wisdom – A Life Overseas |

Lessons with a High Price Tag

If you are in the thick of some really hard things as a global worker, you’re in the right place. If I could, I’d invite you to my farmhouse in South Africa. We’d walk barefoot to admire the blooming birds-of-paradise and enchanting jade vine. We’d pick a dragon fruit straight off the vine and let the juice run down our elbows. And of course, you’d meet my chickens. They all have antiquated names like Mabel, Blanche, and Gertrude. Then we’d make coffee and sit awhile so I could hear your story and you could hear mine.

We’d talk about the raw beauty of the places we live. How we’ve changed since we came here. What we’ve gained and what we’ve lost. How we have communed with God and also how there’s been a felt distance. And eventually, we’d roll around to the things that left an indelible mark on our journeys as global workers. These are the lessons we paid a high price to learn.

We’d find out that we’re not so alone in some of the costly mistakes we’ve made and that we hope others can avoid. Because we know they are common missteps in global work. And we don’t want to keep paying for them.

These lessons were taxing and suffocating at the time, but I cannot be the same after learning them. I’m left with deep gratitude that God didn’t leave me in those places with the insufficient version of who I thought he was and the shallow version of who I thought I was.

And you would sip your coffee and nod in agreement.

I know you paid dearly for some of these lessons too. I’m sorry. I know they cost you or those around you. I also know that on the other side of these lessons lies a more robust and clear picture of who God really is and what freedom really looks like.

I’d explain how I wish I could spare pre-fielders and new global workers this messy process, but that it’s through this very process that we begin to notice smudges on the window of our worldview that don’t belong. We begin to see God’s sovereign brilliance more clearly. God becomes bigger, and he makes us stronger.

And then I’d share with you the lessons that came with a high price tag in my own life. And I know you would have your own to share.

God is the driver of change, not me. I am not capable of changing the inner workings of the human heart. Only God does that (Ezekiel 36:26). My sufficiency, ability, and responsibility ends with my love for and service to others, not in their visible transformation.

Some people don’t want to change. They want charity, but not change (Luke 15:11-32). And they will encourage my generosity with façades of change. When I recognize the motivation, I am reminded to slow down and respect God’s process, even if I’m already heavily invested.

I paid a high price in real life to learn that the father of the prodigal son did not chase after him, chain him to his home, and force him to stay. The father loved, released, and welcomed his son back home again once his heart was in a new place.

Early in ministry, I did a lot of chasing. A lot of enmeshing. A lot of enabling. I learned what codependence is and how it cleverly masks as true relationship. I paid dearly to discover that my attempts to force an intrinsic desire for transformation are futile. God changes the heart, not me. This truth freed me.

I tend to chase the outcome and not the source. God calls me to stay connected to the vine before chasing fruit for other people (John 15:5). Sometimes in our line of work, we run after the newsletter-worthy fruit in others to the detriment of fruit inside ourselves.

My approach to people and service has adapted as my understanding of God’s sovereignty has grown. I no longer seek someone else’s transformation as fruit of my work. My only work is to remain connected to the Vine. In love, I focus on investing and releasing people to own their process with God.

God calls us to be as innocent as doves and as wise as serpents (Matthew 10:16). In my ministry, this has played out as a call to balance altruism with discernment. I’m altruistic by nature. A therapist once told me that many global workers are. True love, after all, is to lay down our life for another (John 15:13-14).

But I’ve learned that altruism is often accompanied by naivety. And I’m not called to foolishness. God opened my eyes to recognize my tendency for altruism with pure abandon and helped me see that I have a duty to exercise muscles of discernment.

Suspicion doesn’t suit me, and I don’t want it to, but there is wisdom in discernment. I’ve learned to beware of people who require constant rescuing or live in a perpetual state of conflict and drama, for my nature is to think that if I just help them one more time, they’ll finally be able to live a fruitful life.

For those who are altruistic by nature, saying no takes a lot more effort than yes, and I have learned to lean into that when needed. Because the wisdom of God helps me to love others better.

God is a forgiver (Ephesians 1:7). It feels like I’ve sinned more as a missionary than I ever did as a pre-fielder. Whether that’s actually true or not, there’s a reason it feels like it’s true.

Stress is magnified in an environment where everything is unfamiliar and we’re learning to navigate a new life. We crave comfort. We crave the familiar. We need something to calm the heck down. We need to survive the moment so we don’t lose it on the people around us. Hard things start piling up faster than we can deal with them. They rage within and eventually claw their way out in the form of unhealthy habits.

Unhealthy coping mechanisms surface or resurface. This happens more often than you might expect in global work. And it’s devastating. Because you’re just trying to do the right thing and you just want to serve God well.

