• 00:00 Intro 
• 01:00 Getting called to missions 
• 06:46 Being effective in the culture 
• 09:45 Expectations on the field  
• 12:30 The dangers of people pleasing 
• 16:00 The stress on marriage 
• 20:45 Having young children on the field 
• 24:38 Ministering as a couple 
• 28:20 The need for community 
• 31:05 Autism diagnosis 
• 40:37 Hard decisions 

So our relationship is going to end because I see myself on this route, and I see yourself on a different route.

There’s the “we should have done more.” And there’s the, “O, we did too much.”

I had always wrestled with, “Is God calling me to this life, this work or not?” I kept waiting for some writing on the wall.

I remember sitting with different cross-cultural workers and asking them, How did you know this is what you’re supposed to do? I got these ambiguous answers, like “you just know.” I was thinking, OK, that’s not good enough for me.

I started looking at the numbers of everything. If we go to this country, there’s X number of million people that haven’t heard, that have no churches, or whatever. Or if we go to this country, there’s only this many people. I started playing the Numbers game. I realize God doesn’t work in logistics and numbers.

If God closes the door, he closes the door. But let’s go.

Here I was, looking at one country over another, thinking I’m gonna have this impact. I’m gonna do something. I’ll be responsible for 100 churches planted. I obviously didn’t believe that, but part of me was like, yeah, I’ll have more opportunities if I’m there. But then I realized I might be in a situation where I spend my life in this place, and I never see the fruit myself. I never see what God was doing behind the scenes

There’s so much we have to learn just to be a useful part of society, let alone be effective.

Things are not as cut and dry as I’m gonna share the gospel with this person and train them and disciple them, and then they’re going to share the gospel and see two more people… exponential growth.

I think it’s prudent to have some structure so it’s not just like oh, I had a rough day at language today. I’m gonna go kickback a nap the rest of the day and not worry about life.

There’s the “We should’ve done more,” and there’s the “Oh, we did too much.”

In our host country, family is a highly prized thing. So, the fact that we’re here and we have the blessing of having children is not only respected in this community but also opens doors to conversations and making friends.

This culture loves kids.

Everyone we talked to said this is normal, but we felt that something wasn’t right.

My wife always says, “I don’t know if this is normal.” And I always tell her, if it seems weird, it’s probably normal.

Our friend said, maybe look into getting some testing done and see if there might be something there.

The term autism was thrown around.

Finally, we could put a name to what’s going on and have resources to know how to help him.

It’s sustainability. Is the quality of care present for our son that we can get him what he needs and still continue on this trajectory?

We had so many thoughts like, “OK, we need to train ourselves on becoming the occupational therapist, the speech therapist. The general idea of; can we do this ourselves?

I had this mindset that we’re here in this context and if we go back, that’s turning away from the plow. But it finally hit me one day that no, just because there’s a big change in our life doesn’t mean that God’s not going to use it for his glory.

God doesn’t waste things. God doesn’t say, “oops sorry.”

Hold true to your calling to the gospel. God has changed the place where we are physically located all throughout our life, but are calling to him are calling to the gospel hasn’t changed, only the context in which we do it has changed.

• 00:00 Intro
• 01:00 Getting Kicked out
• 09:21 From overseas to cross-culture back home
• 12:16 Why is the church collapsing in the West?
• 15:40 Raising Children in the West
• 18:56 Why is family worship so hard?
• 22:15 Technology and raising kids
• 27:35 Discipleship
• 31:40 Healthy signs of spiritual growth
• 35:00 Six Characteristics for church leaders
• 36:26 Pitfalls in Discipleship
• 41:08 Biblical Counseling
• 45:42 The sovereignty of God brings comfort
• 50:28 The sovereignty of God for cross-cultural workers

I woke up from a dream that my sister and my fiancée would be taken in by the police and deported out of the country. I’ve never had a dream like this before, and I’ve never had a dream like this after.

The embassy where I am from didn’t help much. If you are in trouble, it’s your own fault.

That was the plan. To move to a city where there hasn’t been any Christian church since the Muslims came.

Over the last 20 years, the number of evangelical churches in my country has decreased by more than one church closing every week.

We have it in our hearts to reach anyone. It doesn’t matter who it is. I want to reach out with the Gospel, disciple, train leaders, and see churches planted.

The church has not been prepared for secularization. To a great extent, parents trust the church to raise their kids by just going to Sunday School on Sundays.

It’s been hard to find role models.

We want to try and get to their hearts. It’s easy to raise moral kids, where it’s just moralism, you tick a box.

When we have Bible studies in our home, we start by eating together and having family worship. I invite participants in the Bible study to lead the family worship.

You need to be really deliberate and to know what you are going for. What’s your purpose? What’s your vision?

If you become too controlling, it might backfire.

Four types of people: 1) people who need to be engaged by Christians. 2) People who need to be evangelized by Christians. 3) People who need to be established in the faith. 4) People who need to be equipped for the ministry.

If there is health, a plant will grow. You cannot always stir how it grows, but if it grows, it’s healthy.

Healthy signs of growth: when people start to handle suffering well. How do you view suffering? How do you view trials?

What am I trusting in instead of God?

We also want to see people God-centered and not me-centered.

When I train leaders, I look for six characteristics. 1) Competence. 2) Convictions. 3) Chemistry. 4) Cultural suitability. 5) Calling. 6) Consistency.

When I grew up, I didn’t experience anyone discipling me.

In ministry, there’s a lot of silver bullets and shortcuts to success.

When it’s a silver bullet approach to reach results, you remove some of the cost of discipleship.

I think counseling goes into discipleship. I don’t separate the two from each other.

A lot of secular counseling is about changing behavior or fleeing from circumstances. But to get to the real thing, we want to see a heart change.

If you can get to the heart, you can win the person, but if you just argue, it doesn’t go anywhere.

We want to see a Gospel culture where everyone shares what’s hard in life and where we care for one another. 

I haven’t seen a single person come to faith at the point where I can say, “That’s me.”

From trying to kill a sister to coming to faith.

May the Lamb who is slain receive the reward of his suffering.

I know you look at the world today, and it’s a mess, but God is in control.

The measure of success is not numbers but faithfulness. But then we need to make sure it’s God‘s definition of faithfulness, not ours, so we search our hearts, and it’s not wrong to question, “Am I doing the right thing?”

• 00:00 Intro
• 01:00 Orthodox Christianity
• 7:42 Dealing with the physical needs of the people
• 12:42 Signs of spiritual maturity
• 16:00 The toll missions takes on marriage
• 24:15 Spiritual retreats
• 26:03 Family rhythms of rest
• 30:10 Raising third-culture kids
• 36:20 The Value of learning the language
• 42:45 The comparison trap
• 53:35 Advice to the weary worker

Whenever we have had a question-and-answer time in churches back in the country we are sent from, whenever they ask, “What is one of the most challenging parts of your work?” This has been it. This is what I’ve answered people because we are in a very poor country.

It’s difficult to know to do this in a way we are expressing Christ’s love and yet doing things wisely.

My children are seeing something amazing, and we share this with them, not for bragging, but for them to see what kind of a God it is that we serve.

One of the earmarks that I’ve noticed to be a common thread amongst those that I would consider mature spiritually is contentment.

We need to thank God. We have things to think him for.

Life itself just takes more time.

Faith is not knowing the right things. That’s truth. The shield of faith which is going to quench those attacks of the devil, is you being completely convinced and persuaded of those truths.

Regardless of where you live, marriage is going to take work.

My wife and I were studying the language together. We were in classes together. But the huge difference was she had 3 little ones, at that after lessons, she had to go be mom. She is spending all her time with them, whereas I get to go out and spend time with the nationals and practice the language.

Personal spiritual retreats are a life-blood, because in a short amount of time God can do a great amount of work.

Family Rhythms of Life

• Family nights during the week
• Monthly Family days
• Yearly vacations

Our kids are neither, but they’re both. They’re a whole new thing.

I want my children to learn how to adapt.

Language is the key to the heart and mind of the person.

What was the first thing that God ended up doing, through the Holy Spirit, in Acts chapter two? He gave people the ability to hear the Gospel in their own tongue.

My past failures are in no way going to be limiting to what God will do in the future.

God’s sovereign hand, even in the sin, or insufficiencies, or failures of people in the past, are not limiting factors of what God can do in the future.

A lot of those things that we’ve been talking about come down to the importance of having a very close, intimate walk with Christ.

It was very discouraging founding out how many marriages, amongst those in missions, are, I I’ll say not just that great, but are actually horrendous. But not one talks about it.

I met the mentor I wanted; I felt like he had what I needed. So he was willing to mentor me, but he said, “But I want your wife with you.”

This was the missing key: to spend time in adoration and praising the Lord.

Unfortunately, many people in ministry feel like they cannot seek help from other people because of fear of what that other person would think of them. I’m supposed to be the spiritual leader, the spiritual giant.

Marital problems on the field are more common than you think. Get help. And when I say that, get good help as well. We had people tell us, “Oh, you’re doing just fine. Just keep going.” That’s not what I needed.

