So I guess that if you're a person who decides to raise funds through a missions organization, sets up times to talk to people about your dream/vision/mission for you ministry, and plan on going overseas to work in a mission hospital for 3 years, people will call you a 'missionary'. Yeah, that seems like a logical conclusion, but to me, it kind of feels weird. Aren't missionaries supposed to be... you know...more... missionary-ish?
When I look at my life in the last 2 months in the States, it seems like not a lot of me has changed from pre-Togo times. It feels normal wearing shorts and a tank top. As a 'missionary', it doesn't mean that I act like a saint when a patient throws his full coffee mug at me. I still come home from a long day at work and just want to veg out and watch Hamilton on Disney+. I still complain about the coronavirus. I still talk about movies and boys and Taylor Swift's latest album. Though I don't understand TikTok at all, I try to stay kind of culturally relevant. Jury is out on how successful that venture has been...
But then... How could the last 18 months leave me unchanged? My moto scarred and burned legs alone are a testament to the... enthusiastic lifestyle I've lived for the last 18 months. I will forever be missing somewhere because my heart lives in two places half a world apart. Friendships that were formed in the midst of experiencing some of life's most difficult moments together will last forever- because how could we forget? There are fewer things I take for granted, more things I hold sacred, lots of things I understand differently, and nothing in my wardrobe left unsaturated by sweat.
Ergo, I've deduced that missionaries are still just people who don't have it all figured out. Parts of my life have been forever changed, and that can be hard, but it's a good thing. You know what else is a good thing? God doesn't change. He loves the Togolese baby girl on a CPAP machine and the 95 year old American man with severe dementia. He is loving and good and just. Astonishingly, He uses flawed people like me and you to fulfill His will, and that'll never change.
-C-
