Better isn’t Always Easy

I leaned my head again my hand as we were talking after the meal and my Kenyan colleagues both instantly asked me, “What’s wrong?”

Beautiful scene from the big island

“Nothing is wrong.”  I responded.  “I’m just listening.”

“When you put your head in your hands like that, it is a sign to us that something is wrong.”

“Nothing is wrong,” I assured them.  “It just doesn’t carry the same meaning for us.  Look.”  I pointed around the room to various Westerners happily carrying on conversations with their heads resting on their hands.  

We both had to laugh.  “All these Western teammates must be very troubled.”

But the thought occurred to me, how easily this could be misconstrued.  Imagine if my Kenyan colleague were giving an engaging thoughtful talk and I and other Westerners decided to rest our heads on our hands.  What would we be inadvertently communicating to him?  That we were bored or upset?  Heaven forbid!

Did you know that most cross-cultural workers go back to their home countries because of other workers? That is at least the often-repeated statement that we’ve heard many times. Many things can be difficult about working overseas— the strain of being away from family, the struggle to understand a new culture, the frustration of learning a language. I think we often assume that our relationship with other workers will be the easy part— that everyone will naturally get along and understand each other and be a support-system for each other. And sometimes that is how it is. Sometimes workers come together in unity, God does amazing things and it is beautiful.

Enjoying coast with colleagues

That’s how it should be. We should be able to find unity and work together for a greater purpose. Sometimes in our desire for unity, we seek conformity. We mistakenly think that conformity is the source of (or at least will help ensure) unity. But we are meant to seek unity in the midst of diversity not through conformity. We read about people from every tribe and tongue coming before one throne, of many parts with different strengths forming one body. One of the things that drew us to our organization is that it included people from different backgrounds and sought out partnerships with like-minded people and groups. We love that!

But here’s another secret— working amidst diversity and still finding unity is hard. We understand the desire for conformity because respecting diversity is difficult.

We’ve just come back from two larger group gatherings. First in mainland Africa we went to a gathering of team leaders from around the continent. Then back on the islands, we joined a gathering of cross-cultural island workers. In both places we were celebrating and praying for more diversity. We want to be serving alongside people from different nations and with different mother tongues. It is so much better when we do! But at the same time, we talked a lot about how much harder that is. It is so easy for one culture to dominate and either silence or alienate those from other cultures. Our group has long been dominated by western (and often American) culture, so there are a lot of habits and ways of operating that have to change for us to truly welcome in workers from other cultures.

Navigating different languages, cultures and customs will mean we make mistakes. We will offend, misinterpret and confuse each other sometimes. We have to have a lot of grace for one another and assume the best of one another. We have to believe that it is better that we work together. It won’t be easy, but it is better. It is worth it.

Boys attempting volleyball

Across the four islands, we have workers from North America, South America, Europe, Asia and Africa (we’ve had Australians in the past too!). I wish I could say that no worker has ever left the islands because of other workers, but that unfortunately has happened. But we can say that we have been blessed by the amount of unity and true desire for godly partnership that we have seen on the islands. We truly share one vision and the same values. By one Spirit we who are many continue to work together.

Unity and diversity have to be fought for, have to be prayed for. This doesn’t happen in our own strength. Will you join us in praying for it?

PRAYERS ANSWERED
We got our passports in time! It was a close thing and in our minds we were already making plans to change our tickets and extend our stay in Kenya, but God is good and we got the passports when we needed, got our negative COVID tests and were able to return to the islands as planned! Thank you so much for praying. All the logistics fell into place nicely and we were able to fully participate in the meeting of workers from across the islands. The new worker who was rushed to the hospital with breathing problems last week is doing much better. The meetings went well and we were blessed to get to know all the new workers who have come to the big island in the past few months. It is exciting to see the group grow and diversify! Our kids had fun playing with all the other worker kids from other islands. 