• 00:00 Intro 
• 01:00 Figuring out if missions for me
• 04:10 The first two years in the Middle East 
• 07:45 Being a single woman in the Arab World 
• 10:42 The support of families on the field 
• 12:55 Re-entry and transition 
• 17:00 From cross-cultural to home office
• 19:00 Getting married and moving back to the field 
• 21:50 Feeling like a failure on the field 
• 25:30 Feeling like you’re not enough 
• 33:00 Dealing with anxiety 
• 40:00 Dealing with the inability to have children 

I was there to teach these young girls about missions, and I was really learning myself about missions.

I didn’t know any missions organizations, so I turned to Google. I did a Google search for missions organizations and that’s where I found the organization that I joined.

It was a mix of good experiences and really difficult experiences.

I left thinking I was going to change the world, but God wanted to change me and change my worldview.

I had conversations with Arabs that were very similar to my conversations at home. These were real people that were normal.

I don’t know how much of it was in my head, and how much of it was actually happening: the idea that men were staring at me.

These people were my place of rest. We didn’t have any money so I would go to their house and eat their cheese. They had nice cheese, I would go to their house and eat their cheese.

One of the most difficult things about reentry is that no one shares your experience.

You feel lonely because you can’t connect to people; I think that’s the hardest part of reentry.

We fell in love over football.

We are both way more gifted in support roles than in evangelism.

People talk about the word calling: Are you called to this, are you called to that? I’m not so crazy about that word because the only thing we are called to do is be faithful to God.

We didn’t have that strong calling to a specific country, but we wanted to go and serve in ways that we felt like God had gifted us.

That program made me feel like my role is not valued.

It made me feel like what I was doing was not enough.

I grew up in an environment where I didn’t learn to deal with my emotions in a healthy way.

I was always asking if I was good enough. Am I funny enough? Am I pretty enough? What do I need to do to be friends with you? I wanted to be popular.

I had a skewed picture of who God is, and I had a skewed picture of who God thinks I am.

The two things she said to me were, what do you believe about God, and What do you believe about yourself?

I felt like I was facing all the emotions of the first 40 years of my life because I had never dealt with anything. My body was compensating for 40 years of things that I had never dealt with. And I was crying all the time.

It takes a lot of courage to be honest with yourself about what’s happening in your life.

What am I telling myself? What is the narrative that’s making me think, “Your ministry sucks because you haven’t talked to people today, or you don’t have a fun story or a dramatic story to tell in your newsletter”?

God’s not looking for numbers.

Even going to a counselor, for some people, is a really difficult thing. “If I go, nobody can know. What if somebody sees me go the door?”

I expected it was just going to happen. And then it didn’t happen. And then it didn’t happen. 

The overarching idea of getting pregnant and being a mom was driving my life. I felt like this was going to be my purpose. But then it never happened.

Eventually, I said, I have to shift my thinking. And it was a big question: what is my purpose if I’m not a mom? It doesn’t happen for five years; you can’t just put your life on hold forever.

Now the ball was in my court and if I do this, I can’t get pregnant. If I do this, it’s over.

Some people ask why haven’t you adopted? And they kind of push that on you, “why don’t you want this? You want this.”

• 00:00 Intro 
• 01:00 Impacted by prayer and need 
• 05:25 Spain in the 70s
• 07:12 The Arab World in the 70s 
• 11:55 A passion for languages 
• 15:10 Helpful translations in Arabic 
• 19:12 The values for workers to know the Bible in the local language 
• 22:18 Teaching English on the field 
• 27:00 Moving back to the field after 17 years 
• 32:50 Discipleship issues 
• 35:12 Strengths and weakness of DBS 
• 38:45 The value of knowing Islam 
• 42:15 The value of knowing the Bible 

We had the map of the world, and we were praying for these different places. That was in 1972.

There’s a map on the floor. We’re kneeling down around the map. We’re not worshiping the map, of course; we’re praying for the counties where the number of Christians is slim to nil to see how we could impact people who had no knowledge of Christ. 

That really shook me up, and I knew that’s what I needed to do.

We were up there waiting and praying because it was a war zone…We waited, prayed, and fasted for two days…Finally, on sundown on the third day, they let us through.

We got to the capital city of this country at war, and they were armed to the teeth…That was very scary.

I’m big on language.

I feel a deep sense of the Bible in Arabic. I became fanatical about learning the Bible.

I kept looking for ways to have conversations and to help push the envelope without them getting troubled by saying something like, “Well, of course, Jesus is the Son of God.” That will end the discussion.

