Missional Lessons

11/4/17

                Guatemala is alive! The energy of this place strikes us in the staccato popping of birthday firecrackers at 4 AM, in the gonging of the bell sounding from the pinnacle of the Catholic Church, in the pumping music played in the busy afternoon market. Life is facilitated by the water that pulses audibly through the collection system at the top of the mountain north of Magdelana, appearing in form as well as function as some massive heart supplying the people below. Infectious joy is spread through the laughter of children amusing themselves with blown bubbles, through delicious homemade food generously prepared for us by our homestay families, through vibrantly hopeful testimonies of God’s provision in the lives His children here.

                It is too easy for missions to be defined by an egocentric paradigm, wherein Christian missionaries travel to a place that demonstrates a quality of life different than their own and so treat the local people with superiority, assuming that they can serve them and spread God’s word by “improving” the conditions they find. Duane Elmer combats this idea in his book Cross Cultural Servanthood through the concept of developed humility. Elmer maintains that we must learn about the culture we seek to minister to- through that culture- if we are to authentically serve them. Only once we understand can we avoid alienating or destroying the potential we have to serve. If we learn from and thus come to understand the culture we come to, we may see the needs they have and reach those needs in an effective way. But learning and understanding first requires relationship, which can only be formed through openness and trust.

                My favorite portion of this trip so far has been working at the Special Education Ministry site (I expect a majority of these blogs will feature each of our respective sites!). It has been a huge blessing to me and has been a fantastic example of Elmer’s take on genuine missions played out. In some ways I did come to my site with an expectation that the help I could offer would benefit the students. I am learning, however, that these students who come to the site with varying levels of disabilities and unique stories can and are impacting me more than I could ever hope to impact them. Their smiles, their love, and their contagious laughter bring me an unexplainable joy. I can only pray (and ask you to join me in praying for them!) that my presence in their educational environment brings them some joy as well and that God would work through me to demonstrate His fierce love for them.

Gloria a Dios!

Seth Brown