Why did the chicken cross the road? and other linguistic challenges

Why did the chicken cross the road is a classic joke, but we recently found out that it's very much an English-speaking-culture joke. We had dinner last week with two colleagues, one Australian and one German. After dinner we served our Australian guest tea in a mug that had a version of the chicken-road joke. It was a "Far Side" comic. She loved it, but confusion took over as we tried to explain to our German guest the meaning of the joke. She's fluent in English, but didn't understand why that version (or the original) made us smile. (The joke turns out to have quite a history, check it out here.) Humour is so much more about culture than it is about language.

We continued talking about humour and I brought up the example of Mr Bean. I'd thought he was pretty clever with his non-verbal humour that seems to be appreciated across cultures, but our friend tells us that in Germany, Mr Bean is seen as "British humour"!

Most of our colleagues and friends are not Australia, many are not native English speakers either. Sometimes people in Australia notice that our English isn't quite as Australian as it used to be and it's because we've spent nearly 24 years living and working outside of Australia in multicultural environments. It means some of our word choices are different, for example, I tend to say "bathroom" more often than "toilet" these days, simply because it's less likely to cause confusion or offence. I used "rush hour" just this morning and found out that "peak hour" is more often used in Australia. Probably "gas station" comes out more often than "petrol station". I tend not to use colloquial words like "arvo" or "footy" and geographically-tied words like "ute" (pickup truck) and "regional" (yes, this word is used differently in Australia to other parts of the world). Our accent has become more "international" and we probably don't lengthen our vowels as much as many Aussies do.

My work as an editor and writer means that words are on my mind a lot. Almost all I write is for an international audience. Both my jobs are with international teams who speak different kinds of English, or have English as their second, or third language. Linguistic challenges are often on the table for discussion, hence my apparently well-known "Wednesday Words" Facebook statuses. The other day I tried to set up an online meeting with a British colleague and American colleague. Communication went a little bit awry with what I suspect was a hastily written email by our British colleague that confused my American colleague. Each of us had a slightly different understanding of what had been written. No big deal, as far as I know. But it could easily have been.

Working in an environment like this can make you think more carefully about the words you use and how you say them. A good communicator thinks more about their audience than they might have in their own country. For example, if I'm talking to an American, I would tend to say "ketchup" not "tomato sauce" or "candy" not "lolly". If I'm talking to a friend who speaks English as their third language I might choose simpler words and sentences than I would when speaking to my Australian or British colleagues, not because my friend is unintelligent, but as a way of respecting them by speaking in a way they understand.

It might be a surprise to you, but the differences between our English go way beyond spelling, word usage is a big difference, and not simple biscuit vs cookie vs scone. Will I stand at the back of the room, or in back? Is it good or bad news if I hear "you lucked out"? Is the chicken walking in the road or on the road? But I think it's time I hopped on my bike and rode on the road to the grocery store.

Walking alongside older teens and young adult children

We're walking through that part of parenthood that is not often talked about among parents: parenting older teens and young adults. Well people do talk about it, but not deeply. We talk about what they're doing: "My son is in second year uni." or "He's applied to study XYZ" or "She's doing an apprenticeship." or "She's taking a gap year." But not much deeper than that. And generally the parents who have young adults who are struggling, don't talk about it at all (except to those very close to them). 

I have to say it's very challenging to watch our boys as they make their way through this period. A very different stage of parenting indeed.

I'm not saying that any of this is easy! And some
days it helps to wear this t-shirt a close friend
 gave me: "It is well with my soul."

I was greatly encouraged by a book recently about genius called Spark: How Genius Ignites, From Child Prodigies to late Bloomers. I didn't pick it up with the intention of seeking encouragement, but it was much more grounded than you might expect. It looked at the stories of thirteen people who have had significant success in their field: including art, literature, science, and business. But more than that, it looked at the combination of factors that helped these people find their niche and thrive (and yes, luck was one). One interesting feature was that the author specifically sought out people who began to thrive at different ages, from child prodigies to late bloomers.