There is a verse in the Quran that says, “We have redeemed him with a great sacrifice.” That verse has caused numerous to seek out the Bible. Their question is, “How can a sheep be great? This is impossible. Only God is Great.”

Does it get into the minds and hearts of Muslims to understand who Jesus was?

My heart is to get across the deity of Christ in a way that Muslims can understand.

If you don’t like it, don’t use it.

The believers wanted their kids to know the Bible.

Forget the shame part. Honor. Honor. Honor. Speak respectfully to people.

I had a really bad attitude about a lot of things.

The Middle East was still stuck in our hearts.

There’s been some movement, but unfortunately, quite a bit of persecution.

It took a year for us to gain their trust before they introduced us to the believeres.

Jesus has some pretty funny friends.

There was a lot of things I could bring up that wouldn’t cause an argument, it would cause a discussion.

The more you know, the more you are able to push the envelope without insulting them.

• 00:00 Into
• 01:00 Recap from last time
• 04:55 The ability to not doubt God
• 06:30 Understanding where God is during difficulties 
• 08:30 New approaches to communication
• 12:22 Living alone
• 13:08 Experiencing loneliness
• 17:20 Resilience
• 21:10 The role others play 
• 24:10 Starting the process again 
• 26:25 Choosing a new org
• 31:15 Getting back to the Middle East
• 36:00 What is different this time?
• 38:45 The pyramid of care
• 43:00 The story of Joseph

I came back, and I was in a very bad spot emotionally, physically, and spiritually.

I really needed a lot of help, which was difficult for me because I’m a strong personality.

I was in the middle of trauma, and people didn’t realize for a long time.

In this whole time, I never doubted God; I never doubted his goodness, his mercy. I also never doubted my calling.

I experienced before that God is faithful, and you can trust him fully, even if you can’t trust people anymore. You only learn that when you are experiencing difficulties and when you’re experiencing the Lord’s help in that.

My family doesn’t communicate very well, so I grew up with very bad communication.

In the first two years there is so much going on, you have to go through so many difficult things, you don’t even know how to voice them sometimes.

Even if I wanted to, sometimes I just didn’t know how to explain.

On some lonely days, you’re better at it, but on other lonely days, you’re not. You just suck. You feel like you’re not strong enough to reach out to someone.

I’m as lonely as I would be in my home country.

It’s the process of learning how to deal with loneliness. There are things you can do when you have acute loneliness.

I feel like the people who are single and feel lonely, you have to discipline yourself to reach out to others, and it works, and it’s hard sometimes. And sometimes, no one responds.

Patience, and endurance, and resilience, and growth; that’s only happening when you’re facing the difficult things. It’s not the fun and easy times that help with that.

You learn to put a limit to the heaviness of the situation.

The elders from my church said, ‘When the time has come, we will send you out again. When the time has come.’ I was like, ‘Maybe it will take five years or ten years!’

I thought after two years, I kind of felt like I am ready to go out again. But that was my will, it was my flesh, I think, trying to prove; I’ve been here for two years. I went through trauma counseling. I went through difficult times. I did my forgiveness part. I tried to reconcile. I know my calling is still there. So I think I’m ready to go out again.

There was a day, or a week, when I felt, oh, I’m ready to start the process again.

I really felt like the Lord blessed me and rewarded me for really trying to go through the whole process and not trying to take short cuts. And not trying to push it from my side.

I had this strong impression that help and relief projects have become stronger than the Gospel, missions, evangelism…It struck me.

I didn’t have too much romance in the first four years. I loved to be here. I felt like this is home for me after three years. But I never had this big romantic time with the Middle East.

I think I experienced more difficult things than easy-going things.

As soon as I started the process again, I tried to not romanticize it. I tried to remember what life was like.

When I came back this time, I was like, ‘Oh, what am I going to do with my week? How long is it going to take to have a routine, or to be back in the ministry, or having friends here and relationships’?

A lot of my old friends were gone, and I had to start from the beginning again.

It’s hard work. Friends don’t come easy.

The truth is, there are no detours with God.

• 00:00 Introduction
• 01:00 Getting called
• 07:25 Called together 
• 8:59 Advice for couples with tension in calling
• 11:15 The passion to keep going
• 14:03 Willing to suffer
• 17:00 The desire to quit 
• 19:54 Raising a family on the field
• 24:55 The tension of ministry and family
• 28:44 Meditating on God’s Word
• 33:00 Preparing mission sermons
• 40:20 Preaching to other cross-cultural workers
• 45:00 How the devil attacks workers
• 49:00 Serving without a role

Jesus was saying do I love him more than my family? Do I love him more than my own life? Do I love him more than my own dreams? And it just really hit me and I had a powerful experience with God.

