Ministry

Sometimes We Eat Cereal For Supper

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by Elizabeth

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Some days I spend hours reading aloud with my kids. Sometimes that means science doesn’t get done. Other days we pore over science books for hours, but grammar doesn’t get done. Some days we get all the subjects done, but I run out of time to prepare dinner. On days like those we eat cereal for supper. But only if we have milk in the house.

Or we might eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for supper. But only if we have bread in the house. Because even with dedicated weekly meal planning and shopping trips, I can rarely keep enough bread or milk in the house. Which makes for a lot of husband-texts like “please pick up bread or we won’t have supper” and “please get milk or there will be no breakfast.” If all else fails, I pop popcorn.

Some days not every school subject gets done, but I dance with my younger kids and laugh at my older kids’ jokes. Other days I put in a good, solid school day with the kids and feel satisfied but much too tired to write. I’m almost always too tired to exercise. Mostly I force myself to work out. I know from experience what happens if I don’t. Sometimes I don’t get to my email for weeks. Or I go for weeks without having time or mental energy to write. In those times I can really become unpleasant to live with.

Sometimes I go months without spending time with my closest friends. Sometimes I have so many social, school, and ministry engagements that I don’t get sufficient time by myself to be a kind, sane person. Sometimes I’m so worn out by all this busy rushing that I lock myself away and skimp on spending time with my husband. Other times I choose to hang out with my husband regardless of what else “should” be getting done. And nothing does get done, but I sure am happy. I have discovered, in fact, that husband time is the biggest key to my happiness.

Sometimes I bemoan the fact that I can’t do everything all the time. That I can’t seem to get my life in order and pull myself together and balance all the needs. But maybe I’m not supposed to. Maybe every day isn’t supposed to contain every thing. Maybe each day is only supposed to contain some of the things. Maybe something is always going to fall through the cracks.

And maybe I’m supposed to be ok with that.

How to be a Human Christian

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by Jonathan

Here’s a link to the article I mention in the video: The Gaping Hole in the Modern Missions Movement.

Here’s a link to the feelings wheel.

Facebook Live at A Life Overseas

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Hey all, just a quick note to let you know Jonathan and I were on Facebook Live for about an hour last week, talking with friends and readers all over the world. If you want to watch a replay of our conversation, Jonathan posted it here. We talked about many topics during that hour, so Jonathan included a cheat sheet of sorts in the replay. ~Elizabeth

Love with Faith (or Play Guitar with Both Hands)

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Recorded at ICA in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, March 2017.

To listen to the message, Click Here or visit the trotters41 podcast on iTunes.

Paul concluded his message to the Ephesians with the idea of Love mixed with Faith(6:23), and I borrowed his thoughts for a bit. Here are some excerpts…

Love comes to seek and save the lost, while Faith believes they can be.

Faith empowers Jesus to prophetically imagine a new paradigm for the co-crucified: “Today, you will be with me in Paradise.” While Love communicates the fantastical truth: “I want you with me in paradise.”

Faith innervates Jesus’ declaration to the Samaritan woman, “If you only knew the gift God has for you….”

But Love is what got Jesus talking with her in the first place.

“Love joined with faith.”

Faith helps me believe the Gospel. Love helps me share it.

Without Faith, Love lacks vision and imagination, leaving us without mooring and definition.

Without Love, Faith becomes cold and unapproachable, leaving us bitter and mean.

We need both.

Love mixed with Faith.

Living Well Abroad: 4 Areas to Consider {A Life Overseas}

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Jonathan’s at A Life Overseas today. . . .

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My day job here in Cambodia is serving as a pastoral counselor. In a typical week, I meet with clients from Asia, the Americas, Australia, Europe, and occasionally Africa. And whether these clients are missionaries, NGO workers, or international business people, they’re all trying to figure out how to live well here. In Cambodia.

I was recently asked to share at an international church on the topic of Living Well abroad. I gave it all I had and presented my compiled thoughts and hopes. This article is an extension of that presentation.

It’s not short and it’s not fancy. But it is pretty much all I’ve got. 

My hope is that this article might serve as a resource, a touch point, for you and your team/org/ministry/family/whatever. If you’d rather listen to the podcast of this material, you’ll find some links at the very end. All right, here goes!

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How long were you in your host country before you cried really hard? You know, one of those famous UGLY cries that no one sees but certainly exists? Was it sometime in your first year? Month? Week?

For me, it took about 27 hours.

Our theme verse for those early days was 2 Corinthians 1:8, “We think you ought to know, dear brothers and sisters, about the trouble we went through in the province of Asia. We were crushed and overwhelmed beyond our ability to endure, and we thought we would never live through it.”

But we did.

For as Paul Hiebert writes in his seminal work, Anthropological Insights for Missionaries, “Culture shock is rarely terminal.”

Theory can only get you so far. At some point, you have to get your feet wet and Nike the thing. That’s what this article’s about. It’s an attempt to give some practical, hands-on, nitty-gritty, [insert random epic language here], rubber-meets-the-road, advice.

Much of this comes from my own experience of transitioning a family of six from the suburbs of mid-west America to the concrete vistas of Phnom Penh. The rest comes from observing lives and stories in that enigmatic place we call “the counseling room.”

The four specific areas we’ll consider include Living Well Abroad…

  1. Theologically
  2. Spiritually
  3. Relationally
  4. Psychologically

Click here to read about the 4 areas.