One of those featured was Eleanor Roosevelt. The author quotes her as saying:

We are constantly advancing, like explorers, into the unknown, which makes life an adventure all the way. How interminable and dull that journey would be if it were on a straight road over a flat plain, if we could see ahead the whole distance, without surprises, without the salt of the unexpected, without challenge. I wish with all my heart that every child could be so imbued with a sense of the adventure of life that each change, each readjustment, each surprise—good or bad—that came along would be welcomed as a part of the whole enthralling experience.

Eleanor had an extraordinary career as a social activist, advocate, and diplomat. But she really didn't start to thrive until her middle age. I was most encouraged by the stories of those who took some time to find their way—it gives me hope about my own boys. You invest so much energy into them, you really want them to thrive as they move into adulthood.

So where does this leave me, as I walk alongside my young men (close-by and at a distance)? It gives me hope. Hope that they will one day find their place in the world, that they will find they are able to live meaningful lives that contribute to those around them, however that looks.

In the meantime I think I need to walk gently, not pushing and shoving, or meddling unduly in their affairs. I need to keep the communication lines open, which often means not talking about certain things. I need to hold back on giving unwanted advice, but be ready to give advice if asked. I need to allow them the freedom to make bigger mistakes than I might have when they were younger. I need to continue to do my best to make decisions that are moving them towards independence, whatever that looks like for each child. And believe me, it looks very different for each of my three!

We're missing our eldest son in Australia. It's been nearly two years since I've been able to hug him or give him a back rub (he planned to visit us last Christmas, but the pandemic has made travel in and out of Australia difficult and very expensive).

One thing we're really enjoying at the moment is a weekly family video call with him. Sometimes that just involves him, David, and me; but more often than not one or both of his brothers also join in. It's been a big step forward in keeping communication lines open with our guys. This month we've discovered a website that allows us to play boardgames. So far we've played games that I know, so I've been able to join in. It's a brilliant way to connect with our sons. I've learned that while most women are happy to sit down and just talk, men usually aren't wired that way. So, being able to do something like a board game together really helps. 

If you're wondering, it's boardgamearena.com that we've been using. To initiate games with people you know, you need to pay a small subscription fee.

Mental health and missions

Here is a great article from OMF US on a topic that has touched our lives in various ways. 

I know missionaries who struggle or have struggled with mental health issues, and yet are here, serving in Japan. It's not easy, but with the right support, they're able to use their gifts for the Lord here. In many ways it's not much different to someone with well-controlled asthma serving in mission (i.e. me). But I also know missionaries who have had to leave the field due to mental health (or, for that matter, physical health) issues with themselves, or their kids.

Mental illness still holds a stigma and it's not easy to talk about these things openly. This is especially the case for missionaries who are unfortunately often held up as something like super-Christians. 

Mental illness is also beset by stereotypes. So if a missionary tells their supporters about their particular struggle they are opening themselves up for misunderstandings from the very ones who are supposed to be supporting them. Understandably that is not an easy place to be.

I like what the author of the above article wrote about pretending:

Whether we pretend we’re fine, pretend we’re holy, pretend we don’t need help … The life of pretense sets us up for failure and separates us from ourselves, from God and from others. Whether we face mental health issues or not, we must learn to stop pretending. Our only hope to deal with the challenges of life is to learn to come to the Father and rely on him in our lack.

We are a body, not individual units. Let us each care for the members of the body, giving grace and providing a safe place for transparent and honest living. 

Today's adventures

I have a bunch of blog post ideas running around in my head but things are starting to crowd in on my time and alas my blog is one of the first things to get crowded out.

But I've got a few moments now, so I'll see what I can churn out.

Park ride

Today I went for my last park/coffee shop ride. It was a gorgeous day in the midst of a bunch of gloomy, cool days. I'm so glad I seized the opportunity.

Here are some photos. Such a sparkly day!

Then I rode to a favourite coffee shop and enjoyed a light lunch with a street-view.

I did some shopping (coffee to last till we leave, plus a couple of other needs).

Orthodontist adventure

Then I went back to the orthodontist that we visited last Friday to pay the balance of a bill. 

