Sometimes, When You’re A Missionary…

~Your 3 year old gets eaten alive by unidentified insects.

~People show up at your doorstep in the middle of dinner or bedtime just to hang out, or in the middle of the night because when they were driving drunk they ran off the road and can’t get their car out of the mud
~You throw your plans out the window
~You nearly die of malaria

~Your 2 year old runs around in a diaper for a full week because it’s SO hot she refuses to wear clothing

~someone walks into your home when you’ve stepped out for a minute (and forgotten to lock the door) and steals your new bag of sugar, or bottle of oil, or your favorite cookies
~Your favorite friends are scattered all around the world

~You don’t do laundry because you’re busy only to find that 2 days later one hundred million thousand ants have created a nest in the laundry basket
~you eat things you didn't know were edible

~Your children will eat fresh tropical fruit from the vine everyday. But sometimes they will run home screaming hysterically because they have eaten poisonous leaves that burn like fire going down

~You will develop tropical ulcers and boils from minor cuts and scrapes
~you catch 3 rats in your house on ONE night

~you will develop amazing skills as a triage nurse

~You will pray like your head’s on fire

~Your heart will break because you can’t do enough

~You marvel at the vast creativeness of our God

~You will well up in the Presence of God at random times
~You love until it is physically painful

~You will say “God help me, God help me, God help me!” on a daily basis

~You will cry “Thank You, Thank You, Thank You GOD!” on a daily basis

~It will take you 8 hours to get a few things in town that you need

~Your family will become funky bilinguals

~The people you love will forget your Birthdays

~You need to spill your guts but realize there is no one who will remotely understand
~You will desperatly crave food that you can never ever have

~there are weeks when you feel utterly and totally alone in the world
~You see beauty that you could never imagine

~You wake up to sunrise over the ocean every morning

~You will be overwhelmed by the beauty of a full moon rising over the sea

~the life you once knew will fade into distant memory
~thoughts of suburbia become nightmarish
~you lose your personal space

~ returning to your “home country” begins to seem scary

~you give sacrificially and love it

~You develop a relationship with God that you didn’t know was possible

~people think you’ve lost it and you don’t care
~Your family will never be "normal"
~You realize what ABUNDANT life is all about

~Life is one HUGE adventure

~YOU COUNT IT ALL JOY.

xo Blessings, tiff