Language Shock

I have been in Thai language school for 3 months now.  Which pretty much means I can tell you my name, "happy birthday," that my air conditioner is broken, it's really hot outside, and I want to order fried rice.

Other than a couple semesters of Spanish in high school and college, I've never really studied another language before.  Like the I-actually-want-to-speak-this-in-life kind, not the I-just-want-to-pass-this-test kind.

It's just a miracle that anyone can ever communicate at all.  For real.  And I don't even mean Thai, I mean any language.

The more remarkable aspect of this is when someone learns to speak English, with all its crazy idioms and metaphors and junk.

For example.

I was riding in the car, listening to music the other day with my Thai friend.  She speaks a good amount of English, but not enough to navigate the parts of it that make no sense.  "Shake It Off" by Taylor Swift came on, and as we listened to the lyrics play play play play play play I asked her if she understood what the phrase "shake it off" meant.  She nodded in affirmation, then stuck out her hand and... shook it off.

I mean, that's fair.

After I laughed at her for not being fluent in my first language, I told her in some-Thai-most-English language, "It's like... something bad happens to you, and you say, 'Never mind!  I don't care!  It's fine.'"

The same thing happened when we listened to Ellie Goulding's "Love Me Like You Do," who tells her lover, "Only you can set my heart on fire."  When I asked my friend if she understood that phrase, she nodded again and pretended to remove her heart from her chest, then talked about... setting it on fire.

English is so hard.

Sometimes, when I'm in a team meeting or serious conversation with someone, I check out for just a second to think, We understand all the words each other is saying and that's amazing.

When it comes to people understanding me in Thai -- now that's a miracle.  I call the same girl every week when I want to order more drinking water.  I have no idea who she is, but her name and number were given to me by a friend of a friend who said, "Just tell her you want to order water to the farang ("white foreigner") house."  So that's what I do, week after week.  I call, and something happens in between that causes these guys to roll up and bring me humongous bottles of water, and then I don't die of dehydration.

I felt a little guilty today for calling this girl all the time and never trying to actually make conversation, so I threw in a "Are you doing well?" and tried to slip in a "Thank you for helping me," as she interrupted me with polite Thai words in a way that seemed like she was ready to get off the phone with this needy white girl who speaks Thai like a 2-year-old.

And it wasn't annoying or hurtful or anything, because I get it.  Communicating in a foreign way is just kind of exhausting.  Learning to change your greeting phrases from things we would say to Westerners like, "Hi, how are you?  My name is Reagan.  What's yours?" to, "Where did you come from?  Where are you going?  Have you eaten yet?" is one of a thousand adjustments that must be made to live life here without looking like a freak all the time.  I'm thankful that Thai people are pretty gracious and that I like them enough to want to adapt.

And on the days that I don't, a good sandwich and an episode of "The Office" normally do the trick.

I Blew It

I had the perfect chance, but I checked out instead.

I got the usual small talk questions as I sat across the table from my coworker while we supervised the adolescents on our unit.  "Are you married? Do you have kids (statements usually coupled with follow up phrases like, ‘Really?  You’re too pretty to be single,’ or, ‘Oh, usually when you meet young, Caucasian females who seem to have it all together, they’re married.’  Thankfully, this guy just let it go).

“So, are you planning on doing this job for a while?” he asked.

“Not forever,” I responded.  “I'll be leaving to go do missions overseas in a little less than a year.  I'm be going to Thailand with a team for 5 to 7 years, and we’ll be church planting.”

“Oh.  I don't really know what that means.”

“Basically, we’ll be talking to people and telling them about Jesus and how great He is, and then they’ll tell their friends, and then… churches will form.”

I said something else in Christianese that I can't recall now, something unintelligible to the untrained “churched” ear.

“Oh, that's interesting,” he replied.  “I'm not really religious, though.  I used to go to church…  But me and God, we have an understanding,” he said with a chuckle.  When I asked what he meant, he went on.  “When I was a kid, I was at church almost every night of the week.  But I didn't like it.  It just never really made sense to me.  So now I don’t really go anymore.”

“Yeah… It would make sense that it would be hard to enjoy church when… you didn't really… care about it.”

Conversation over.

I left work that night feeling like such a missionary failure. What happened? This guy set me up for the perfect opportunity to share Jesus with him, but I was too scared to ask more questions, to breach uncomfortable boundaries.  I had talked about Him with strangers before.  It's not like this was my first ballgame.  But for some reason, the right words just seemed to escape me.

