Your missionary definitely appreciates prayer on his/her behalf. Here are some fresh ways that you can direct your prayers.
1. Pray for healthy balance in the use of time
The cross-cultural missionary finds it takes longer to do everything. There’s never the sense that, “It’s 6 p.m., and my work day is done.” Unfinished tasks constantly loom. Too often, the urgent crowds out the important.
2. Pray for wisdom in witness
Sometimes we’re excited about a new contact and feel that they are surprisingly responsive. Then later, no matter what we do, they gradually drift away from contact. We need wisdom from the Holy Spirit to know when to pursue a relationship, and when to draw back.
3. Pray for insight with difficult cultural issues
Any Japanese person who has a serious interest in Christianity soon starts asking about funerals.
“Can Christians go to Buddhist funerals?”
“What about burning incense?”
“My husband is the oldest son. He will be responsible for his parent’s Buddhist altar. Is that a problem?”
On the surface, the answers may seem simple. But if you’ve never lived in a group culture, you may not realize how “not simple” the answers can be.
What is “honoring your father and mother” in an Asian context?
Where is the line between what is “cultural” and what is “religious”?
4. Pray against the human inclination to compare ourselves with others
When things don’t seem to be going as well as we’d like, it’s easy to look at what other missionaries are doing and begin feeling jealous or like a failure.
“That ministry seems to be a lot more successful than what I’m doing. Am I really useful here?”
Of course, intellectually we know we need to remember our call and be faithful to that call in the context of our unique gifting. But the disconnect between knowing our call and feeling that we should be experiencing results like those we see others experiencing can easily turn into discouragement.
5. Pray for wisdom to know which opportunities to accept and which to decline
Ministry requests abound, and we’re regularly asked to participate in yet another outreach. We can say “yes” far too often. Saying “no” is difficult, but it’s essential to firmly decline opportunities that sidetrack us from God’s best use of our call.
Thank you for your encouragement and prayers as we seek to make good choices!
Strategic Resource Development
Editor, Japan Harvest magazine
Tokorozawa, Japan
More Information
- This post was originally published here: Five Ways to Pray for Your Missionary
- Gary Bauman's staff profile
- Book info: Misreading Scripture with Western Eyes:
Removing Cultural Blinders to Better Understand the Bible
Description: What was clear to the original readers of Scripture is not always clear to us. Because of the cultural distance between the biblical world and our contemporary setting, we often bring modern Western biases to the text. Read more...
