Article of Explanation

Purpose This article is aimed at providing advice for missionary parents to take care of their kids in a third cultural setting emotionally and most importantly, spiritually. Before we dive deep into this discussion, lets take a look at some cases from the same missionary family in real life: Background M is a college student in the U.S. now. His parents are missionaries in Mozambique sent by IMB. He was born in Zimbabwe and raised up in Mozambique. He went to Kenya for school from 8th grade to 12th grade until he came to America for his college. He has an elder sister E and an elder brother A. All of these three kids were spending a significant amount of time in Mozambique before they came back to America for college studies. They are lucky in the terms of mobility. Unlike other missionary kids who have to move in every two or three years, Ms family basically stay in Mozambique, so the kids move just for schools. Even in this lucky case, the kids still faced some challenges emotionally and spiritually in a third cultural setting. As Case Ms brother A is a typical model kid brought up in a Christian family. He had a positive attitude towards different environments and was involved in church services acting a little bit like little missionary in the community. He thought he loved God and he was a quite good believer. However, until he met with his girlfriend and observed how his girlfriend serves God with all her heart, he realized that the identity as a missionary kid helped the spiritual pride grow in his heart unwittingly. He is so familiar with Bible, fellowship, everything related to church. However he never really established an intimate relationship with God. The worse thing was that everyone else thought he was a pretty good Christian. Now, he spends more time with God and serve in the church with all his heart. Es Case Ms brother E is a negative example for kids raised up in a missionary family. She was so hurt by the feelings she had to deal with when she moved although she did not move that often. She was too young to figure out how to handle this emotion. She simply thought God was the one to blame because her parents are doing Gods work. She just left God which broke her parents heart. You can imagine how it is painful that the missionarys kid turned back on God! Until some people from a Catholic church cared for her and brought her back to church, she recovered the relationship with God. However, the big scar still bothers her. She has decided to stay in the U.S. after graduation from the college and settle down in America.

What she wants is just a normal and stable life. Ms Case M is a wild boy enjoying the life in South Africa and always curious about something new. He is a highly adaptable person. Concerning his walk with God, for a short time he was rebellious with God in a secret way. He did not want to lose his parents face or make them worried about him, so he went to church as usual. His parents did notice something wrong with him but did not talk with him about this issue but they prayed more for him. When he was attending a boarding school in Kenya for his 8th grade, in a Spiritual Emphasis Week (SEW) the Holy Spirit worked deeply in his heart and came back to the Lord Jesus. Ever since then, he has been devoted to God. He is learning global communication and planning to be a missionary in Indonesia by teaching how to improve the agriculture there. He is determined to work for those unsaved souls there although he knows pretty well that many missionaries were killed in that pagan culture. Analysis and Suggested Solutions for Parents Actually, A, E, M represent three typical kinds of kids in missionary families. A type kids take up a considerable percentage of missionary kids. They have the privilege to travel all over the world and it seems that they know everything about church and God. They look fine and are considered their parents pride but their hearts are not right with God. As long as they realize the wrong situation and re-establish an intimate relationship with God, they will be devoted believers. Suggested Solutions: This type of kids needs the parents to guide more on their relationship with God than the knowledge about God or the services they do in church. E type kids are more often seen among girls who are more sensitive and easily get negative attitude toward mobility and think God is the one to blame simply because they move with the family to do God s work. Parents should be sensitive to their changes and find time to listen to them and give advice. Suggested Solutions: Missionary parents with girls should watch over the changes in their feelings especially when they need to move. Parents should teach them to well day goodbye to their friends and places they really like and encourage them to keep in touch with old friends by Facebook, email or Skype. They should also talk more with them about what is going on in school M type kids would in a way break the parents heart for a while or for a

long time. They obviously walk away from God and always feel guilty. Parents should ask Gods mercy and show love to them which means there is always a door open for them to come back. Suggested Solutions: Parents should understand and comfort the kids in the hard time instead of just showing an emotion of disappointment. Conclusion: Generally speaking, missionary parents are busybodies. However, they should not neglect the growth of their kids that God has committed to them for care. 1)Transition time between the changes of places is very important. Parents should inform the kids of the possible coming moving in advance so that the kids have a chance to prepare their emotions and to say good bye to friends and the place they have been living in for a while. 2)More often than not, girls are inclined to show a negative attitude to the third cultural settings which means parents should take care of them by spending more time with them especially when they are in the process of saying goodbye to old friends and kind of worrying about jumping into a new environment. The mother and the father should have persistent joint prayer to provide a spiritual covering over the kids and live as the role models for the kids.

3)Because most missionary kids would go back to the home country for college studies, their parents should keep some festivals such as Christmas, Thanksgiving etc. as a tradition for the family. 4)Another preparation for their kids reentry to the home country for colleges is that if possible at least one of the parents should go with the kids and help them settle down in the new life in university because some of missionary kids are tempted to alcohol, video games or even drugs during their free and independent life in college. Parents should spend some time to help them successfully transit in this period. In a word, missionary parents should not take it for granted that their kids need their care and prayer while they are busy with enlarging the Kingdom of God. They also might need training and counseling on how to help with them kids

during some sensitive periods. Before they leave for another country , they had better learn more about the educational opportunity in that country and the advice from those who have been to that country or those who are still living in that country with family. Asking advice from experienced people is a wise act. Last but not least, raising kids in a third cultural setting for missionary parents is fighting a spiritual war. The father who is supposed to be the head of the family should pray hard to provide a spiritual covering over the family and ask Gods wisdom to lead the who family.