This was a classic culture-confusion problem. Kids in Japan get extra health coverage until they start high school, yes, even non-citizens. The "start high school" thing is, of course, linked into the Japanese system, not the international school system. So we didn't register that our middle son's coverage ran out on March 31 this year. Apparently, the dentist didn't either. I tried to present the now-expired card, and she pointed out that it had expired. She didn't realise why it had expired and neither did I. So I paid the mere 200 yen for the checkup (about $2.50) and promised to email a photo of the new card.

But when I got home David realised what had gone on and we had to 'fess up to having not paid the whole bill. He called them Friday afternoon and said I could come back this week. They said "call us before you do so we can have the bill ready." The orthodontist is quite close to this coffee shop, so it was natural to just do it when I rode down there, rather than taking an extra hour's round trip in the car. 

David rang them this morning. No worries. Except that after he left to do the car-parking paperwork chasing, they rang back on my phone and I missed the call. I stiffened my upper lip and called them back (I'm not fond of phone calls and even less in Japanese). I'm actually not really sure of what happened in that conversation, except that they ended with "matte imasu" (we're waiting for you). So I left.

I didn't get to the orthodontist until just after 1pm. Here, many medical/dental places have about two hours closed in the early afternoon and I walked into a waiting room that had the lights off and the door to the "surgery" closed. So I sat and waited a while to see what would happen (and save myself another hour's journey later in the week). After about 15 minutes someone came into the reception area and from there we quickly sorted things out. I paid the outstanding 2,170 yen (about $AU27).\

Back to my ride

I rode back to the park, via this intersection where I've been fascinated by this little shrine for many months. I've driven past it many times as we've gone back and forth from the orthodontist. 

I rode back through the park, took a few more photos.

And said "sayonara". This is the little path I use to enter the park (and exit today too). Can you see it? It's hard not to feel a little envious of the people living in these houses abutting the park!

On the way home I stopped at one set of lights. I was startled to see my image reflected back at me by a little roadside mirror placed to help someone get out of their driveway.

After I got home and had a shower, I coached the person taking over my blog-posting job to get an OMF Japan blog post up, at the same time as worked with David on speaking material for Australia. 

Phew! It's been quite a day.

And now I've run out of time. My next blog post might be about "God's amazing economy" in us being so dependent on others. It was one of the themes in an unusual sermon on Sunday and has come up in other conversations recently too. So stay tuned.

Ugly is okay?

There were two Australians and an American at a missionary conference in Japan. The American had been in Japan many less years than either Australian.

In a casual conversation, one Australian mentioned their son in passing, using the word "ugly" as a descriptor.

The North American was shocked and said so.

The other Australian pointed out that the comment was a beautiful example of contextualisation: that a Japanese person would naturally say such a thing about their child.

There was a pause in conversation as they considered that.
_______________

Of course the Australian was, perhaps, not being as Japanese in their comment as their colleague suggested (although after a lengthy period of living in this country, the ways of this country do rub off on you). For in Australia such a comment is just a bit of lighthearted tomfoolery. In Japan, a parent might say something like this out of humility. And, well, for an American, it was all rather a shock.

It's easy make assumptions or mistakes when you're dealing with multiple cultures, even between native English speakers.

Please don't assume you know who is who in this scenario!

Geographically distant teams

My workday yesterday was been bookended by Skype calls. 

The first was a monthly editorial meeting with the executive editor of Japan Harvest. Most it is a meeting that gives us accountability with regards to bigger-picture stuff related to the magazine and communications with the organisation who publishes it (Japan Evangelical Missionary Association). The call only spanned about 9 km, but allows both of us to work from home with no commuting time or cost.

The second call was to the UK, with a member of OMF's International Communications team. She was providing support to me in my role as part of the mobilisation team for OMF Japan. She taught me a new techie trick to use with my social media role.

Both these calls were very useful and extremely convenient. Not to mention time- and cost-efficient.

