Here's a topic: We're the missionaries, wherever we go:
Sometimes, American missionaries will it a priority to be do missions in other countries, while other missionaries from other countries will make it a priority to come to America.
Sometimes we overlook the problems in our own backyard, neighborhoods, cities, countries, which later inspires missionaries from other countries to fill in that gap. Doing so takes traveling expenses, money, travel, resources, time to learn new languages, customs, and this goes for us, too, when we travel out to other countries, ourselves.
Missionary work is always in the mind. I just posted on my Facebook that I still want to be a missionary in Australia. There is something truly innovating about foreign missionaries in foreign lands, something that truly is remarkable and effective to many extents. People will sometimes listen to a foreigner more often than they would one of their own people. So, in other words, there is something truly special and truly vital about having missionaries in other countries due to that alone. For example, if I go to Nigeria, the kids there may be amazed at my white skin. It's an ice-breaker, an attention breaker. They may think I talk funny. They may want to learn how to spean English.
However, a pastor commented when I was writing about my desire to move to Australia, "When's the last time you visited Portland, Oregon," because they have plenty of homeless people and other problems. That's when it hit me. I'm really overlooking these things. I live in Portland, Oregon, by the way. That's the thing. As cool as traveling the world sounds, we can't neglect where we are in the meanwhile, our neighborhoods, homes, family, friends.
We got to be a light in the darkness wherever we are: even if we aren't where we want to be.
lain:
