Now there’s another question that keeps us awake at three in the morning. God might be leading us to serve cross-culturally in the third world… but what about our careers? In going overseas, are we throwing away everything we studied and worked for? How will we keep up-to-date while we’re serving in the Ice Valley of Tajikistan or in Outer Mongolia or in Northern Iraq? And what will happen after we return to Australia? What if we can’t find work again… and then how will we pay off the mortgage or provide for our families?

And as we lie awake in bed we think about the precautions we would need to take if we move to those places. We could read journals on the internet, attend courses in the capital and maintain membership with our professional association. But as our imaginations conjure up the stresses of doing that, we try to reassure ourselves by thinking of other returned missionaries and noting the way God has provided for them. There seem to be those who re-find work in their chosen profession quite easily. Their employees even appreciate the depth of what they have gleaned and experienced overseas. Others seem to be led into new areas, finding work in mission societies or development agencies. After having lived with a broader understanding of the world and its needs, they no longer seem content with their previous occupations. Still others seem to embark on completely new careers, somehow utilizing skills or language that they used overseas. But as the possibilities excite us, they also worry us. What about the missionaries who spend years looking for work again? How will I cope if that’s me?

Wherever we are, we yearn for security and some kind of certainty. We want to know that the decisions we make now will enhance our way of life, not endanger it. And so as we consider serving overseas, we begin to pore over verses like Matt 10:29-30, thinking that it’s the spiritual equivalent of life insurance. “I tell you the truth,” Jesus replied, ‘No one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age (homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields – and with them, persecutions) and in the age to come, eternal life.”

And the verses are reassuring but also confusing. How does Jesus speak of the present age and the one to come in the same breath? Is the triumph of eternity so real to him that he sees and imagines both at once? And on top of that, how does he speak of fields and persecution in the same breath? Does he truly know that fellowship and growth and salvation occur most profoundly amidst suffering? But yes, he seems to and he assures his disciples that right now its okay – its promise and persecution, its blessing and suffering… then in the age to come, its eternal life.

And as we sigh and ponder the reassurance, we realise we can’t guarantee what will happen after we return to Australia. We don’t know whether we’ll find work quickly or slowly, or what that work will look like. But we can guarantee that whatever it is – he’ll be with us and at work within it – to grow us more like him, to bring glory to himself and then – to prepare us for eternity. And not only is that the best guarantee we’ll ever find, it also reminds us of the reason we go in the first place… so that others will hear it. And with a certainty that’s as new as it is compelling, we leap out of bed and fumble in the dark for our passport forms…

Last year I was in Melbourne helping to prepare candidates for cross-cultural ministry. The leader of the session asked everyone to get into groups and write down a list of personal characteristics that they would expect from someone serving cross-culturally. And moments later there was butcher’s paper all around the room covered with words like; adaptable, committed, biblically-based, strategic, flexible, compassionate, practical, visionary, outgoing, reflective, sociable, humble, organised, spontaneous, humorous, competent, easy-going, empathetic, vulnerable, auditory… And it was enough to make any of us want to run away. How could we possibly be all of those things?

But later as I reflected on our years in Nepal, I think that we put ourselves under even worse expectations. We seemed to hold up an image of an ideal missionary and berate ourselves for never getting there. And maybe the ideal missionary was all of those things on the butcher’s paper. I remember that in the nineties, I was always watching an older, outgoing woman who had beautiful language and spent her time creating memorable dramatic pieces with large groups of women at her Nepali church. So every time she told me stories about the profound biblical truths that emerged from these dramatic pieces, I’d just be thinking, ‘Oh… that’s what I have to be like. To be in worthwhile cross-cultural ministry here in Nepal, I have to be like her.’

And I wasn’t! Not only did I not know how to be like her but I also clearly didn’t have the gifts or the personality to be like her. But in my insecurities, it was the only obvious solution. And I’m sure that it wasn’t just me. Recently, a returned missionary told me that during her entire time on the field, she felt under the distinct impression that she had to be ‘perfect’. And as soon as I type that word and see it in print, it sounds so ridiculous, doesn’t it? As if any of us could be perfect… when we’re so acutely aware of ‘the sin that lives in me.’ (Rom 7:17). But I think there’s something about cross-cultural ministry that adds to that sense of expectations. It might be the remittances that come in every month, reminding us of the generous support that allows us to be there. It might be the deliberateness of living in another culture, reminding us of how much is invested in us being there. It might be the newsletters that we write each month, reminding us that people want to know what God is doing. Either way, there’s certainly a sense amongst missionaries that we’re living up to something… and usually failing.

So then, by the time our second term in Nepal rolled around, I was so convinced that the comparisons and expectations weren’t healthy that I decided to do something about it. I spent a year interviewing 49 other workers and writing down their stories. And the first thing it showed me was how diverse we all were – our stories and struggles and joys and frustrations were all different. The second thing it showed me was that our experience of cross-cultural living was strongly linked to personality type. And the last thing it showed me was how much we needed each other, in order to serve as the body of Christ. God has indeed ‘arranged the parts, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be.’ (1 Cor 12:18).