Over the last seven years I've become an experienced geographically distant team-member. I didn't know this term until I went to a workshop in Bangkok last year and spent a week learning about teams. I was puzzled at the time because the teams I'm involved in are quite different to the face-to-face ones they were talking about, so I did some research and discovered a the term "geographically distant team" (also known as geographically dispersed/distributed, remote, or virtual team). In this world of increasingly fast internet speed, the sorts of teams I'm a part of are increasingly common. Teams where the members work from their homes, or from locations that aren't favourable for regular commuting.

Below I've pasted part of an assignment I researched and wrote following the above mentioned workshop (which was called Project Timothy 3). I wrote it before the mobilisation team of OMF Japan was formed formally, so that team is not mentioned. 

If you're working on such a team, you may find it useful (sorry, it's a bit longer than my usual blog posts).

Project Timothy 3 focused on understanding teams and how to best help them work, but the type of teams the course focuses on is teams that work closely together, they see one another often, and are in the same geographical location. The team that I am most involved in is a geographically distant team. We produce a magazine, Japan Harvest, for missionaries in Japan, but do it from our own homes. Our team lives in several prefectures in Japan and two other countries. So for this assignment I sought to understand geographically distant teams better and then took a look at my own team, at what’s working for us and what needs some attention.

What are they?

Geographically distant teams are increasingly prevalent in this world as companies and organisations take advantage of the technology available to them to connect teams in ways that has never been possible before.  A broader term that’s used more frequently is “virtual teams”. They are groups of individuals not physically in the same place but united by a common goal.

Wikipedia defines a virtual team as “A group of individuals who work across time, space and organizational boundaries with links strengthened by webs of communication technology.”

Powel, Piccoli, and Ives define virtual teams as “groups of geographically, organizationally, and/or time dispersed workers brought together by information and telecommunication technologies to accomplish one or more organizational tasks.” (http://www.managementstudyguide.com/virtual-team.htm)

Virtual teams communicate predominantly by the use of technology and may never meet. In some cases they have cultural, language, time zone, and ethnicity differences also.

Some virtual teams are temporarily formed to accomplish a set or limited task.  Teams aren’t necessarily from the same organization, are frequently topic-specific and dissolved after the completion of the task. Some teams are formed with specialists for the purpose of making recommendations, other teams have more powers to effect change and make decisions. Some virtual teams are set-up to outsource specialist tasks, like software development.

Where do you find them?

“Today it isn't uncommon for companies to have as many as 50% of their employees working on virtual teams” (http://www.reliableplant.com/Read/27807/Virtual-teams-are-different).

You can find them everywhere, from multimillion dollar companies to small business, and even in mission. NASA uses virtual teams to run space missions. Whirlpool developed the chlorofluorocarbon-free refrigerator using a virtual team. You see them in customer service support, consulting firms, management teams in national and international companies, and offshore teams for software development.

OMF International has many virtual teams. For example, the Field Leadership team in Japan—the members live in Tokyo, Tohoku, and Sapporo. One member is currently on home assignment. They sometimes meet in person, but many of their communications are via email, phone, and Skype. Another virtual team on our field this year was the Field Conference planning team. This is an example of a team that came together for a specific purpose for a short period of time.

How do they work?

There are different types of teams. Variables include: purpose of the team, whether members are from the same company or multiple companies, and the length of the project.  Some teams regularly meet, for example, the TED tech team has 29 members spread across several US states and two other countries, they meet via videoconferencing every week, as well as in person every three to four months (http://blog.ted.com/8-tips-for-virtual-collaboration-from-teds-tech-team/). Other teams meet less often or never at all.

A friend of mine in Australia works for a Christian organization called Scripture Union, that especially reaches out to school students. My friend supervises chaplains in schools across a wide geographical region. She periodically drives for several days visiting them at their place of work, and they periodically gather together at conferences. But she told me that the most meaningful thing they do to promote team unity and productivity is meeting weekly via Skype for time of reading the Bible and sharing and praying for one another.

Advantages?