Literally, within three weeks, I was on a plane heading overseas.

We wanted to follow God and whatever God had for us.

There was nothing long-term for me. It was just be obedient, at this point, and go overseas.

The guy looked at me and said, “Are you willing to die in the Middle East?”

It’s not a matter of calling to be in that place as much as it is; we’re not doing this together.

It’s good to be on the same page because spiritual warfare, the task of being God’s representative needs to be a demonstration of unity and love, togetherness, commitment. That is just central to being in that part of the world as a married couple.

We’ve had several times where we were in situations that we hated. And yet, at the same time, very, very clear sense of God saying, “Just stay where you are.”

God is more concerned about our obedience. Will we do what he asks us to do whether we like it or not?

Are these people even reading the same New Testament that I am?

Things got tough. Things got hard. It was overwhelming. And you wanted to quit. Each time I would go back, there was that sense of God saying, “My grace is sufficient. It’s not time yet. Keep going.” And then you keep going.

What is God saying to you for that moment?

It’s not about did I finish a task. Did I create some new ministry? But am I actually listening and following what God has for me at that point?

It’s important that we don’t leave unless we’re released.

The tension we realized, was when I came back, I would bring the whirlwind back into the home. And my whirlwind would disrupt the stability of the homeschooling and routines.

A lot of people believe there is a hierarchy here of how you spend your time. It’s God. It’s family. It’s ministry. Something along these lines. But he said, “That doesn’t seem to fit what I see in scripture.” Now, obviously, God is central; God is the number one thing. But God is going to hold me accountable if I’m a good Father. He will hold me accountable if I’m a good husband. He will hold me accountable if I have used the gift he has given. And for the ministry, he has empowered me to do. So he likes to put it more as a circle; at the center of it is God, and then around the circle, we have responsibilities where God expects us to do well in these.

The Bible is a big book. But when I think that the God who created the universe has given this to us. And everything that we need for life and godliness, he’s told it to us in these words. What an amazing thing!

The danger is more: do we put ourselves up on that pedestal? Do we think we’re hot stuff? Do we think we have something that they don’t have?

God is more concerned with us as individuals and our relationship with him than anything we’re doing in terms of task on the mission field.

• 00:00 Introduction 
• 01:00 Taking measures to avoid missions 
• 02:35 Ministering to woman  
• 04:58 Figuring out culture 
• 12:23 Enjoying the culture 
• 15:25 Ministry expectations
• 20:30 Worship with locals 
• 21:40 The importance of language
• 28:35 Friendships with Arabs
• 43:20 Getting rest 
• 50:30 Healthy boundaries 
• 54:56 Staying healthy on the field 

I did everything to not have anything to do with missions. And I sat very calmly through most of my youth time in conferences where we would be nudged or hinted towards, like, “How much of your life do you want to spent for Jesus or his cause?” I comfortably sat and ignored all of that because I had paid off everything. It was not for me.

One of the things that I was a bit scared about was that I’m not very girly… I really was a bit scared that if he throws me in with a bunch of women, and there’s a very segregated context, that I don’t know how to be girly with him.

Every time I make a good connection with a woman, I say OK, God is in this, because this is not me.

We learn more from imitation than from studying.

It’s not really about who you are; it’s about your behavioral codex. Do you fit in? Are you actually doing the things you’re supposed to do, at the time you’re supposed to do it, towards the person you’re supposed to do them to?

You can do something wrong every single second. It matters who agreed first. It matters who you sit next to. It matters when you sit down, who sat down first, who grabs a date first or second, who is offering to whom. Everything has a behavioral codex, which they know, but we in the beginning, and I have absolutely no clue about.

One of the most difficult things is to kick out the foreigners because they just don’t get the clues.

They don’t want to fall short with their hospitality just because you don’t like coffee. It’s not up to you at that point.

You have to spend a lot of time to become friends? You cannot just visit once a month and expect the friendship to grow in trust and depth.

In the beginning, you think a casual wave towards the door is enough. It’s definitely not enough.

Sometimes I feel like I’m the liar in this… I’m really asking a lot from them, and I don’t even share why I’m here.

If I speak to the local language, their face is changing. It communicates to them that I really value them, that I want to know them, and that I must’ve spent time here already, and that they mean something to me.

You always think you’re the special one that made a connection with your teacher.

My teacher told me that she never experienced a student that leaves language school and still improves afterwards.

I always have my pillow in my car, and it might be that I stay over for the whole weekend or I go home.

