Why?

The question on the application simply asks why do you want to experience international mission? I am not sure how to put into words the part of me that has been crying out for 20 years. “I want to go” seems like such an empty phrase.

We are called to reach out. Somehow I think this includes more than the woman at the Sonic drive-in that hands me my diet coke most afternoons. I stand before a congregation on Sunday morning and challenge them to show Christ’s love to a broken world. Do I really know of God’s world? Do I understand brokenness?

Yes, my heart hurts for those I talk and pray with that are walking through broken marriages and grieving the death of a love one. However has my heart ever really been broken, literally broken due to the compassion I am called to feel for another? A tear may fall, a lump may gather in my throat and at times I have been moved to lift a prayer or throw in a dollar. I can collect food for a shelter, wrap gifts for the local Christmas giveaway and even rebuild the ceiling of a home in intercity Memphis and I am in missions. Yet, somehow my heart has craved more.

The draw for missions comes from the desire to have my small and comfortable world bump up against God’s complete world. To have my heart pierced with what pierces God’s heart. Can that happen as I drive to my air-conditioned office in my paid off Honda Accord?

Why do I want to experience international missions? The circle that I have spent the majority of my life existing is not even a drop of whom I am called to love and serve. My heart knows there is more on the horizon or at least on the other side of an airplane ride.
I want to go.