Virtual teams: 

• save money,
• allow people with necessary gifts to contribute regardless of their location,
• can be more efficient,
• are more flexible to meet needs,
• can work at times that suit them best,
• individual team members have more control over where they work,
• they save time wasted on commuting, and
• at times it means that they can make decisions faster.

Disadvantages:

• Essential technology can be expensive and can break down.
• Trust is hard to build and easy to break.
• Collaboration is difficult to manage.
• Conflict can more easily arise from misunderstandings that come with a lack of the non-verbal cues that are part of face to face communication.
• Members may feel isolated and lack the motivation that being physically with a team can provide.
• Self-discipline is a must for a well-functioning team.
• Not being in an office can be less productive.
• Communication in general can be more difficult.

Specific challenges these teams face?

• Building trust.
• Managing collaboration
• Avoiding and resolving conflict.
• Accountability.
• Team spirit and motivation.
• Finding ways to meet.

Are you  a part of a geographically distant team? How do you make it work?

Making and keeping connections with others

Making connections and maintaining them is really hard when you live as we do—away from many who love us as well as in a very mobile, very busy expat community. It's a topic that often comes up on two of the Christian expat communities that I keep an eye on: Velvet Ashes and Thrive Connection.

Velvet Ashes has published two articles recently that resounded with me, so I'm passing them on, in the hope that they may either help you, or help you understand the challenges we face:

Here's a friend who's taken a piece of my heart to
Singapore this year.

8 ways to make real connections with others

This article gives some good suggestions. I don't think they are all helpful for everyone, but you never know which might be helpful for you. 

I especially am challenged by number two: be courageous. I know that in general it tends to get harder to make new friends as you get older, but the rate at which we have to do it is high. Not to mention that we don't know how long we will have these friends that we've invested in, so it takes courage to put yourself out there again and again.

Number four is hard: teach others how you communicate. I think people have figured out that I'm a prolific communicator, but that doesn't mean that they have learnt to connect to me. I feel quite disconnected from many in Australia. When I see them, I'll probably connect to them quite quickly, but in the vacuum of communication, I sometimes wonder if they still consider me a friend. I wonder what's going on in their lives. 

Just the other day one of my boys reminisced about this outing
 in Australia 2½ yrs ago. The memory is full of friends we miss.

Please, friends, don't feel too guilty here. I don't expect communication to the level that I've pushed it with my blog and Facebook and our newsletters, and I know that you are busy. I'm busy too . . . too busy to maintain dozens of close relationships that require the sort of upkeep required for a long-distance friendship. I think that is one reason I'm attracted so much to social media. I can maintain connections with people I don't see in my regular life without too much additional work. I also know that a lot of people struggle to maintain friendships that aren't face-to-face. But I did want to put it out there that I struggle sometimes.

Keeping track of sorrows

This article talks about the grief of never being fully known. There is much underlying grief in the missionary lifestyle and one is this, that no matter where we live in the future, no one (barring perhaps a spouse) will ever have been a part of most of our daily or weekly lives for much of our lives. I know that's true more and more as people all over the world become more mobile. But I think that as missionaries (and those in the armed forces too), as we interact within very mobile communities, we end up with bits of our hearts spread all over the globe. That is hard.

Another website A Life Overseas published this article last week: The five people who shape you the most that touches on the expat's frustration that the people who we would spend the most time with are never all in the same place at the same time.


And one more recent article that touches on this topic: A love letter to my expat friends, also published by A Life Overseas.

However, despite all this, I'm encouraged by this paragraph in the Keeping track of sorrows article: 

Psalm 56:8 (NLT) says, “You [God] keep track of all my sorrows. You have collected all my tears in your bottle. You have recorded each one in your book.” Every step we take is not only observed but also thought worthy of counting and recording. He remembers every detail and recognizes our grief as a real thing. David, the Psalmist, fully trusted God with his future, and still let his tears flow. He knew God was compassionate and was not embarrassed by his own tears. 

The special place of postcards in Japan

Front, with the information.

People send postcards in Japan. Not scenic ones, generally, but informative ones. They're used for New Year and birthday greetings (the latter generally by businesses who happen to know your birthday or from things your kids are associated with, like Sunday School).