If you want to have friendships with Arabs, you have to be proactive.

If you haven’t been in touch with them for two weeks, they ask if you’ve died.

We want this. We want relationships. They’re not really waiting for us.

Being entertained by foreigners can be done in one or two tea sessions.

In the beginning, I felt like it took a lot of energy from me and not from them.

In the beginning, it’s difficult to find when is enough and what is too much.

I’ve never become more of an introvert because friendships here, relationships, take everything of you. It’s a 24/7 effort.

A lot of times when I was at my limits, physically at my limit, God did something amazing.

She asked me are you sad? And I got tears in my eyes, and I said, “No, I’m just exhausted. I’m so tired. I think I just need to sleep.” And she alerted her other sisters and was like, “Oh she’s crying because she’s exhausted. We are boring her!”

In my exhaustion, God opened up the most amazing opportunity.

• 00:00 Intro 
• 00:59 Getting called at 13 years old 
• 03:45 Missions in the 70s 
• 06:22 Persecution and imprisonment 
• 10:30 Overcoming cynicism 
• 12:10 How to pray on the field 
• 15:10 Spiritual longevity 
• 18:10 Prayer in missions 
• 21:35 Grief on the field 
• 28:40 The costs of being on the field
• 32:40 The cost for local believers 
• 39:40 The cost for extended families 
• 42:55 Changes in missions 
• 46:50 Who would you want on your team? 
• 49:45 Being a mother on the field 
• 56:00 Do it all to the Glory of God 

The Lord doesn’t owe us anything, but we owe our whole lives to him.

From when I was really little, I had read every book in the church library, and I knew I was going to go into missions for the Lord.

So I said, “Lord, listen, I came here; I’m really happy it’s a good education, but I came here to get prepared for your service. And I’m going to ask you that I can meet some true believers who are concerned about the world and getting out your message. And if I don’t meet them by the next seminar, I’ll leave. Because I really don’t care, what I want to do is be prepared for what you want.”

They had a weekly prayer meeting for the world.

We had our wedding in June, and by September, we were in an Arab country studying Arabic together, starting our lives in ministry.

There were no key phrases.

There were very few people who had actually seen anyone who came to faith in Jesus from a Muslim background. But we believed that God’s word is true and that we were supposed to everywhere and preach the Gospel.

It was a lot of hard going. It was quite discouraging.

By the time we were in our 30s, we felt like it wasn’t working; we are not seeing anyone come to the Lord…We thought, “What’s wrong? Have we not prayed enough? Have we not fasted enough?”

I thought we are going to quit. We went to my husband’s home church, and his pastor did not say, “Ok, you’ve done so much. You’ve already been out there for so long.” No, no, no, he said, “when someone puts their hand to the plow, they’re not supposed to turn back.”

The devil is very good at giving you scenarios of “what if.”

The second year of our marriage, my husband and I didn’t see much of each other. My husband visited another less-reached country and didn’t come back until after our first baby was born. He was being held in prison for eight and a half months.

They had stolen my suitcase. They had taken everything I had prepared for our first year.

I am not cynical. But maybe I get confused, or I wonder. Or maybe I question the Lord about some things.

It’s being childlike. It’s taking Jesus’ hand and saying, “Ok, Lord, you chose a different way.”

Why are big prayers not being answered? Maybe it’s because your big prayers were your own ideas.

Our mid-thirties was our lowest point.

The Lord doesn’t owe us anything, but we owe our whole lives to the Lord.

I want God to use me for his glory. Not my glory. Not my plans. Not my great goals.

There’s a lot more talk about prayer than there is prayer.

They took the skateboard out into the streets. And we got a phone call. One of his friends said, “They had an accident.” He was dead.

I can’t tell you it was easy; it was terrible. I understood what grief is.

The Lord knows how to heal his children.

We give our expectations to the Lord. We can’t put them on humans.

For 33 years, we were with this group every week.

They were given instructions to cut off all relations with us.

Religious leaders are not always what we wish them would be.

Why do we have this large number of people who fall away? When they come to Jesus, they need a family.

All our children love the Middle East. All our children love Muslims. All our children speak Arabic.

Our real country is actually our heavenly country. And we get that the longer we stay abroad.

Many times, the things you might see in teenagers, when kids question their faith or question their upbringing or their parents’ calling, sometimes with MKs it shows up in their mid-thirties. And that’s what happened with our oldest son.

We must not put our hope in man. We are going to be constantly discouraged. There are disappointments because people are all just human. Churches are human. Mission groups are human. Leaders are human. There are going to be disappointments in life. We have to keep our eyes on Jesus.

