My Preparation

I grew up as a missionary kid overseas and the Lord placed a desire on my heart to serve in the role of a missionary. This section will tell you what it is the Lord has laid on my heart to be a part of, the preparation I went through to get to where I am now and why that preparation was important, as well as the end goal of where I am going and some of the things involved in that.

Ever since I was young and felt the Lord’s call on my life towards missions, I began to think forward of what training that would require. I knew being a part of a church planting team was a daunting task that could not be done through desire alone. My parents had told me stories of them going through training to become equipped. They had gone through two years of Bible School, a year of what was called boot camp, and around a year of language school. I had seen it pay off, and yet four years of training seemed like a lot. Here is my experience with the preparation in my life for missions, and why I would do it all again.

One of the first ways I was equipped and prepared was growing up in the home that I did. The Lord blessed me with my parents who have served Him with their lives and been godly examples to me. They taught me through scripture, challenged me to make my faith my own, and encouraged me to walk with the Lord wherever He might lead. I was able to grow up on the mission field, experience life in a distinct setting, and gain a unique perspective on the world. This preparation gave me a walk with the Lord, a heart for missions and a desire to seek the Lord and what He had for me.

The other thing that the Bible school really challenged me in was missions. We had a lot of missionaries coming through and sharing the ways that they were working, the ways that the Lord was working in their life and their ministries, and the great need for the Gospel all over the world. This continued to encourage me and made it clear that what the Lord was laying on my heart was important, as well as the fact that where I was going and the way He was leading me was extremely vital because I do want others to hear the Word of God.

Another area I was challenged in was discipleship. While I was at Bible School, all of the staff were there because they wanted to serve the Lord. None of them were on a payroll and all of them were really excited for the students to get to know the Lord, study His Word, and to really dig in deep and to grow. Their examples and their godly ministry was evident in all they did. There were also Deans for the marrieds and for the singles. The women dean really impacted me, they made time to spend individual one-on-one time with each of the students and that was really impactful on many of the students’ lives. I was able to be mentored through their ministry during a time in my life when I was going through transitions.

In the classes regarding language and culture I learned about how different people view the world and how where you grow up and what you are taught as well as your language and your culture really affects and impacts the way you view the world. I had already known and realized this growing up, but seeing it laid out wholistically helped me to further realize the span of the impact. All of the missionary kids and their families that I am serving are going to be experiencing transitioning and living in different cultures, languages, and views of the world. Learning and now understanding the impact of culture and language will help me to better understand where the families may be coming from and how the kids may be impacted by this life of different languages and cultures. No two kids will be the same, because where they grew up and the combination of their home countries as well as the countries they're growing up in is going to impact how they view the world.

Relationships and team building was one of the areas that had the greatest impact on me. I learned about discipleship and its impact, the fact of as the body of Christ we are to be an example of Christ to others, and teamwork and how we work together is extremely important as we are working together as the body of Christ. I had an incredible staff lady who mentored me and walked me through a lot. She guided me and gave me advice on areas that I could grow in and then checked in with me to see the progress I was making. I was able to learn a good deal about myself and my strengths and weaknesses. Knowing these strengths and weaknesses helped me to grow and ask for help in my areas of weakness, and to work on and cultivate my strengths. This was extremely helpful to be aware of as the teambuilding classes pushed me to work with others, laboring with one another in accordance to each member’s strengths and weakness. It is amazing to realize how much each person impacts the rest of the team as you work together as the body of Christ. I was able to realize throughout my classes on Church planting methodology, that although I may not be directly involved in church planting, a lot of the missionaries that I'm going to be supporting and working with are going to be doing church planting or supporting a church planting role in some way. Better understanding church planting is helpful understanding the circumstances and transitions that my coworkers are going through and how I can best be a part of the team to serve them well.

Further Training

One of the first things I am going to be continuing to do through my ministry is developmental training. This is not training like the training I have had up to this point and that I just summarized for you all, rather it is going to workshops, training sessions, and seminars. Much like doctors, pastors, and others who have had training of some kind have meetings and seminars to refresh their knowledge, gain new insight, and talk with others who have experience, I will be doing this developmental training to help me to grow in experience to better care for the missionary kids and their families. Some of the things it will help me to better understand is how to talk through hard things that the MKs have experienced, how to better understand and care for the MKs’ mental health if needed, and how to help MKs to transition well. My desire is to be able to understand how to care for missionary kids so that I will be able to care for them to the best of my ability.