Another use of postcards is reminders. This one we received this week to remind us that it was time for my husband to make another dental appointment.

This struck me as quite different to Australia. These days in Australia we might get a text from the dentist. 

Japan is odd—such a reputation for technology, but the uptake on using technology in daily, domestic life has been slow. City offices seem bowed down in paperwork, the pharmacy has several people dealing with paperwork whenever I visit, and faxes (rather than email) have been extremely popular until relatively recently.

Back: reserved for address and stamp. It is frowned on to write
much on the back. And only 52 yen to post (62 Australian cents).
Probably one reason why it's remained a popular way to communicate.

Today's language mayhem

The person who came up with this translation "ship shortage",
might have been having a mayhem of a day too.  This was
the reason given for our flight back to Tokyo being
cancelled last June.

This morning I was head-down-tail-up trying to get all the articles for the next magazine issue finalised before going away again tomorrow.

Finalising an article means making sure every detail is taken care of before I hand the articles over to the designers: from the obvious mistakes the proofreader might pick up, to checking on communications with authors about details they are concerned about, to images I've received from authors or a myriad of other small matters that can become big matters if not dealt with at this point.

This is not my favourite part of editing. I prefer content editing where one is looking at bigger picture issues.

So in order to do this end of editing for the magazine I need to work myself into a certain focus. The sort of focus that doesn't allow me to quickly jump in and out.

This afternoon I had my semi-regular language exchange meeting. A time when I get together with two Japanese friends and we try to talk in Japanese and English, helping each other learn. 

Unfortunately I did not allow myself sufficient transition time. I jumped almost straight from editing onto the train and into chatting. My "Japanese brain" simply didn't snap into gear. Especially as they wanted to hear about our son's wrestling! And that is something that I almost never talk about in Japanese, so my vocab is pretty limited. Not to mention that they had a lot of questions about specifics that are challenging to explain, even in English.

So I went from thinking about a sentence like this:

US authors may object to “maths” being used in place of “math” in their writing, just as Commonwealth-background authors might protest about “cilantro” replacing “coriander” (the leaf, used in cooking) in something they’ve written. 

To trying to figure out how to explain "pinning" in Japanese (not knowing the word for shoulder blade and forgetting what verb I could use for "holding someone down").

Thankfully my language exchange partners are very forgiving and don't mind if we end up doing more English than Japanese. It is I who tends to beat myself up.

So we ended up talking about all sorts of things in a mixed-up way. Not the best for language exchange, but still fun.

Something that struck me later as I walked home, was the number of times I talked about "the feeling" of a word. Words like "seedy" and "balmy". Even talking about a "white elephant" and how it isn't just something that is useless, but it carries the feeling of an encumbrance.

The "feeling" of a word is very important. It's something that you only get when you are becoming familiar with a language. For example, when you put  the word I've used in the title of this blog post: "mayhem" into the thesaurus, you come up with words that are similar, but not necessarily quite the same. For example, "violence" and "destruction".

Similarly in Japanese. I only can think of poor examples, but I learned the word for energetic or lively: "nigiyaka" when I was at language school and applied it to my son, but was immediately corrected. "That is only used for events or situations, not people," I was told. The word "gambatte" is a Japanese word that isn't easily translated, but means something like "do your best" or "try as hard as you can". The feeling of the word is one of encouragement, with an edge of stoicism to it. Something you don't easily get with those English translations I've given.

So anyway, I've learned that I have good days and bad in Japanese. Probably I would have more good days if my job required me to work more often in Japanese. But I've learned to accept that sometimes I'll feel like I'm flying through and other times it is more like a less-than-graceful trek through a bog.

Supporting the missionary who comes from your church

It occurred to me over the weekend that we write a lot of prayer letters but rarely hear back from churches who support us. It's not easy to know how to support a missionary beyond giving them money and praying for them, so I did some searching to refresh my memory on this topic. 

You may find this useful information to apply in your own church. 

