Heart of a Missionary (2024)

10 Nov 2024

It took me forever to learn where my “deep gladness meets the world’s deep hunger” (Buechner); I was much older than I feel I should have been. But I did finally find it when I worked internationally as a missionary. It married so many of the things I love: travel, consuming work, problem solving, and, most importantly, living for others and relying so heavily on my faith and cultivating a personal relationship with Jesus. It was easily the most grace-filled time in my life. Until it wasn’t and I had to stand up, however wobbly and terrified, against falsity.

It’s been more than a decade since that time and my life has changed dramatically but not so completely that I don’t still have the heart of a missionary. I feel a deep frustration at not walking amongst those I serve. 

As Christians we say we are called to be in the world and not of it. Years ago, as I walked around in a foreign country truly feeling my Other-ness, I felt I understood this phrase on a deeper level. And let’s face it; it’s easier when you’re in a place where you’re the Other to “do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God” (Micah 6:8). Of course, we’re called to live this way in our own villages & in our own country; but it’s harder to do in a familiar community. We have the phrase, “a prophet is not heard in his own land” for a reason.

But it just got easier. 

That feeling of Otherness creeped into my heart as I watched the election results last week. I’m walking in a land that seems to wildly disagree with my view on how we should be walking. (I’m not claiming any marginalization here: I’m privileged by most measures and know it.)

There are, by many predictions, dark days ahead. What to do; how to react? I will not spend my limited stores of energy constantly debating politics but I must stand against all the -isms and -phobias that have become central in our political landscape. Perhaps it’s not terrible that the sense of my missionary self has returned; the awareness of walking in a land that isn’t mine.

A land where marginalization has become policy. Where I’m to walk humbly, but not apologetically. Speak truth without hate and ideally with love. The problem is that my crayon box has a big Snark-colored crayon in it and I’m not always capable of replacing it with a more level headed option. I am human, after all. And opinionated. God and I have frequent discussions about that. 

It’s time to try to regain a bird’s eye view and get back to meeting the world’s deep hunger through the things that bring me deep gladness; and do it close to home as well as internationally. There’s plenty opportunity to stand firm and unapologetic against hate and to speak truth to falseness.

And perhaps, when needed, I should ask my Lord Abba to help me do so with less snark. 🙂