It’s back to the basics. Fast. Pray. Repent. Read your Bible and get out there and live. Get out there and live with people.

If people don’t get the language, they don’t stay.

In the Middle East, it’s very acceptable to be a wife and raise children.

What we need to know is what the Lord is going to say when we come to him. It’s not what the world thinks. It’s not what we think. It’s what the Lord thinks.

• 00:00 Intro
• 01:00 Getting into missions
• 03:20 Called to the Muslim World
• 06:20 The benefits of singles on the field
• 10:10 Leading as a single
• 13:48 Leading as a woman
• 17:50 Turning your eyes to Jesus
• 19:35 Staying Spiritually healthy
• 26:25 Changing counties and languages
• 33:04 Ministry never looks like you want it to
• 35:05 The importance of prayer
• 42:05 Experiencing despair and the gift of joy
• 46:45 Resting on the field 
• 55:25 Dealing with failure
• 1:01:00 A final thought

I didn’t know we could hear God’s voice.

If I could do anything in the world, what would I be? I’d be a dolphin trainer! But straight away, another thought came to my mind, “There is something more important than dolphins; People.” After that, I thought, “Wow, I could go around the world telling people about Jesus.”

I sold my fridge and left for one year. That was 20 years ago.

As a single, I thought, I can’t go. It’s too lonely to go alone.

I asked someone if, as a single, I can be a blessing in a Muslim country. Her answer to me was, “Whatever stage of life you are, you will meet someone in that stage of life. Whether you’re single, whether you’re married and can’t have kids, whether you’re married with kids, whether you’re a widower, you will always meet people in the same stage of life.”

What about leading as a single?

Yeah, this is where it would be good to have someone to come home to and just be able to talk to.

And there’s Jesus…relying a lot on him.

I asked my leaders questions in the beginning, Who do you talk to? How do you debrief? How do you get your social time? Now I feel like I’m following their example a lot of the time.

My leader would just say, “It’s been a tough week. Can you pray for me?” She didn’t go into any details. So the people around her knew that she wanted their support, she needed a hug, but not to ask questions.

I love the outdoors. But sometimes it’s like, oh, but you should be working. But the outdoors gives you so much life.

I’ve been taking a sabbath every week for the last ten years.

I was having visa problems to another country, but during that time of unknown, God was saying to me, “Praise me, praise me, praise me.”

I thought God had totally forgotten about me.

What are the impossible things that God has done today?

Why do I just write praises? Because sometimes it’s like, “God, please can you change this situation? God, please, can you tell this person to change their mind, or treat me better? Please, can they stop complaining? But if you turn it into praise, “Thank you, Lord, for this person. Thank you, Lord, that they are contributing to our field and to their team. Thank you, Lord Jesus, that your hand is upon them and that they want to hear your voice.”

Turning it into praise fills me with a lot more faith.

All the terrible things, all the wonderful things, but Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. It’s all about Jesus. Everything I’m doing, it’s all about Jesus. Everything that we get to be a part of, it’s all about Jesus.

Learning Arabic was with a lot of chocolate and a lot of tears.

God has done a lot of preparation work in the country I’m in now. There’s been a lot of ground that has been broken, and it’s been because of prayer.  We are reaping the harvest of other’s prayers. But I also want to sow in prayers that others who come after me can reap.

When you take a sabbath rest, it’s one day a week when you are not doing anything, but God is still at work.

I love reading biographies. You know, people don’t write biographies when they’ve had a perfect life, they write them when they’ve had a lot of struggles.

I love my one day off, but then I need to see people the next day.

I tried to hide myself between the Russians.

I need rhythms rest.

Also, with taking a sabbath day, especially in leadership, I give myself permission to take a day off, therefore, I am giving you permission to take a day off.

I struggled with language, but at the same time, I’m using it.

We’ve all heard stories where someone is in a situation, and they can’t do it, but God does it through them.

There is a lot of grace.

Be faithful in what God is asking us to do right now. My life has been adventurous, and it’s fun, and I’m doing things I never imagined I would do. Especially leadership, I never wanted to be a leader. But my life has just been one step of obedience after the other.

• 00:00 Intro
• 01:00 The impact of a short-term team
• 04:14 Misconceptions and missions
• 05:35 From personnel to the field
• 11:54 Building your own job description
• 16:35 The worker and their identity 
• 23:20 The inner voice of the missionary
• 28:10 Seasons of darkness and doubt 
• 31:40 Examining your faith 
• 40:16 What rest should look like
• 46:00 Costs and benefits of singleness
• 50:57 Singleness through the decades

That was 33 years ago, so my gap year extended to be slightly longer than I anticipated.