I wrote an article about this about four years ago and put it on my blog back then. I'm reposting it:

How churches can support their missionaries

By Wendy Marshall

There are many ways you can support missionaries. Different people feel comfortable with different ways of doing it. Here's a grab bag of ideas you might like to consider.

Let them know they are remembered

Missionaries love to know that they’re remembered. And because they aren’t with you, it is hard for them to know unless they’re told or shown. Emails, letters, postcards, Facebook messages etc., are always welcome. Phone calls or Skype calls are sometimes difficult to fit into busy lives, but they can be especially encouraging. Paul models this in his first letter to the Thessalonians, telling the church, not only that he was praying for them, but what he was praying. Hearing someone pray for you or about their prayers for you is a wonderful blessing — pass it on to your missionaries.

If your missionary is working in a limited access country, it would be wise to check with them or their mission’s home office about what guidelines they have for safe communication. You don’t want to cause them difficulties and different countries have different limitations.

Keep them informed

It is helpful to keep missionaries informed of changes in the church, especially if you are their home or one of their main supporting churches. This includes leadership changes, a change in the church’s name, or mission contact change, as well as more basic contact detail changes. When sending out prayer letters each month, it can be a drag to find that many emails are returned. Including the missionaries in the church directory and ensuring that they get a copy is one way to help keep them informed.

Many missionaries like to know what is happening in their home church; so let them know about significant events like church camps, baptisms, births, deaths and marriages. These things can help a missionary feel included and also make it less of a shock to transition back into the church when they’re home.

Include them

Including your missionary when they are out of the country takes creativity but can range from being included in email conversations, to being asked for input in a Bible study via email. You could also ask your missionaries for photos to show at church during a missionary spot or prayer time.

Visit them

Have you considered whether your missionaries would enjoy a pastoral visit? Think about sending one or more members of your church or leadership team to visit a missionary your church supports, particularly if they are members of your church. 

But do consult first with the missionaries. Different people have different coping thresholds when it comes to houseguests. It can be easy to become overwhelmed with visitors, and some missionaries seem to get more than others. Be aware that they have busy ministries to attend to, as well as potential limitations in providing you with accommodation. Ask them when a good time would be for you to visit, and be sensitive about the length of your visit. Be considerate about their finances too. You don’t want to cause the missionary distress by cleaning out their pantry without helping out with the expense. You also might consider taking a suitcase full of goodies from home; it could be a huge blessing for them.

Care for them with gifts 

Different people feel loved in different ways (as in The 5 Love Languages by Gary Chapman). Love can come in care packages too, especially ones that have been thoughtfully put together. A surprise is good, but a care package is even better if it contains items that your missionary especially wants, so it is good to ask them what they’d like.

Show loving concern for their family

Caring for missionaries’ families at home can be a way that churches can show their love and support. We have a colleague whose father became a Christian after their home church showed care for him, drawing him to church, and eventually he commited his life to the Lord.

When they are in your country

Missionaries appreciate practical care when they’re transitioning in and out of the country. A full pantry speaks volumes when you’ve just landed back in your home country and cannot face grocery shopping yet. Finding accommodation and transport, setting up telecommunications, and finding local services are ways that you can help your missionary when they’re coming back from overseas.

Coming back to a church you’ve been absent from for a long time can be scary. It is nice if missionaries are welcomed back as if they are locals who’ve been away for a while.

Missionaries love it when they’re given a reasonable amount of time to talk about what they’ve been doing in front of the whole church. It is fine to give a firm limit on how long they can talk, but consider how difficult it is to summarise years of ministry in only a couple of minutes.

Most missionaries love to have one-on-one conversations with you. This can be difficult to achieve on a Sunday morning, so think of creative ways that you can get to know your missionaries better when they are home.

Missionaries especially enjoy it when you ask thoughtful questions and stick around for the answer, even if it is a bit lengthy. They love it when they find out people actually read and remember their prayer letters. There’s a joke in missionary circles about the people who enquire about the wrong country; for example China, when we’re actually serving in Japan. Missionaries joke about it, but it really isn’t funny. Missionaries love it when you remember to enquire about the smaller details they’ve mentioned in their recent prayer letters, for example, “How’s Mr. Suzuki going?” if Mr. Suzuki is someone they’ve been meeting for Bible Study.

