by Andy Johnson

Director of Worker Care

and former worker in Burkina Faso

I launched to the field as a relative newly-wed (married less than two years) who went straight out of grad school. My bride Melissa and I got on a plane nine days after 9-11. I used to think our departure was the weirdest one ever for moving abroad; then I walked alongside people trying to move to the field during and just after COVID. They win the weird competition (congratulations…).

I wish that my church knew I wasn’t nearly as strong as they thought I was. I was a kid following God to Burkina Faso with some friends that I called teammates. We were all foolish enough to think that God meant us when He said Go! (He did) and that He would show up before we got there (He also did that).

Our church was amazing (still is!). They celebrated what we were going to do (even though we hadn’t done anything yet). They gave us space to speak to the children and the teens of the church. They combined their adult classes for Q&A sessions with us. I was even allowed into the pulpit! They used words like inspiration, faithful, and sacrificial to describe us.

I didn’t feel I could burst their bubble by telling them that the closest I’ve ever come to a panic attack in my life (still to this day!) was when that plane was landing in Burkina with me for the first time. I was white-knuckled and wrestling in fear with whether or not to get off the plane at all. I don’t think my church had a clue, nor did I feel I could clue them in.

I wish my church knew that a big part of why I stayed during those hard early months and years of glorified camping in our home as we learned language and culture and made friends and plans for disciple-making was that I was too scared to admit defeat. Some days the only reason I stayed was that I wasn’t brave enough to tell everyone I quit!

I wish my church knew more about that “triumphant” moment when, after years of learning and preparation, I stood up in a village market and told a story about how God made the world. I’d make sure they knew that my hands were shaking and my voice cracked several times.

I wish my church knew that, when we chose not to take them up on their offer for a stateside break after an adoption falling through and having our fourth miscarriage, we weren’t being brave and dedicated. We were just too tired, ragged, and scared to try to face them.

I wish my church knew that when Burkina Faso started its slow decline into unrest with some baby steps during our time there, I was scared. When I watched armored combat vehicles roll through our town while holding my toddler’s hand because he loved big trucks, I wasn’t nearly as brave as a I flippantly declared.

I wish my church knew that leaving the life we knew in Burkina Faso, this home where God had given us three children, was (and still is!) the scariest thing I’ve ever done. I barely had enough courage finally to pull that plug.

Whether or not they really did (after all, they had watched me grow up and knew what a knucklehead I was), my church made me feel like I was on a pedestal, like they were all hoping to be like me or raise their kids to be like me. I know it’s a part of how one generation inspires the next to think that God actually means them when He says Go!, but it sure does make life tougher on your workers.

Here's the thing about pedestals: they are lonely and precarious and tip over easily.

Your cross-cultural workers likely also feel at times lonely and precarious and easily-tipped-over. It’s a tough center to hold for churches. You want your worker to know they are loved and seen and prayed for and remembered in part because of how great it is that they said yes! to God. Let me let you in on a secret, though: workers pretty frequently swing between scared and prideful. Pedestals are crummy places to put people working through that mess!

What could my church – who were AMAZING, by the way – have done differently? They could have sometimes asked what my fears are rather than whether or not I was afraid. An assumption of the presence of fear might have made it easier to talk about. That might have made our relationship the kind of place where I could speak openly about the pendulum that careened wildly inside my heart between fear and pride and joy and peace.

They also could have tooted my horn a little less when I was around them and helped me point to the Father more about what He chose to do through us. That might have slowed the pendulum swinging between fear and pride.

I’m so grateful to have been sent by the church family that sent us to the field. They were great, and I often use pieces of what they did to teach other churches. That said, one unintended consequence of doing a job like that too well is creating an environment where your worker feels you expect strength at all times rather than admitting that God pretty much always works best through the weak.

Peace, friend.

Andy