It was that same defeated feeling times a thousand that had me in tears as I revealed my fears to my teammates a week later in Kansas City.  As we sat in our stuffed sofa and chairs, encircling a coffee table piled high with perhaps not-so-realistic expectations, I confessed.  I feel like I am going to fail in Thailand.  I have no idea what to do, and I'm afraid I won't be able to create any relationships with the people.

If I can't do it here, what makes me think I'm going to be able to do it there?





I'm sure Moses and I would've had a few good laughs, a couple of blubbering idiots trying to tell God we can't do anything right.

And then I picture God sitting back with sort of an amused smile, thinking, "Okay… so what?

Apart from me you can do nothing.”

Turns out, nearly every teammate in that circle had experienced some kind of spiritual attack that weekend.  Plaguing thoughts and fears about how there were a thousand people more qualified than them to go.  About how the team would be better off if they weren’t there.  About how they were just fooling everyone with a mere appearance of spirituality.  About how, really, they were just hypocrites.

It should be no surprise.  The greater God’s plan, the greater Satan’s attack.  The more affirmed the calling, the more prevalent the lies seeking to destroy it.

What I tend to forget is that the victory doesn’t depend on my sufficiency, but on the One who is already the Victor.

He is security.
He is relationship.
He is sufficiency.

Coffee Date

Let’s sit down for a cup of coffee.  Or tea, or hot chocolate, whatever you like.  Wrap your fingers around your mug, soaking in the warmth of your preferred comfort beverage, a sharp but pleasant contrast to the chilly weather outside.  Lean back in your big, cushioned chair, inhaling the candle scent of… what’s your favorite?  Vanilla?  Cinnamon?  Fresh linen?  Let it stimulate your senses, conjuring up thoughts and dreams you may have set aside long ago for more practical things.

Because, for now, I want to talk about things that aren’t so practical.

What is your calling?

Has anyone ever asked you before?

What’s the thing that sets you on fire?  That niggling thought of what could be, the issue that keeps you up at night?  What has God awakened in your soul?

Maybe it’s kids living on the streets of a land oceans away.  Abandoned, helpless, hungry, your arms long to hold them and your heart longs to love them, breathing affirmation and the reality of something better to come.  Maybe it’s the professional women who wander through life in a haze, wondering if there is any meaning to the day in and day out, keeping of books, laundering of clothes, scheduling of appointments, handling of budgets, securing of relationships – but ever alone.  Maybe it’s writing music or researching the cure for breast cancer or saving the killer whales at Sea World.

Sit on it for a minute.  Allow it to stir you.  Reflect on how it began, where the journey has taken you.

May I tell you mine?

I have made it my ambition to go where Christ has not been named.

It all started at Camp.  The experiencing life beyond the Bible Belt, the coming into contact with kids who didn’t grow up singing “Jesus Loves the Little Children” or having parents who kissed them goodnight.  The realizing…  Oh, I have the Message that matters.  And the ability to tell them about it.

So I did.

And God woke me up to a passion I didn’t know I had.

This started me down the uncomfortable and dangerous path that is…  Well, I have seen.  And now I am responsible.

I volunteered in youth groups.  I got back to the very basics with my small group of high school girls:  Why did Jesus have to die for us to be saved?  What does being “saved” even mean? 

I loved teaching, I really did.  But my heart wandered elsewhere, to the places where the name of Jesus had scarcely been uttered.  Countries far, far away.

I spent eleven nomadic months in these places, growing into a state of dependence, a realization that I could never change the world on my own. I saw the hunger – physical, spiritual, emotional.  And I was never the same.  Trusting the Lord to be my strength and my guide, that was the key.

Having dabbled in enough wanderlust to satiate me for awhile, I asked God to open up a door for something less short-term. And he did.

Imagine.

Imagine growing up in a place where the name of Jesus had never been spoken or heard.  Where your parents encouraged you to dedicate your worship to various gods of gold or stone.  Where your sole ambition, besides maintaining your existence, is to gain perfect peace, nirvana, through giving to temples, feeding monks, and praising lifeless idols.  A place where the produce of the soil is low, but the number of people who believe the Truth is vastly lower.

This is the province of Isan in the country of Thailand.

For the past 120 years, international missionary organization Avant Ministries sought out these kinds of places to plant thriving, Christ-centered churches where none exist.  They invited me to be a part of the team they will be sending to Thailand, where the harvest is plentiful, but the workers are so few.  I have been appointed to be a real, live, full-time missionary.  To learn a new language, adopt a new culture, make new friends, tell them about Jesus, and watch the Holy Spirit transform their lives.

Pretty cool, right?

I’ll leave it at that for now, but I’m excited to tell you more… soon.

For real, though, I want to know:  What sets your heart on fire?