Throwing it all Away

Okay, I want you to take your idea of a missionary and just throw it out the window.

I’m probably not what you imagined I am and I probably don’t do the work you thought I would do. I don’t see people healed and I don’t have people converting to Jesus a hundred times a day. I don’t live in a mud hut and I usually get to make any kind of food I want. I’m terrible with the language and the longer I’m here the worse I get at speaking Kiswahili. But I am just as much of a missionary as the people living in the mud huts. I think that westerners (including myself) have a messed up idea of what a missionary is. We expect terrible living conditions and miracles to be happening daily but that is only one tiny part of reaching people for Christ. I was talking with my boss/friend Trish today and I was telling her about my struggles and the things the Lord has shown me over the past 4 months. So now I’m going to try to translate them for you. I have a lot to share and I’m going to try to keep it as succinct as possible but if my thoughts wander then they wander and I’ll just trust the Lord to speak through my inability to communicate.

Ps. this is going to be a long one, and I’m not sorry about it! Also, it is a lot easier for me to explain in person so once I’m home, if you want to know more I would be so pleased to sit down with you one-on-one and explain it that way! Here it goes!

My Time Here:
I did have expectations, and none of them were met. Instead I found a God who is big enough to make America the most desperate mission field I have ever known personally. I found a God who showed me that a relationship with Him starts with the big bang or realization of who He is and then the dramatics end and the hard work of truly pursuing Him begins. He is a God who demands to be known not just seen. This is my part of reaching the world for Him. As Trish so aptly put it, we are not all Peters and Paul’s. Sometimes we are the apostles who come after the wave of huge dramatics. Sometimes we are the ones called to go deep not wide. The ones to walk along and do life in Christ with others, teaching them how to not just see God but to pursue Him.

I have been asked a few times if Africa has captured my heart. The honest answer is no. I don’t feel any calling here beyond my 6 months that are almost at an end. I have loved my time but the biggest adventure with the Lord is yet to come. An easy way to explain it is that I came to Africa to be prepared for my work back home. My heart is called to the people who are just as lost in America. I have 53 days left in Kenya and I am as terrified about leaving as I am about staying. Part of me is 100% ready to come home because I know with pure joy what the Lord wants me to do and the other part of me is completely scared to face the challenge of coming home. It is so easy here to be with the Lord because my job description is to be focused on Christ daily. I’m here to share His love with others and to talk about Him to people. When I get home, my main focus will naturally be on finishing school. But I’m not just a college student anymore. I care even less about school than I did before which is saying a lot since school was never anything more than a platform for me to reach people for Christ. I don’t want to return to that life.

Okay so my time here has honestly been more about changing myself than about changing the world. I explained it to Trish as a huge wave constantly breaking over me. The wave is Jesus, and when it hits me it tears things off of me as well as pummeling things into me. I am being changed completely from the inside out. I have learned the things I can handle and the things I can’t. I’m at the point now where being here is a huge struggle. I know what I’m supposed to do when I’m home and I feel like I should be going home tomorrow. I am already beginning my struggle against things I’ll face at home and I still have a month and a half left here.

I get all sorts of emails from people saying they are proud of what I’m doing here and excited for the change I’m making and I don’t really understand why they say those things. I don’t see this time as any different from my time at home. If anything, the real change will come when I get home, Lord-willing. I don’t feel like I’m making a difference (I know in some way I am but it’s not in ways you guys are expecting or imagining) and just because I’m in Africa I think people expect for me to be changing this country. Well, I hate to burst the bubble but I’m not making that kind of difference. It’s not the difference I expected to be making and it probably looks a lot different from what you guys think I’m doing. Oh how I wish you all could feel the joy I feel over my coming work at home! But even more than that I wish and pray that every single one of you would figure out exactly what type of missionary you are created to be and that you would pursue the Lords calling on your life with more focus than anything before.

My Failures As A Sinner:
Is it possible to explain to you guys all the things going on in my heart and mind? I doubt it. This time in Kenya has been the most painful yet beautiful time I’ve ever had. I have never seen my pride for what it is until I came here. I was skyping with my sister last night (she is a missionary in France) and it was such an encouraging time to share with her because she has experienced a lot of the same things I am going through right now. One thing I am struggling with is my pride over my image as a missionary. The Lord has been stripping me of it by showing me exactly what type of missionary I am. I was telling Carie that a difficult thing for me with going home is that I will lose my difference. I came to Africa expecting to be the next poster child for mission work (which I’m not). When I go home I will be just another American.