I had a lot of arrogance with God, telling him, “I hope you appreciate all the sacrifices I’m making for you here. I’m giving up my job. I’m giving up my flat. I’m giving up my salary…But after about six months, my mindset changed considerably, and I realized, no I’m actually the one who’s privileged here, and I’m the honored one who gets to participle in what God’s doing in the world.

I was quite intrigued by the “face-saving” reasons people gave for why they left the field, and then in personal interviews hearing the real reasons why they left.

I became a controlling leader, as many insecure leaders become.

I have no idea what she’s even talking about, but she seems enthusiastic enough, so why don’t we have her?

For the first six months, survival is an achievement.

If you could not disappoint God, and if God gave you all the freedom and said, “Son, what do you want to do with your life?” What would you do?

We also don’t want to be overly disturbed by not having perfectly pure motives because I don’t think any of us has entirely pure motives for serving God.

God is picking humans because he wants humans. If he wanted angels, he would have sent angels.

A lot of the inner voices of a lot of missionaries are the discrepancies between what they feel they should be interested in and passionate about and spend their lives doing, and their inner desires.

Loads of Christian workers are far more comfortable doing for God than they are being with God.

If you really look at how your relationship with Jesus is, is it the kind of relationship you would want other people to have?

There was a season in my life where I was like, “God, I’m fed up selling something that I don’t have myself.”

Until you change something in my heart, this whole evangelism thing is on hold.

Everything that isn’t processed is buried alive.

Questions, accusations, and disappointments need to be talked out with God; expressed, rather than buried.

Some food needs to be digested, and some of it needs to be vomited out.

Unless I apply the Gospel to myself, I have very little to give.

A lot of people don’t rest because they do not have a cooking clue what to do when they’re not working.

When I ask people what they do for fun, I get a lot of blank looks.

What is actually restful and life-giving to me? Then if I don’t know that, I work by default because I want to avoid boredom.

As I grow older, one of the costs of singleness has been the lack of that one person with whom there is continuity. 

I think it’s a wrong assumption that it’s only the singles who are lonely and the marrieds are not. Loneliness is a human challenge.

My 30s was a decade, making the very conscious decision that I don’t want to spend my life in the waiting room. I didn’t want to put my life on hold and assume that life only begins when I’m married.

God really challenged me and said, “You know, your being single is not a value statement about you. It doesn’t diminish who you are.

When I’m needy and when I’m tired, I could easily be prone to do something very stupid. And so I put accountability for myself in place, but I also looked at, ok, how do I ensure myself that I don’t get to this needy place where I’m so hungry that I’m no longer selective in what I’m eating?

• 00:00 Intro
• 01:08 Challenging expectations
• 07:00 Chasing fads
• 11:41 The Western church and our methods
• 15:05 Motivating passion for missions 
• 19:25 Dangers of being on the field too long
• 27:21 Dealing with cynicism
• 30:09 Getting out of your comfort zone
• 33:49 Turnover and trauma
• 40:23 How the field changes you
• 50:35 Advice you would give your younger self
• 54:50 A single gives advice to marrieds
• 58:12 The future of missions
• 1:04:19 Called, gifted, enjoyment

I don’t care how much tangible fruit I have, I care about being faithful. The numbers are in God’s control.

I’m fine with small numbers.

Missions is slow, messy, two steps backward and one step forward.

If we pray and it gets answered, we think, “Oh, what did I do in that prayer? Why was that one answered? Was it the position? Maybe I was lying prostrate? Or maybe I quoted scripture…ok, I need to quote more scripture.” Human nature tries to make a formula or structure for whatever works. 

Am I going to be hanging out with men in their 20s forever?

I’m so much more effective in my own language. I’m so much more intuitive in my own culture. Why am I out here? Last night we gathered together to read God’s Word, and I had to practice read the text. I don’t have to practice read the text in English.

I am more gentle when I share the Gospel than I was before. I was much more combative ten years ago than I am today. I’m much more willing to listen. I’m much more willing to let my Muslim friend smell the rose of the Gospel rather than banging him on the head with it. 

It’s hard not to love someone when you’re sitting next to them, praying for them.

It’s not easy to invest in people, get close to them, and then they leave.

Turnover is harder for singles, but it’s also hard for married people.

I think the longer you stay out on the field, the lonelier it gets.

Your world will expand in your new context only as fast as your language does.

Sacrifice more now so you can enjoy more later.

Seek humility at all costs.

There has to be an ever-increasing willingness to suffer

When you’re called, gifted, and enjoy it, you’re willing to stay forever.