion (Romans 8:34, Hebrews 7:25). Finally, entrust your fears to God through prayer, asking for His help and the courage to take one small, obedient step forward. (Editor’s note: see the Resources section for guided articles, videos, and worksheets of the NAME acrostic tool.)

This process of focused attention does several things at once: it strengthens the hope neuro pathway, weakens the anxiety (fear) neuro pathway, nurtures a secure attachment to God, and builds courage by shifting focus from threat to trust. By practicing this process for 10-12 seconds at a time, neuron by neuron, we can change our brain. In difficult times, naming and trusting fear prevents it from paralyzing us, enabling clearer thinking and hopeful action.

Moral Decision-Making During Uncertainty and the Threat of Death

When war brings deep uncertainty and the shadow of death, ethical choices can feel paralyzing. How do we make wise decisions when information is limited and fear is high? There are two key skills that help with this: first, threat assessment; and second, ethical decision-making that incorporates three decision-making aspects. These skills should not be used solely by the security specialist on the team. All team members will benefit from becoming better equipped in this area.

In Leadership and Ethical Responsibility: The Three Aspects of Every Decision, Thomas Schirrmacher demonstrates that the Bible never pits the three aspects of ethical decisions against each other. Mature Christian ethics consistently integrate them: the normative (God’s clear commandments), the situational (practical wisdom), and the existential (heart and conscience).

The normative aspect grounds us in unchanging biblical values—love for God and neighbor, the sanctity of life, and truth and justice. Even during a crisis, we ask, “What does Scripture require?” The situational aspect calls for wisdom: evaluating the real context, limited options, consequences, and seeking counsel—without needing perfect foresight or abandoning God’s standards. The existential aspect touches the heart—internalizing decisions before God with a clear conscience, genuine trust, and love.

Facing death requires genuine surrender: a willingness to entrust our lives to God, refusing to act solely out of panic or self-preservation. Ignoring any part of ethics results in unbalanced decisions. Combining all three aspects brings clarity, courage, and confidence. In times of uncertainty, this balance allows us to act with integrity, compassion, and hope—trusting the outcome to the One who holds our lives.

Who Is My Enemy? Nationalism, Syncretism, and Christian Hospitality

In wartime, uncertainty often heightens the question: “Who is my enemy?” Governments, media, and national loyalties quickly provide the answer—yet as followers of Christ, we must evaluate every answer against Scripture rather than simply accept the state’s definition.

Normatively, the Bible clearly states: “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (Matthew 5:44). The command to love God and neighbor (Matthew 22:37-39) extends beyond national borders. Treating another nation as an enemy simply because our government labels them as such is not biblical ethics; it is syncretism—merging Christianity with nationalism until the flag and the cross become indistinguishable. This distorts the gospel, which proclaims in Christ “there is neither Jew nor Gentile, slave nor free, male nor female” (Galatians 3:28).

Situationally, wisdom evaluates threats without exaggeration or demonization. Evil exists, and governments bear the sword (Romans 13:4). But wisdom recognizes when fear inflates “the enemy” to justify hatred. History shows Christians have baptized wars as holy, only to later repent for endorsing hate.

Existentially, the heart and conscience must be shaped by the cross. Jesus welcomed the Samaritan, the Roman centurion, and Judas. Hospitality—welcoming strangers, feeding the hungry, sheltering the displaced—is not optional in hostile times (Hebrews 13:2; Matthew 25:35-40). It is obedience. When fear whispers that the “other side” is irredeemable, we respond with Christ’s mindset: our true enemy is not flesh and blood, but the powers of darkness (Ephesians 6:12). Every person remains an image-bearer loved by the same Savior. In the fog of war, this truth frees us from hatred and calls us to courageous hospitality. Fear labels enemies; Christ names neighbors. We choose His voice.

War and Trauma

Trauma reveals knowledge we were not meant to carry, but how we handle war trauma shapes not only our healing but also what we pass on to future generations.[5] The challenge is to see trauma as the opposite of God’s beauty and choose how we process it instead of being overwhelmed by it.

Modern ethics and mental health often reverse the order of the transcendentals (Truth, Goodness, Beauty). Western thought emphasizes truth (facts, rationality) first, then goodness (rules), while downplaying beauty. This reversal disadvantages trauma victims.