It's up to you

How you manage all this as a church is up to you. You can have a missionary committee; you can have one person dedicated to missionary care. You can have a mission-minded pastor who promotes mission as a matter of course. You can have, as we do, a small group dedicated especially to help, advocate, and pray for each missionary family. You can have regular missionary “Spots”, a mission’s night, weekend, or month. You can have mission displays around the church. You can distribute literature or summaries of prayer letters, and hold regular missions prayer meetings.

There are many ways to go about it and different people are comfortable with supporting missionaries in different ways. However, we've found that it really needs to come from the top. Unless the leadership of a church is mission-minded, it is difficult for a church to be mission-minded. We ourselves have lots of individual supporters, but not so many mission-minded churches.

But you needn’t be discouraged if your church isn’t mission-focussed. There's nothing to stop you from taking a step and doing just one thing from this list. You may never know until heaven the difference it might make to someone having a tough time.

It is easy for missionaries to feel that we're out of sight, out of mind. But missionaries are still a part of the body of Christ — we're the hands that are overseas. As Paul says in 1 Corinthians 12:25 "There should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other" (NIV)

Other articles

Other people have written on this topic too. Here are three helpful articles I found:

This article amazed me. It is the first time I've ever heard anyone say this: the best way a church can be an encouragement to its missionaries is to maintain a strong base. "There's nothing more discouraging to those on the field than to hear of difficulties in their sending church." We can testify to the truth of this after having heard significant bad news more than once from our first sending church. The whole article is excellent, however.

This is from the Gospel Coalition is written by a missionary I've met.  She has some excellent things to say too.

Finally a pdf that covers a life-time of supporting a missionary (from the start tot the end). This author also has some great points you may not have thought of before. 

Key to survival as a missionary?

On Saturday I sent out our monthly prayer/newsletter. It's something I'm passionate about: good communication. Especially missionaries who are being supported by people back home with prayer and finance. If we don't tell them how things are going for us, how can they pray? If they're giving money towards our support, the least we can do is to let them know what we've been up to.

So when I saw this article about how to write excellent missionary newsletter, I got excited. I don't agree with all of it and not all of it is relevant to everyone, but it makes some really great points that are worth taking note of. It even goes to the extent of saying that "Newsletters could be the key to your survival overseas." Indeed, we don't know how much prayer contributes to our ability to remain here, it's not something you can quantify like you can with money. But I would venture to say that without the prayer support we've received over the last 15 ½ years from 200+ supporters we wouldn't still be here.

If you're in the position of receiving newsletters, do take a look as well. You may be able to find a way to encourage the missionaries you support to do a better job at keeping you up-to-date with them.

A mobilising table

This is one aspect of mobilisation that
I've already been involved in producing.

I've recently been tasked (actually I halfway volunteered) to oversee a mobilisation table at our upcoming mission conference.

What's mobilisation? 

Mobilizers stir other Christians to active concern for reaching the world. 

Phil Parshall

This is an excellent video by OMF which explains six ways that Christians can be a part of reaching God's world, five out of the six don't require you to move countries! I recommend every Christian watch it. If you aren't a Christian I recommend watching at least the first 38 seconds, because it explains why we do what we do.

This is a good article about mobilisation at varying levels of involvement and locality. However, our mission doesn't quite agree with what he writes about missionaries and mobilisation. 

Our mission expects that all missionaries on the field are also mobilisers. Admittedly we do more of that when we're assigned to our home countries (i.e. home assignment) for short periods of time, but just us being here and being supported by people in other places is an awareness raising thing, in other words, mobilisation. 

Our prayer letters and other communications are mobilising others, be it for prayer, or support, or even going. This blog is part of what I do in the area of mobilisation.

So back to this table for our conference in June, I have to spend some time thinking about what we're going to with with it to help equip our 120 missionaries to be better mobilisers. We have some ideas, but I'm wondering do you have any ideas?