So is there an ideal missionary personality? Well, the short answer is no, but there’s a challenge in it for all of us. Instead of looking over our shoulders and comparing ourselves with someone who lives down the street and has all the gifts and strengths that we don’t have, we need to grow in our understanding of ourselves and others. We need to be deeply appreciative and thankful for the unique ways God has made each of us. And the more we grow in thankfulness and Christ-likeness, the more he will work amongst us and bring about his purposes to the ends of the earth.

Anyone who has spent time learning a local language might be tempted to respond to that question with a smile and just three words, ‘with great difficulty.’ But that’s a fairly negative way to begin this column and not always true either. There are so many days when language learning feels like ‘wonder and delight’… as well as hard work and persistence.

But how do we begin to learn a new language? After many years of learning Nepali as well as watching others learn it, the biggest thing I discovered was that we all do it differently. And we seem to do it according to our learning styles and personality types. The extroverts, like my husband Darren, like to get out in the bazaar early on, using every new phrase and grammar construction that they’ve learnt. The LAMP method works really well for them because they’re encouraged to go for a walk in the community, repeating certain phrases with whoever they meet. The introverts on the other hand, like me, prefer to spend time alone practicing phrases and vocabulary before we’re ready to have genuine conversations – preferably with genuine friends! Those with an eye and ear for detail enjoy documenting vocabulary on their palm computers, constantly adding in new information. Darren loved memorising new phrases and words as he pored over the dictionary every evening. Others of us who enjoy the bigger picture and the ‘feel’ of a language, tend to put ourselves in situations where it will wash over us. I loved Nepali church for that very reason. I could just sit there for hours, letting the language seep into my thought life, my prayers and my being. Those with preferences for the bigger picture also like to understand the grammar and the system into which every verb and construction fits. In fact, some people seem so wired to capture the system that they spend years inventing a new one because the current system doesn’t seem adequate. Still others seem to learn the entire language through word association. And others plaster their bathroom walls with vocabulary lists while their friends insist that they’ve never made a single list or any kind of written documentation. There’s such a range of language learning styles!

And perhaps the more we recognize the range, the less we’ll be tempted to compare ourselves with others on the mission field. We’ll stop listening to our eloquent friends (in dismay!) and instead, start appreciating the unique way God has made us and the unique ways he wants us to acquire the new language. And the more we realise our own tendencies and preferences, the more we’ll be motivated to put in the hard work and persistence that we need to, in order to communicate well.

But you still haven’t told me about the ‘wonder and delight,’ I hear you say. Well, here’s the best bit. Language learning feels like wonder and delight because praying and singing and crying and laughing and cherishing in another language not only gives rise to infinitely precious local relationships, it also gives rise to a whole new way of seeing and responding to God’s world and God himself. And what could be more wonderful and delightful than that?

During our first three-year term in Nepal, we would go to the mailbox weekly, usually on a Wednesday. That great place of anticipation was situated on the opposite end of the Pokhara Valley, past swollen rivers and an overcrowded hospital and beyond the three straggling bazaars, so it would usually take us at least an hour to get there. But it was always worth it. We would turn the key in the little lock and watch with delight as parcels, letters and aerogrammes from Australia all fell out into our eager hands. And we’d sit down right where we were on the concrete steps, with the sounds of Nepali conversation still floating around us – and we’d drink it all in – laughing and smiling as we tried to imagine Sydney again. And it never mattered to us that the news was three months old, it was still news! We loved to hear how our friends were surviving back in the west, the decisions they were making, the challenges they were facing, the questions they were raising in their churches as well as the delights of their world.

Of course sometimes, as well as news, the letters contained information of support money that had been raised in order that we could continue to work in the hospitals – and that would always astound us. We’d often feel overwhelmed by the generosity of the people that supported us and it would remind us that when God calls, he also enables and he does that through the body. And at other times, the parcels contained newspapers with chocolates hidden all the way through them so every time we turned a page we’d get another surprise. And it’s hard to describe how exciting it all was! With limited access to a phone line or world news or shopping centres, the parcels and the letters and their contents became the link to our other life and community.

The same thing happened of course during our second three-year term in Dhulikhel, except that then, the mail came to us. Often it came immediately via email and the internet and sometimes it came very slowly, via an erratic INF messenger on a motorbike from Kathmandu – when the roads were open. But all the same things arrived – news from home, funny stories, chocolate bars, and important reminders of the partnership we enjoyed in the gospel. So then, when the rain poured down, when the political state grew more uncertain, when we sat through curfews and when the work was discouraging, it was the letters from home that God used to encourage us. He kept showing us through the mail that he was in control and that he cared about the situation we were in.

In one particular week, I was about to attempt a unit on ‘electricity’ in home school with our three boys. And that was a challenging thought because there aren’t many electrical resources in the middle hills of Nepal. There aren’t many educational shops or museums or libraries… So I was a bit worried and I was wondering how we would manage it. But the week before we were due to start, three parcels came in the mail. And inside each one of the parcels was an electricity kit. Two came from Australia and one came from the UK and the most amazing thing was that none of our supporters knew that we were due to study electricity that term. But God, who knows everything and who works in his people as a body, reminds us that the work is his. He moves within his people and provides all that we need in order that his word will go out to the ends of the earth.

So what can we do and how can we support mission from here? Open up the email or pop down to the Post Office, and send a couple of words or a ‘something’ to a missionary this week. You never know how God will use it to support and encourage and bring about his purposes to the ends of the earth.