PRAYERS REQUESTED
Continue to pray for more African workers to join us in the work on the islands. They have unique cultural insights and are able to adjust to the islands in ways that we can’t. Pray for the current new workers to adjust well and to thrive. Pray for workers to continue to be united and to have grace and forgiveness for one another in the midst of disagreements and misunderstandings. Our teammate has taken her first leg of travel to get back to the UK— after much difficulty and a long overnight boat ride, she is on the French Island, only to be told that her next leg has been canceled! Pray for peace for her as at every step she has encountered difficulties. It has been exhausting. Pray that the airlines would take care of her and help facilitate solutions. We just sent our short-termer to stay with an island family for a month— pray that they would take good care of him and that he would have opportunities to be a light to that family.

Good Service

 The whistle blew.  The air brakes hissed.  The train was ready to leave the station.

Sunrise on the coast

“Okay, just get on the train right there.  They will help you on the way,” the man said.  
We hustled into the train with our bags.  Moments later it pulled away from the station with us standing in the aisle.  Would we have to stand the whole way to Mombasa—a six hour train ride?

It all started when we ordered the tickets online.  Something went wrong and though it accepted the payment we were never issued proper tickets.  We called and emailed but never received a reply.  Finally we were able to make contact with someone and they assured us that everything would work out fine at the train station. But when we got there, it was not fine.  “Invalid” the electronic ticket dispenser read.

At the ticket window, they couldn’t explain it.  Clearly we had paid, our information was in the system, but we had never been issued tickets.  We had no seats on the train.

“Don’t worry,” the woman assured us as she wrote down all the information and had me sign.  “Follow me,” she said.  With the signed document we walked over to security where she ushered us through, but we still had no tickets.  “Just go,” she said.  “They will help you over there.”

So we went on and as the train started to board we heard them asking, “Tickets, please.”  We explained again that we had no tickets, that the woman had ushered us along.  “Oh, don’t worry.” the nice train attendant said, “Just wait here.”  So we waited, with our bags, on the platform as the minutes ticked by, as all the passengers got on, as the platform emptied and as the departure time drew nigh.  No one told us what was going on, but just told us to not worry. It was just a few moments before leaving that we quickly pushed onboard the train.

Enjoying holiday on the coast

Once inside we heard, “Tickets, please.”  We don’t have tickets, we explained again.  There was some walkie-talkie talk and we waited again.  Finally a man came to us and said, “Put your bags anywhere.”  After depositing our bags under various seats he hustled us through the whole train all the way down to the dining car.  “You can sit here until we find you some seats.”  After sitting in the dining car for about an hour we were marched through the train again and given seats normally reserved for the staff.  

After that the train trip through the African countryside was very pleasant.  We saw animals: camels, cows, giraffe, elephants, antelope, and wildebeest.  It was comfortable, smooth and easy.  But my heart wasn’t easy.  I had thoughts of writing reviews on TripAdvisor—talking about how badly treated we were, how stressful the whole situation was.  But then I started to reflect…  Was the service really so bad?  Hadn’t we made the train?  Hadn’t they found us seats?  Hadn’t they kept us together?  Hadn’t they gone above and beyond to meet our travel needs?

And it struck me that this might be an example of cultural understanding.  If we had come to the train station in America without valid tickets and the train was full, what would they have done?  I think most likely they would have apologized and put us on the next train.  Or perhaps they would have given us scattered seats around the train.  Either way, we would most likely have not been on that train or not sitting together.  But in Kenya the priority was to get us on the train together.  They achieved this.  It meant bending some rules probably, but they got us to our destination.  

In America, they probably would have explained a lot more of the process to us.  “Your tickets weren’t issued because…”  “Due to the train traveling at maximum capacity…”  “Since your tickets were never issued, we will have to…”  We didn’t get any of this kind of information from the Kenyan train staff.  Mostly, “Don’t worry.  Just wait here.  Just come this way.”  I think this is also cultural.  In America, I want to know all the details.  “What exactly is going on?”  In Kenya, it was seen as sufficient to just let us know there was nothing to worry about.  And really, if we had trusted those words, we might have been less stressed, because in the end—they took good care of us.

Happy Father's Day!

Today we took the train back again.  No ticket problems this time.  Everything ran very smoothly.  We’d recommend it!