Appeals to “the war is over” (truth) or “you should act this way now” (goodness) rarely reach the traumatized. Author Timothy Patitsas considers trauma to be more than just psychological damage—it is a profound anti-theophany, an overwhelming confrontation with ugliness that resembles a false revelation.[6]

It reveals a “truth” that the world is malevolent or indifferent, that God is unloving, and that fellow humans are enemies. This shatters communion (with self, others, and God), unravels character, and embeds a heretical lie deep in the heart that cannot simply be reasoned or moralized away. Victims often remain in a kind of communion with this false knowledge.

Trauma disrupts the integrating, life-giving power of liturgy and genuine beauty. Healing through a “beauty-first” approach requires restoring a focus on beauty, grounded in orthodox spirituality. True Beauty—ultimately Christ and His incarnate, cruciform love—serves as a true reflection of the divine. It reorients the soul by presenting a powerful new view of reality that challenges the ugly “revelation” of trauma. Trauma victims need to fall in love with Beauty before they can be guided back toward righteous moral direction. Beauty unites the fractured self, restores communion, and makes truth and goodness livable again.

Trauma recovery is connected to overall soul-healing. Only by recognizing and emulating true Beauty (which leads to Goodness and Truth) can the soul’s deepest scars from ugliness be healed, and the lies of a godless, hostile world be unraveled.

God’s Spirit Over Chaos

The chaos of Genesis 1 still threatens Earth. But God’s Spirit remains, like a mother hovering over her young. Christ is here. Our Father is not caught off guard by your circumstances as you read this. My heart reaches out to you, whatever you’re facing, as your sister in Christ, to encourage you to stay alert, stand firm, and trust that His hand is on your shoulder, and He will faithfully provide all you need in the real and present danger you or your loved ones face. —Anna

Additional Resources

Fear Management for Adults from Anna Hampton:
Fear Management for Adults Article
Fear Management Video
N.A.M.E. Tool for Adults

Fear Management for Teens from Anna Hampton:
Fear Management for Teens Article
Dealing with Fear Video
Fear worksheet (used in video)

Fear Management for Children from Anna Hampton:
Fear Management Children 5-12 Article
Fear Management for Kids 5-12 Facilitator Guide
Facing Fears Worksheet for Children

Risk Tolerance Inventory from Anna Hampton (available in multiple languages)

Articles from Scott Brawner:
The Watchman’s Brief
Thresholds for Departure and Benchmarks for Return
Individual Stay-Go Assessment

Notes
[1] Marek et al., 2013, https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3678031/.
[2] Delgado et al., 2008, https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3061554/.
[3] Sharot et al., 2012, https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3424419/.
[4] Hampton, Anna. Facing Fear. 2023. William Carey Publishing.
[5] Levinson, Leila. Gated Grief. 2011. Cable Publishing.
[6] Patitsas, Timothy. Ethics of Beauty. 2019. St. Nicholas Press.

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Anna Hampton is a global risk consultant and specialist in a theology of risk. She has over thirty years of ministry experience, raised her family in Afghanistan and Turkey, and serves with Barnabas International, providing pastoral support to Christ followers working in dangerous areas. This article is based on her books, Facing Danger: A Guide Through Risk, 2nd ed. (William Carey Publications, 2024) and Facing Fear: The Journey to Mature Courage in Risk and Persecution (William Carey Publications, 2023). She is currently writing Facing Persecution: The Spirituality and Ethics of Loving Your Enemy. Hampton holds a doctorate in religious studies from Trinity Theological Seminary (Newburgh). She can be contacted at TheologyofRisk.com, on Instagram as @Theology.of.Risk, and via email at anna.hampton@barnabas.org.

Racial Reconciliation in Cross-cultural Ministry

“Why should we trust you when you still view us as slaves?” asked the Cameroonian elder. The room—already stifling—now seemed stripped of oxygen. The crowd sat in tense silence. And I felt the question all the way down to my bones.

I stood encircled by a group of pastors. They had honored me by gathering to hear about my ministry. I had in turn honored them by asking about theirs. I wanted to know, “What has God’s mission looked like in and through your churches?”