Here is also what is true. Cleansing lies in repentance (1 John 1:19). Change lies in seeking help (James 5:16). These two truths have been life to me. Maintaining a pristine reputation is far less important to me now than leaning into God’s forgiveness and seeking help when I need it. Because freedom lies in taking my humanity to him.

God gives me my daily bread and invites me to pray for it (Matthew 6:11). If you rely on support like me, our entire livelihoods depend on the financial goodwill of donors. My current status and my future could be a lot more secure if I gave donors what I think they want: a moving story that appeals to their emotions. Even better if I attach an emotionally manipulative photo of a crying, snotty-nosed kid whose pigment is darker than mine. With flies on their eyes. Those tend to bring in lots of money.

But that is not serving. That is not loving.

Growing up in Africa, I was impacted at an early age by a repulsion for the predatory nature I saw in the unfolding story of non-profit and humanitarian work around the world. The mindset seems to be, “If we can just get a good story, a great picture, we can get more money to help these poor people.” We lose sight of our daily bread promise and our duty to the image-bearers in front of us when we exploit the people we serve in order to gain a buck. Even if it’s for them.

This was a hard lesson I learned flipping through magazines at a young age. But God didn’t leave me in a state of anger and repulsion. I am eternally grateful for the honorable example that my parents set. They shared stories of the strength, beauty, ingenuity, and fortitude of the people in my Cameroonian community. I think they did this because they actually saw my Cameroonian neighbors as image-bearers of God. And because they trusted in God to move the hearts of their donors through stories of the strength and dignity of his people. Not through human efforts at emotional manipulation.

My newsletter readers won’t get the sexy, sensationalized stories from me. Or the pictures that prey on the dignity of the people God has called me to serve, though those stories and images do exist in my work. But exposing someone else’s story in order to make a buck is not the love to which I’m called. It’s proven to be the quickest path to making more money, but it’s not my path. And I hope it isn’t yours.

God is the creator of the people I serve, and they deserve honor. I am yoked to him in his work for his people, and his way offers life, freedom, dignity, and a love covering. He will take care of me. I don’t have to harm other people to get what’s mine. His daily bread is mine. And by God’s beautiful, miraculous grace, our incredible financial partners of 10+ years get that.

God has a pattern of redeeming the broken things and of showing us his goodness (Psalm 27:13-14). That may not be everyone’s story all the time, but it’s an overarching theme for many of us. In the hardest seasons when ministry has “gone wrong,” I’ve looked hard for that redemption. I’ve prayed to see his goodness. The puzzle pieces may not come together until years later. Or maybe not at all this side of heaven.

But more often than not, I’ve been surprised by my surprise when he does indeed fix broken things. It might have been nice to learn the depth and breadth of God’s redemption without having to lose “all these things,” but without the loss, I wouldn’t have truly understood that everything was his to rebuild.

When ministries fold, when plans A, B, and C don’t pan out, when partnerships wane and relationships crumble, I’m told to wait and look for his goodness. It doesn’t mean that every tragedy ends in a miracle. But boy, have I seen some miracles. God repairs dormant relationships, raises up new partners, creates better plans, and builds new ministries. He is so good.

We’d probably cry over the losses and laugh at how appalling some of these stories actually are. We’d curl up and drink two more cups of coffee until it was time to feed my chickens. We’d check on Mabel, Blanch, and Gertrude, and we’d be grateful, though still healing, from the lessons that brought us together. We’d share comfort in remembering the things that felt costly and in which more often than not, God became bigger and he made us stronger.

Photo by Taryn Elliot on Pexels.

A Trip to the Store

by Robert Buchanan

We were on a six-month home assignment after having served our first term as missionaries in a South Pacific country. At the time we were living in our friend’s finished basement and using one of their vehicles. One night my wife Heather told me she wanted to do some shopping in town. Like many men, I’m not a big fan of shopping, and I didn’t want to go. Heather persisted, and I finally said, “Why don’t you just take the car and go? We can do something when you get back.”

For several seconds she looked like she was in deep thought and then said, “Oh yeah, I can do that here!” In our country of service, it is unwise for ladies to drive off our mission center by themselves. Heather and I had spent over 40 years of our life in the U.S. before going overseas, but now after only two years abroad, we had changed.

Even simple tasks aren’t that simple when one lives in the developing world. If you live in a suburban location in the United States and want to go into town to shop at a local store, what do you do? Most likely, you make a shopping list, grab your wallet and car keys, and drive into town without much thought.

You probably don’t check with the local authorities about road conditions and zero out your trip odometer so that you’ll know exactly how far away you are from home if you break down. Or take the time to ensure that you have a full tank of fuel, check to see that your license and registration is up to date, and know that the vehicle is in good working order.