PRAYERS ANSWERED
We are thankful for a relaxing vacation.  The kids loved swimming in the pool, but we also got in some beach time, and sight-seeing.  It was great having one of our teammates join us too!  Thank you for praying for Tom’s dad— he is out of the hospital and doing better, though still without a clear diagnosis of what caused the episode (we’re praying it was a isolated incident). We’re thankful for Megan’s parents celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary! We are also thankful for all our fathers this past Father’s Da


PRAYERS REQUESTED
Passports!  If we don’t have some assurance that our passports will come Wednesday or Thursday, we will have to change all our tickets and we will miss out on the gathering of all our fellow island workers.  Pray that the passports would come in tomorrow!  Pray for the gathering of island workers this coming weekend— that it would build unity, clarify vision and inspire us in our work.  Pray for our teammate who needs to get back to the UK for health check-ups and is encountering lots of logistical hurdles— pray for a clear path forward. One of the new island workers on the big island had some sort of asthma-like attack and was rushed to the hospital. Pray that the medicines would do their work and that she would be able to breathe easily. Continue to pray for justice on the islands— we’ve heard that there are new laws saying you cannot say anything bad about the president and that one journalist and has already been convicted. These are not encouraging developments.

The Coveted 52

 When we started a blog, we knew that consistency was key. If we wanted people to faithfully follow us and for them to faithfully pray for the islands then we knew we needed to be faithful in keeping the blog updated. We knew from experience that we checked other people’s blogs less and less if they weren’t updated. So it became a discipline.

Making a new friend

Over the twelve full years that we’ve been blogging from the islands, we have averaged 51.5 posts per calendar year. Seven of those years, we posted the full 52 posts- one for every single week of the year!

Some weeks the idea for the blog is in our minds pre-formed and the post simply writes itself. Other weeks we don’t know what to write. We brainstorm ideas together, but then it can feel like pulling teeth to get something on paper. On those weeks the other person often has to rewrite large sections to make it passable. Which leads to another common question? Who writes the blog?

More often than not one of us has an idea and offers to write. Otherwise we hash around ideas until we agree on one and then decide who is best placed to write it. But still we usually write in a way that obscures the main author because it is really both of us writing. One person is the initial author, but often the second person comes and edits enough for it really to be both of our voices. People often try to guess the main author. Tom has been congratulated for a post mostly written by Megan and vice versa. We don’t mind. It’s a combined effort and after a decade it has become a part of our weekly rhythm as a couple.

There is some pride involved that keeps us writing every week. We’ll admit, there is something satisfying at seeing the 52 next to the year on the blog’s side panel that announces that we didn’t miss a week that year, but it begs the question…do we ever take a break? Tom is tempted to say that it isn’t a good thing that our yearly average is so high. Writing our blog is work, shouldn’t we take a break sometimes? We believe that rest from work is very important for health and sanity. God wants us to rest. But we also remember that one of the purposes of our blog is to get people praying for the islands…don’t the islands need prayer every week? Aren’t there always new requests of which we want people to be aware?  

Where’s the balance? How do we find weeks to rest while still getting prayer requests out there?

Our kids on the train heading out on holiday

Well some weeks, we actually think of more than one blog idea or we think of a blog idea that is timeless— it doesn’t really matter when it gets posted. We often go ahead and write up these blog ideas when we think of them. Then we save them, for a week when we want a break. A week where we can just add a few prayer requests at the end and call it done.

For a week like this one.

PRAYERS ANSWERED
All of our meetings and appointments went smoothly. Megan finally got the all-clear to stop getting follow-up blood tests and scans, as it seems most likely now that her abnormal bloodwork is from a rare, benign condition. Tom got to visit a school for African cross-cultural workers and share about our work and the islands (some were excited about possibly working on the islands in the future!). We’ve been able to check in with our teammates back on the islands— things remain calm there and our team is doing well.