As they told remarkable stories of both success and suffering, a sad theme began to surface. Feeling the safety of the moment, pastors opened up about deep wounds that had been left by foreign missionaries. They spoke of falsified numbers, unkept promises, and cultural superiority. The eldest of the room—shaking with Parkinson’s yet pulsing with communal authority—delivered the final indictment in a devastating rhetorical question—

“Why should we trust you?”

//

After years of biblical study in preparation for ministering cross-culturally, I’m not sure that the ministry of reconciliation (2 Corinthians 5:18) quite got through to my heart. Of course I understood the urgent need of Genesis 3—a world severed from life with God because of sin. I would go to faraway places to implore on Christ’s behalf: “Be reconciled to God!” (2 Corinthians 5:20).

However, my evangelical pedigree was not as well versed in the full measure of God’s reconciling intent. In truth, I would not see it clearly until the pastor of an ethnic minority church pointed it out years later. Genesis 3 cannot be taken apart from Genesis 4—the breakdown of all human relationships. 

This is likely why Paul’s famous description of the gospel in Ephesians 2 comes in two parts: 1) being made alive in Christ in verses 1-10 and 2) being reconciled (Jew and Gentile) through Christ in verses 11-22.

Paul’s gospel ministry as an aged apostle settled not merely for the salvation of souls (v. 8) but the formation of a new humanity altogether (v. 15). Mine as a young missionary was satisfied with little more than transactional evangelistic encounters. I was not ready for a room full of broken trust.

//

In the complex dance of cross-cultural relationships, we all eventually find ourselves creating (or inheriting) ruptures—moments when meaningful connection is broken. I had not lied, betrayed, or reenacted colonialism in the meeting with the pastors (though I’ve made my share of mistakes in other settings). Nevertheless, the unresolved wounds remained, and my ethnic connection to their perpetrators clearly aggravated them. My flesh offered two quick options: “Exonerate yourself,” or more simply, “Change the subject.”

But something else came to mind, a lesson hard-learned since my days as a missionary. The environment felt similar to certain moments as a lead pastor in 2020 when my city, Louisville, was taut with the ruptured memory of racial injustice; Breonna Taylor had been killed only ten minutes from my church. In those days I learned to sit with minority brothers and sisters without excuse or redirection. Instead, I listened and wept. And said, “I’m sorry.”

The promise of Genesis 3–4 is that despite our best intentions we will inevitably cause ruptures (such as on my second to last day on the field when in a wave of cultural exhaustion I exploded on my closest friends because they asked for money). The aim of cross-cultural service is not solely to avoid such things, though it’s worth our best effort. It is to be sent as ambassadors of the entire Ephesians 2 gospel, true ministers of reconciliation who abide the often mortifying work of repair—the costly reweaving of trust.

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As the elder sat down, generations of mournful pain gazed at me from all sides of the room. The weight of it pressed me into my chair and squeezed me like a lemon. Tears soaked my shirt. I thought, “What am I doing here?”

The tension had peaked and then halted in disorienting suspense. My heart lurched with the nagging awareness that doing nothing might become another wound. Yet helped along by the Holy Spirit, by memories of 2020, and by the sheer necessity of doing something, I stood—tears unhidden—and spoke: “Brothers and sisters, only Christ can atone for the ways you’ve been hurt. But for what it’s worth, I’m sorry. Please forgive us.” Then I sat back down.

Never had I said so little, but been so completely poured out.

In time, the elder of the room rose again. This time he quoted from Isaiah 43:18: “The LORD says—Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. Behold, I am doing a new thing!”

Then he said, “We forgive you. And we see that you are different.”

In an instant, the breathless fog lifted. It was as if someone had thrown open a door and let spring rush in. I’ve experienced African hospitality before, but the welcome that met me afterward surpassed anything owed to a visitor. Pastors confessed their own shortcomings, invited mutual partnership, and held my hand. It was, in every sense, a new thing.

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Should brothers and sisters like these trust foreign missionaries? It is a hauntingly valid question. And it is wise for us to acknowledge that—in many instances—human experience says no. 

All the more reason for us not to merely transact the gospel, but embody it. Indeed, we ourselves cannot atone; but Jesus already has, and he delights to minister healing through those he sends. Though it strikes at the heart of Western productivity, Ephesians 2 gospel ministry calls us to offer unhurried presence, to listen without defensiveness, to validate wounds we caused (and some we didn’t), and to stay in the room when everything inside us wants to move on. For ministers of reconciliation, gospel seeds are watered with tears (2 Corinthians 2:4). 

