For Christmas during my senior year of high school, my parents bought me a set of luggage. I hadn’t asked for luggage, and honestly, I wasn’t quite sure what to make of the gift. My parents were probably thinking I’d take the suitcases on vacations and trips that always included a return ticket back home. And for many years that was the case — until 2015 when I boarded a plane with my husband and three children that would take us to our new home abroad.
Although we didn’t understand then how appropriate their gift to me on December 25, 2001, was, I look back at that moment and think how grateful I am that, even then, my parents were preparing to send me well. We just had no idea how far.
The Christmas of my oldest daughter’s senior year of high school, we followed in my parents’ footsteps and gifted her a luggage set. This time, however, we knew exactly how far we would have to send her. The gift was given with tears and a somber understanding that we would soon be living oceans apart. A few months later she packed those bags, and the day after her high school graduation, with a one-way ticket in hand, flew solo across the globe.
Having experienced both being sent and being the sender, I can honestly say the latter was harder.
I knew it wasn’t easy for our families to watch us pack up our lives in our passport country and move to the other side of the world, but until I had to do it myself, I had no idea how painfully difficult it really is. Becoming a sender gave me a new realization of what our loved ones had experienced.
When my family first left home to move abroad, we had attended training, studied, and prepared for this new career and step of faith. When we landed in our host country for the first time, we had teammates waiting to welcome us and help us navigate the new country and culture. When we had hard moments, we had a prayer team that was faithfully lifting us up and bearing our burdens with us. While it was just the five of us who got on that plane with passports in hand, we never felt alone.
I can’t say the same for our loved ones who sent us.
There was no training course to prepare them for sending their loved ones overseas. There was no team or community to come alongside them with understanding and experience, ready to help them navigate this new way of being. When they had hard moments, there was no group of supporters waiting for prayer requests and updates in order to bear their burdens with them. And though they did have friends and family who cared and knew it was difficult for them, as senders they did not have the same support and resources as we did, the ones being sent.
My parents’ gift of a suitcase was a tangible expression of their permission for me to spread my wings and soar. When I bought the suitcase for my daughter, I was giving her the same thing. It’s a noble and beautiful and right thing to gift to our children. And yet, I’ve learned that giving them that permission will cost you dearly.
I’m grateful for what my experience of sending is teaching me, and how it’s given me a deeper understanding of what those who have sent us all these years have sacrificed. As I’ve learned about the cost of sending, I’ve recognized that there are very few resources for those who send that validate their grief, affirm their sacrifice, and celebrate their role that is vital to global kingdom work. Since I couldn’t find the book that I wanted to be able to gift to the senders in my life, I decided to write it.
I know that one book is not enough to encompass the many facets of being a sender, and it won’t dull the ache of the airport goodbyes and the miles between loved ones. What I do hope is that it will be a companion in the grief and a guide in the vital role of sending and praying for those we send. Whether the reader is a parent, child, family member, friend, supporter, pastor, or acquaintance of the one they are sending, I believe they will find comfort and confidence that sending matters — and that they matter.
My Christmas suitcase showed me the joy of going and the sacrifice of being sent. My daughter’s Christmas suitcase showed me the grief of sending and the sacrifice of being a sender. What I’ve learned through it all is that we cannot be sent without a sender, both roles are essential to the Great Commission, both are infinitely harder than we think, and both are worthy of compassion and care as we live out our callings — sent and sender — for the glory of God.
For Those Who Send: Prayers for Those With Loved Ones Serving Abroad provides senders with a practical and applicable tool for expressing the challenges, losses, and sacrifices that come with supporting those we love as they settle in far-away places. Parents, siblings, friends, supporters, and all those who love and send global workers will find these liturgies to be a source of encouragement, as well as a way to cultivate communion with Christ in the joy and sorrow of sending.
With prayers for topics such as saying goodbye, missing their presence, reading a newsletter, making a video call, giving sacrificially, and spending holidays apart, every sender will be reminded that their role matters and that their sacrifices are seen and cherished by the Father. Now available on Amazon in paperback and ebook.
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Heather is the creator of Liturgies for a Life Abroad, where she writes and publishes prayers for global sojourners. She and her family have made their home in the remote mountains of Southeast Asia since 2015. Heather co-authored Liturgies and Laments for the Sojourner, Volumes 1 & 2 and authored Crafting Liturgies for Life Abroad: A Guide to Processing Cross-Cultural Life Through Written Prayer. Her full author bio and other resources she has written can be found at www.liturgiesforalifeabroad.com
