Perhaps the world would be wiling to listen to a church on its knees, a church that doesn’t pretend to be perfect or to have all the answers.
Rachel Rollefstad is someone who has made my life brighter for the past four years. She was originally going to write this directly to my donors/readers, but then she decided to write it to me and just let other people read it. Enjoy.
Three things I learned in East Asia
I recently came back from six weeks overseas in East Asia. A lot happens inside of you when everything around you is completely different. There was a group of about twenty of us experiencing a new location, new people, new culture, new food, new schedule, new everything. The perfect setting for learning. Here are three of the major things I took away:
1. Vision is caught, not taught.
“You should care about international students!” “You should care! You should care!” - I feel like these are things that get repeated over and over and over again in ministries, often with no actual change because most people don’t care. Or do they?
In East Asia, we are the foreigners. We are the international students. That means: unable to communicate clearly with spoken language, awkward cultural taboo moments, food that we don’t like. In other words, the same things international students feel when they come to the United States.
After we experienced this for ourselves, it’s a lot easier to put ourselves in the shoes of international students who often come across as awkward, rude, or disconnected here in the states.
We get it now. No one taught us that. We caught it.
2. God isn’t hiding in America.
The temptation is to think that one is “bringing God” to a place like He’s not there already. I used to think that (I wouldn’t have said this out loud) America was the center of all the amazing things happening in the kingdom of God. Like all the missionaries sent around the world originated from here.
Well, uh, that isn’t true. We met Asian people with a vision to take the Gospel to the Middle East where loads of Westerners aren’t welcome. We talked to students whose parents and grandparents loved the Lord. We heard stories of boldness about the faithful who don’t speak a word of English.
The proper mindset is to enter a short-term trip thinking “I’m going to join in with what God is already doing.” The “bringing God” mindset makes us professionals. The “joining with God” mindset makes us servants.
God is global, and He’s not hiding in America.
3. Short-term trips matter in the long run.
I used to make fun of missions trips that only lasted for a few weeks because I thought it just meant people didn’t have the courage to pack up their bags and actually stay somewhere for the long term. I was wrong.
Our partner ministry told us that our short-term week sped up their work by about six months. Four weeks = six months.
Amazing.
Now, the fun part is to apply these things here in America.
I wonder how many people just witness to strangers because they’re scared to actually get to know people.
I heart the little things
Ya know the cheesy cliche “you don’t know what you have until it’s gone?” Well. It’s true.
I jacked up my knee yesterday (breakdancing, of course) and am constrained to crutches and a lot of pain. Being injured has made 18,352 things that much more difficult. Little things that I take for granted that I’m able to do with ease when I’m in my normal state of functioning.
Things like:
Taking a shower
Brushing my teeth
Getting a tortilla
Taking my orange juice glass to the table
Walking up stairs
Carrying a book with me to the bathroom
Putting clothes in my closet
You know, those things you did this morning. Those things.
And although it sounds cheesy to the extreme, I’m grateful for the little things today.
Why I’m getting insurance as a Christian
For the past three years I’ve been asking the question:
“Is insurance a legitimate tool of God or an illegitimate substitute for Him?”
And I’ve been floating in limbo. Back and forth, back and forth.
Some months I’d be like “Insurance, ha. I have faith in God. I’m not putting any of my hope in the systems of this world.”
Other months I’d be like “Insurance? Good idea. What if something really bad happens?”
Well, today (yes, today) I heard a pop in my knee while breakdancing.
I can’t put any weight on it. Or make it straight. I think it’s dislocated. And I do not have insurance.
Thankfully, one of my friends picked me up and took me to a medical center. My income is low enough (that’s a whole other story) that I qualify for some discount plan (which basically means taxpayers cover the bill). And since it’s the secondhand medical center they can’t see me until tomorrow.
Now that the rubber has officially met the road, I’m getting insurance.
However, I still have an issue with corrupt big corporation insurance executives taking vacations off of our premiums so I’m doing something a little different.
After three years of being tossed to and fro, I’ve decided. Modern medicine is a gift. And insurance is a legitimate tool of God.
….That’s why I’m getting insurance as a Christian.
The great tragedy is not mainly masturbation or fornication or acting like a peeping Tom (or curious Cathy) on the internet. The tragedy is that Satan uses the guilt of these failures to strip you of every radical dream you ever had, or might have, and in its place give you a happy, safe, secure, American life of superficial pleasures until you die in your lakeside rocking chair, wrinkled and useless, leaving a big fat inheritance to your middle-aged children to confirm them in their worldliness. That’s the main tragedy.
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