Rupture will find us; repair must be chosen. Yet when it is chosen, and trust re-woven, God’s mission rushes in with the spring of a new humanity.

Willing to be Uncomfortable

Our pastor’s wife in Japan recently texted me that her son, a close friend of our four boys, is the only boy coming to church these days. She mentioned that he is a bit lonely and isn’t enjoying church as much since we left for our six-month home assignment.

I immediately thought of the churches we’ve attended since being back in the US: dozens and dozens of kids, oodles of involved parents, pastors, and volunteers, and robust children’s programs. And my heart ached, realizing that a big part of me wants this for our boys. I want them to grow up seeing many children going to church and worshiping, surrounded by moms and dads, grandmas and grandpas, neighbors and friends. I want it to be normal and not weird.

Then this thought came to mind and I jotted it down with a sigh: I’m willing to be uncomfortable for you.

When I was younger, I thought missions was about going on an adventure with God. I imagined reporting back to churches about miracles, revivals, and various ways I had been “a shining light to the nations.” I was so naive and so sincere and so self-focused.

I’ve shared this before, but when my idealistic bubble popped shortly after beginning my first term, I had a prayer time hissy fit — a full-on tantrum —- when I became aware of both my own weaknesses and the feebleness of missions. I remember praying, “This is your plan? A bunch of well-intentioned yet sincerely screwed up missionaries? Just . . . people?! If you really loved the world, you could have and should have come up with a better plan.” (And then I cried and said I was sorry.)

The years have added up, and the terms (measured in three-, four-, and five-year blocks) have too. So much beauty, so much heartbreak, so many stories (who knew being a person meant holding so many stories?), so many disappointments, and also so many blessings. Over these past twenty years, I can say that God sustains, reveals, hides, whispers — and is so, so patient and so, so merciful. 

But going does not get easier.

At the beginning of this home assignment, I read on Liturgies for a Life Abroad:

The first time I came overseas, I didn’t fully know what I was saying “yes” to, which was hard.

The second, third, fourth time I came overseas, I knew exactly what I was saying “yes” to, which was even harder.

It’s brave to go, but perhaps it’s even braver to keep going.

The longer I live in Japan, the more it feels like my home. That said, it is and will always be uncomfortable in many ways — as a gaijin (foreigner) but especially as a Christian. And I like comfort. So going back for yet another term (fourth in Japan and fifth overall), my current missionary motivation might very well be, “I am willing to be uncomfortable for you.” Because I love you. Because Jesus loves you.

Perhaps that’s enough motivation.

Yet the preposition “for” feels a little off somehow — incomplete. Over the years, I have seen missionaries come to Japan eager to do missions to Japanese people and for Japanese people and fewer people interested in doing missions with Japanese people. They may use “with” language, but their postures and behaviors show otherwise. 

I have shifted over time, too, but now strongly believe that “with” is our primary role and privilege as missionaries.1 So maybe I need to change my wording to “I am willing to be uncomfortable for you and with you.” I still need for, which recognizes that I am coming from the outside, that I am living out of my comfort zone and out of my culture. Including with means I know that the Christian life is inherently lonelier2 in Japan than in other parts of the world, and we can link arms with other Christians there as we hobble forward together.

Yet I cannot escape the fact that going back to Japan involves discomfort and going to a lonelier place for all six of us. It involves a lot of beauty, too (free range kids! forests and beaches and mountains! kind neighbors and church friends! fresh tuna! people and places and things we love!). But it also means a lot of concrete, a lot of overworked parents, fewer dads (by a wide margin), life in an aging city in an aging country, and living in the reality of less than one percent of people knowing Jesus.

This willingness to be uncomfortable for and with those across cultures is what we signed up for as missionaries. It is a holy burden we bear — both a privilege and a grief. And in some small way, it gives us a glimpse into what our incarnational God did. He crossed cultures to live among us and experienced extreme discomfort because of His love for us — and He invites us to follow His example.

 

1. Really smart people address this “with is greater than to and for” thing much more eloquently and intelligently than I can. Yet it needs to be said in short: “to” and “for” people can be part of the neocolonial model of missions, which is not best practice.