PRAYERS REQUESTED
This week we had a scare when we got news that Tom’s dad had to be rushed to the hospital and ultimately ended up in the ICU after being ill for a couple weeks. Thankfully he has stabilized, is out of the ICU and should be heading home soon. Cancer has been ruled out, but the exact cause of his troubles has not been identified yet. Pray for a diagnosis and for Tom’s dad’s continued healing. We are starting a week of vacation— pray that it would be restful for us and our kids. Megan has been sick with a cold, so pray that she feels better. Some of our teammates are also heading towards some holiday time this week— pray that they would get the things done that they need to in order to have refreshing breaks. Also a big prayer request— we were disappointed to learn at our Embassy appointment this past week that our whole family will have to stay in Kenya until the new passports are ready (we had hoped/planned on Megan staying to collect them if the new passports were delayed and had been told we could do that). Now that we all have to stay, we are praying that they are not delayed at all! We need the passports by Thursday, June 24 (although for the sake of our nerves we’d love them sooner) if we want to get back in time for the meeting of all the island workers on the big island (not to mention avoiding the headache of more COVID tests and changing flights). Finally, our colleagues on the small island are having trouble renewing their visas. Pray that they would find favor with the necessary officials and that this wouldn’t be an indication of future troubles for the other two islands getting visas.

Fruitful and Multiply

Kids showing off at leaders' conference

This week we were gathered in mainland Africa with a group of team leaders. We were from different countries and continents and we work among different peoples, languages and cultures, but with the same heart, vision and values. We want to be fruitful and multiply.

This is one of the oldest commands and the origin of meaning may have been biological, but the spirit can be applied to many of the things we do. If they are important, essential things, then we want them to be fruitful and to multiply. That is to say that we don’t want them to end with us, we want them to be passed on and done by others.  We want to see our roles carried on by others. We want to work ourselves out of a job and see the work grow and increase. 

But beyond just seeing our work reproduced in others, we want islanders to have that same desire to pass things on. We don’t just want to share good news, we want the people we share with to share the good news. If just one person treats it like a “secret” to keep to themselves, rather than “news” to be shared, then the multiplication process stops. So we have to pass on not only methods but the vision and values.

Hawk  looking for free food

It was exciting to hear about work happening in different places. Sometimes it is easy for us to be consumed by the challenges and victories of working on the islands. It is good for us to broaden our perspectives and see the work happening on a greater scale.

As we’ve been pushed to consider the bigger picture, we have been struck by how the the need to multiply ourselves is played out again and again. As faithful followers, we want to see more people grow in faithfulness. As leaders, we want to see more people grow in leadership. And as we are asked to support other leaders, we want and need to see more and more people able to train and support leaders. We realized that at some point we’ve expected people to go to the select few “experts” rather than encouraging everyone to grow in their expertise. If at some point someone feels like they aren’t qualified or experienced enough to pass on the knowledge they have gained, then the multiplication stops. People need to be empowered to pass on what they have learned rather than waiting to attain an expert-level before they help others.

That’s not to say we should falsely puff people up. We always need to hold in balance the desire to pass on the things we have learned and humility to realize that we still have a lot to learn— even the so-called “experts” need to maintain learner attitudes.

It reminds me of big families. At some point if you have a lot of kids, then the older kids will have to help the younger ones. If everyone waits for mom and dad to help then the family won’t survive. The older kids might only be kids, but they still have expertise to offer the younger ones.

Our boys & old team leader

Listening to the wisdom and experience of some of the team leaders this week, we are humbled by the areas we still need to grow in. But we’ve been team leaders for awhile now, so we want to see our teammates grow in leadership and we look to help our one teammate become a team leader herself. And we look forward to the day, when it will be islanders leading teams and going to new places in the hopes of sharing good news, being fruitful and multiplying.

PRAYERS ANSWERED
Our travels to Kenya have gone smoothly so far.  All COVID tests were done in a timely manner and were negative!  We were able to participate in the team leaders' conference which was beneficial and encouraging.  The children had good dental appointments today.  The places where we are staying have nice firm beds, which is a blessing for Megan’s back.  We are enjoying the cooler weather and a chance to catch up on some work and personal things while away from the islands. The islands have remained calm.

PRAYERS REQUESTED
Tomorrow we head to the embassy to renew our passports.  Pray that everything would be in order and that the process could go quickly and smoothly.  This week we have a number of visits and meetings to complete before heading off to the coast for some real vacation.  Pray that all of our appointments and meetings would go well.  Of course, lift up the islands in our absence.  May there be dreams and visions, softening hearts, opening doors, major breakthroughs, repentance, growth, fruit and multiplying.