You are even less likely to make sure someone else knows your itinerary, that you have emergency contact numbers written down, have redundant communications devices available, ensure that there is a reasonable proportion of adult men to women and children, think about who would be an asset and who would be a liability in a critical incident, have a throw-away wallet in your possession in case of a robbery, or on occasion request an armed escort from a local security provider.

As you drive, the tactically minded among you may be looking for roadblocks and choke points, but for most Americans without a law enforcement, military, or security background, that is an odd and foreign concept often relegated to the paranoid. Of course, humans aren’t the only hazards on the roads, but in the U.S., you are unlikely to have pigs, dogs, and drunk people wandering in the middle of the “highway.” If for some reason that does happen, it doesn’t last very long.

Similarly, you’re unlikely to drive over bridges without railings or that seem ready to collapse. Pedestrians and other drivers may sometimes use bad judgement, but for the most part, Americans follow the rules of the road which are actively enforced by the police.

When you arrive in town, you probably don’t have someone stay with the vehicle to deter theft. You probably don’t consciously ensure that the men in the group take responsibility for looking out for the women and children. You probably aren’t looking for surveillance and likely don’t have a mental contingency plan for a riot, medical emergency, or firefight between the police and local criminals.

If you live in the developing world as a missionary or NGO worker, you likely do all of this and more for every trip into town. Are there some missionaries and NGO workers who become complacent and fail to take all these precautions? Yes, there absolutely are, but even in their complacency they are more alert than most Americans who have never lived overseas.

This is understandable since the United States has good roads, well-trained police, fire, and emergency medical service professionals, trauma centers, available tow trucks and mechanics, solid communications infrastructure, and a stable power grid. So thank God and count your blessings if you live in suburban America, but remember that, to the majority world, the stability you experience in the U.S. is unheard of.

As a career security professional, I have always run scenarios in my head and made plans for a whole host of contingencies, but it wasn’t until the I lived overseas that I began to fully understand the quote from General Dwight D. Eisenhower, who famously said, “Plans are nothing, but planning is everything.”

No matter how good my plan is, it is unlikely to match the exact situation I find myself in, but having gone through the act of planning, I can more easily adapt. Now, as practical as that statement is, my time overseas has also taught me a corollary: “No matter how much I plan or how adaptable I am, I am still totally reliant on the One who knows the end from the beginning.”

God stands outside of time, knows all things, and works all things together for His glory. As a servant of God, I fall short when I only rely on my ability to plan and adapt. My faith must be in Him, who not only gave me the skills and intellect I have, but who knows far more than I ever could.

Proverbs 21:31 says, “The horse is prepared against the day of battle: But safety is of the Lord” (KJV). Notice that the horse is prepared. We are not to shirk our duties or ignore our talents and abilities, but in the end, it is God who gives safety.

As a missionary with 10 years of overseas experience and a security professional with 34 years of experience, I can give this advice: Learn everything you can, plan to the best of your ability, and prepare for foreseeable events, but most of all, rely on the One who holds all people and all history in His hands.

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Robert Buchanan is a career security professional who answered God’s call to use his skills in overseas missions. He currently serves as a security advisor for a mission organization in the South Pacific. His wife, Heather, serves as a teacher in the local international school, and together they have found that true joy comes from doing God’s will – even when conditions are challenging.

I have nothing to prove

Sometimes I think I must be a fool.

Of course, I know that much of my cherished wisdom is foolishness to God. And sometimes it’s foolish even in my own eyes. But what makes me feel quite foolish sometimes are the opportunities I’ve let go of.

If you’ve given your life to missions and ministry, maybe you can relate.

After college and graduate school, awards and accolades, degrees and dreams, we went into ministry. At first it didn’t feel like much of a sacrifice; our friends in other fields of work were also just starting out, taking risks, living like paupers. But after a decade or two, the difference between us is stark. They’re rich. They occupy positions of economic and social power. They have long lists of achievements attached to their names. And those are great opportunities to serve God.

What have we done? Survived, even thrived, in a foreign country or among a new people? Learned a new language? Preached and taught falteringly in that new language? Made fruitful friendships? Learned how to live very simply? Rejoiced and wept with people? Opened our home and practiced hospitality? Launched a church? Started a business or organization? Made disciples who make disciples?

What are those things worth? Are they enough?

At first, there’s the “cool” factor of missions: it’s “radical” to live in another country. But after a while the luster wears off, and we’re just people who have given up our own ambitions to serve Someone Else’s. It’s simply not logical in the eyes of the world.