2. A lot of us who try to follow Jesus are called to go to lonely places and to lonely people. The way of Jesus is noticing, going to, and loving the shut-ins and those in jail or foster homes or lonely homes. It is noticing, going to, and loving those without families and the prickly and unlovely and even our enemies. Many do this across the street or across town; others do this across oceans or cultures. 

Am I a Missionary?

by Abi Little

This summer on home assignment I was asked so many questions about what it is like to be a ‘missionary.’ What it is like living away from your first home for so long? Do I feel ‘at home’? Will we stay forever . . . all good questions which are hard to answer.

But am I actually a missionary? I used to cringe when people called us missionaries. How on earth could we take on such a title? We are nothing like the great missionaries.

I often think of Hudson Taylor and his team who set sail for China and never returned. Some of his children died of horrific illnesses, and so did his first wife. They literally took their coffins with them on the boat. Honestly, I wouldn’t have been prepared to do what they did. Selfless people. I am only prepared to take reasonable risks. I am English after all. But then again, so were they. 

Almost six years ago we brought five suitcases to Cambodia, and we got here via two aircrafts which provided hot meals and movies. No comparison. Maybe, I am a level 10 missionary and Hudson was a level 1 missionary? That would be fair. But can you only be a missionary if you are as brave as Hudson was? 

Aren’t we all on a mission? Don’t we all have a purpose? I have so many friends who have far greater responsibilities than me and they don’t get a title. They are living in the developed world and just ‘doing their job’. I disagree. Also, perhaps someone works for a huge company but they quietly share their earnings. To me, that’s a mission. Quietly making a difference. Taking no glory but changing lives.

However, my mum told me that unless she calls us missionaries to people, people really can’t understand why we moved to Cambodia. Placing us in a specific category helps people to understand our motivation for being here and, for that reason, the title is helpful.

I consider myself to be a children’s charity coordinator, and I would call my husband Sam a pastor. I think those titles fit. My title is far less intimidating than ‘missionary,’ although the title and role of pastor is extremely weighty (that is another article altogether). 

Why does the word missionary scare me a bit? Well, because it probably gives the impression that I am ‘all sorted.’ (I can hear my close friends laughing as they know that has never been the case!) 

A good friend once cried as she told me how shocked she was that all the missionaries she had met were so much less mature than she expected. I explained that we are just normal humans with the added pressure of living in a different culture — hoping to make a difference but fearing we won’t and feeling subconsciously guilty for what we have left behind or caused our children to lose out on. 

As I said these words, she stopped crying and said: ‘Oh wow, I never thought about any of those factors. So, missionaries are humans who are living in a pressure cooker?’ I chuckled. It certainly can feel that way. 

So, am I a missionary? Well, yes, I am on a mission: to educate some of the most vulnerable children I will ever meet so they can break out of poverty. 

But perhaps the question really is, am I anything special? No, I am sorry I am not. I am a normal, imperfect human who lives by grace. 

A new friend wrote me a card a few days ago to say she hoped to be like me one day. She said she wanted to live her life for others and not for herself. What a lovely thing to write. And it did mean a lot to me.

But actually she is already living for others. She works to support and care for very vulnerable individuals. Just because she does that in England doesn’t make it less important. Plus, if we are all truly honest, no one has purely selfless motivations. It is a privilege to help others, isn’t it? I gain a lot! 

So who am I? I am just Abi. You are just you. But don’t think of the word ‘just’ as a negative. To me, it is a protective word. It tells me and others not to expect me to be more than the sum of who I can be. Actually, being just me is ok. I like it. Just me is a very honest, loving, fun-loving and non-judgmental person. I would have been just me whether I had come here or not. 

So, please remember we all have a mission (perhaps some of you have many). We all get to make a difference wherever we are. Just be you as you do it. 

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Abi and her husband, originally from the UK, have lived in Siem Reap, Cambodia, with their two children for six years. Three years ago, they founded Grace Church Siem Reap, a bilingual, multicultural church. Abi also established Devoted to Cambodia two years ago, a charity offering free English lessons to children living near the provincial dump. By improving their English, students gain access to safer, better-paid jobs in Siem Reap’s tourism industry, helping families break the cycle of poverty. You can find them on Facebook as “Littles in Cambodia.”