But it’s not true.

The Complexity of Christ:
I don’t know what changed me but I am completely different. I haven’t even begun to crack into the heart of Jesus but I know Him now in ways I never even imagined. If I’m being honest, I know a lot of things about Him that I don’t even understand. I walk around every day with a deeper understanding of Him in my heart that my mind doesn’t understand at all, but it knows it’s there. That probably doesn’t make any sense to you. It sounds crazy as I read over it but it’s the truest way of explaining it. The thing that gets me the most is how complexly simple He is. My brain begins to unravel and explode when I try to think about Him and comprehend what He does, whom He is and what He’s capable of. So sometimes I just stop thinking about Him and enjoy His presence.

My Future At Home:
Looking at what’s to come I am afraid of entering back into my old life. A lot of the time I don’t feel like I fit anymore. I feel like the next part of my life has started and that in going back to school I’ll be going in reverse. But I understand what I’m supposed to do. I want to share my new understanding of living for Christ with others. I already know what a lot of my struggles will be and it’s hard to stay focused on my work here as I prepare even more for beginning the next journey at home. I want my time at home to be just as focused on Christ as my time here has been. I don’t want to get sucked back into the culture of the university life. I want everyday to be an encouragement to someone and end in a deeper relationship with Jesus. I LOVE people, and university is a place where I thrive because I get to constantly be around people who love Jesus. But I don’t want the Christian bubble to swallow me up again. I have to work to figure out how to be diligent to Christ and His call. I know I will have to work hard to get away from that bubble and into the places where Jesus’ heart is breaking. So I’m working to prepare for the battle that is to come. I honestly think that in some ways being home will be more of a challenge because it will be a fight against the things I struggle with most. When I’m here in Kenya, all the struggles of choosing friends over unbelievers are gone. When I get home, I will have to work to choose the Lord over “fun” college things. But I’m so stoked for the blessings it will bring and the chance to walk with Him on paths I’ve known for years. My school, Boone and the community I exist in at home has changed colors. It’s as if there is a new lens over my eyes when I look at it. I see it now for the mission field it is and the hope that the Word of God will bring to that small town. The more I think about it and pray about my time at home the more excited I become over leaving Africa. Crazy eh?! So I don’t know what this will look like but I know it’s right where I’m supposed to be, and because of that confirmation I can face the States with a hope I’ve never felt for it. I can look at America and see it for the broken country it is. I am SO excited to get back and start going deep with people. To start finding Christ in the broken and lost of Boone, NC and to begin loving people in ways I should have been doing all along. It just took me 6 months, a lot of challenges and 7819 miles to find my place in the Lord.

My real mission work won’t start until my feet hit the American soil. I want the church to get rid of its view of mission work. I want to explain to everyone at home what the Lord has shown me and for them to become a part of it!  How disfigured our image of Africa and of what it looks like to show people Christ. I honestly don’t know how to explain my heart but I know it is incredibly important for me to share it with you. I want to take the whole idea of “the church” and shake it up. I want people who are considering mission work and are exploring the idea of going to another country to become a “true missionary” to stop and get the romantic ideas out of their heads. I want to show them my mission work and to show them the importance of not just reaching people but of developing people. I want to cleanse my heart of the ideas and preconceived notions I had about what my life with Christ would look like because if I was to live my walk with Christ as I expected it would be a dreadfully boring time. I want to break the mold of the box most Christians expect and unveil a new type of missionary to the 1^st world Christian. I want to bring the 3^rd world Christ to the comfortable 1^st world believers and leave them wondering what their adventure with the Lord will be and how their time on Earth will forever change the course of humanity. It’s a bold statement but it’s the reality of serving the God of the Universe. At what point will we all wake up and see this world for what it is? When does the reality of a life with Christ verses a life without gain the importance it deserves and demands? What is the point of our short time on earth? Do we really truly believe in the power of the Holy Spirit or are we waiting on others to stand up and make the change? I have never been surer of the power that resides in me, of the God I serve and of the calling I’m destined to fulfill. The big question I ask myself now is “when I get home, will I be strong enough and willing enough to start a journey that is even harder than the one I’m currently on?”