Sometimes a sneaky feeling darts into my heart and makes me want to prove that even though I’ve chosen ministry, it doesn’t mean I couldn’t do those other impressive things. I decide to show that I can succeed with the best of them, and I labor over a project for entirely the wrong reasons: to prove that even by the world’s standards, I’m worth something! If I’m honest, part of me still hungers for that approval.

But ministry does not consistently give us that approval. Even if you started a business for missions that’s thriving, achieving all the goals you set, and becoming a fixture in the community, it’s not the same. It’s not the same glory as building a successful business in the developed world that brings millions of dollars along with social and civil positions.

If we feed our self-worth with accomplishments, missions won’t give us enough. In fact, nothing will.

If I take on the perspective of eternity, I know that being approved by the world is a poor, stingy substitute for God’s pleasure. I know what I must do: set my eyes and my joy on Christ, fulfill my calling with excellence, and be glad in what my brothers and sisters are doing. It is literally true that being faithful to God is genuine success.

And in my imperfect way, I can live this out. My husband and I, we make decisions based on eternity. But in some of my bad moments, fears and insecurities creep in, tempting me back toward that merciless treadmill to prove that I’m enough.

But I don’t have to prove a thing. I know for whom I live: He died a supposed failure, yet He lives again and rules the universe. I will neither die His death nor live His glory. And yet, in a way befitting the creature rather than the Creator, I will. I die to sin and self. I will rise again to an imperishable body and the glory of the adopted children of God.

He has proven all that needs to be proven.

Traveling Missionaries

Being a missionary carries a great cost, but does have some benefits. It is not all doom and gloom, complete with vows of poverty and poor fashion choices for clothing.

In today’s day and age it is easy to benefit from one aspect of the missionary life. Frequent travel. The nature of missions involves being traveling missionaries. We have left home to go somewhere.

There are great opportunities and value given to those who find themselves on the road often. It is easy to believe that obtaining these perks are not something “spiritual” missionaries do. I would like to contend it is the practice of the wise

I’ve written several posts on my blog regarding how to benefit from these perks. Some of the topics I have covered are:
– Racking Up Frequent Flyer Miles.
– Finding the Best Flight Deals
– Avoiding the Middle Seat and more Travel Tips.

These posts have been some of my most successful. I will not repeat what is in them, but would like to offer a few points based on my experience and mention the benefits of following the advice to the Life Overseas community.

1. Always, always collect your miles. You might not be a missionary who’s job involves multiple trips, but simply earning miles for moving to the field or your visits home can earn you a lot of free travel. When you move a family to the field, you can earn miles for EACH member. One trip can net miles in the six figure range.

2. Don’t see benefiting from hotel points or airline miles as un-spiritual. I believe God would say it is wise. Last Christmas our family traveled home to the USA from South Africa. We purchased the international tickets, earning nearly 80,000 miles for this. While in the USA, we did not pay for a single domestic flight to see our families or supporters saving several thousand dollars. In fact, we used 7 free tickets to visit family and supporters. We were even able to use this commodity to bless others. We gave others three tickets. We might not have a lot of cash, but this is a currency we can be generous with.

3. Miles or points can benefit your ministry. I have flown free within Africa on ministry trips, Often it costs less to fly 10,000 miles to the USA than it does 2,000 within Africa. If I pay for the high mileage tickets, it helps me fly free on the lower mileage but higher priced ones. Also, on the hotel side of things. Having a free night in a hotel on a long international layover beats sleeping in an airport anytime!

4. Mileage can serve us in emergencies. This is a savings account of sorts. Recently, our family needed to respond to a family emergency back in the USA. Within 2 hours of hearing of this, I had a mileage ticket booked for my wife to travel internationally. She departed the same day we found out. If I were to buy this ticket, it would have cost me several thousand dollars.

5. Travel currency can benefit you with rest and relaxation. Even missionaries need rest. God commands it after all. We might fight the guilt battle which says we can’t do this (maybe believing we are indispensable), but God tells us to. As you read this, my wife and I are on a much needed break. We have flown to a foreign destination and are spending time in hotels, completely FREE. With the year we have had, we needed it!

Not sure where to start? It’s simple.

The next time you fly or stay in a hotel, make sure you have signed up for that airlines or hotel chain’s loyalty program. Try to pick one which serves your frequent travel destinations and stick with it.

It’s called wisdom and it carries many benefits; financially, emotionally, and “vacation-ally”

How have others in the community benefited from travel perks? What stigmas do we need to expose which tell us missionaries we are not able to do such activities or that they are “un-spiritual”?

– Chris Lautsbaugh, Missionary teacher and author with Youth With A Mission, living in S. Africa.
Blog: NoSuperHeroes Twitter: @lautsbaugh Facebook: NoSuperHeroes