Coaching at RashidatO.com | Social Activism at Whereveryougolove.com
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I am writing this from seat 47H on my way Seoul, Korea still in awe that this is finally happening!
But as I mentally prepare, I want to share some of the expectations that Adventures in Missions has for us during our year abroad.
We are going to another country to work with a ministry that is already established, to be its hands and feet.
– [ ] We WILL go in with an open heart and an open mind ready to support and submit to the leadership in place.
– [ ] We WILL NOT go in with a Savior Complex. We will not go into the ministry with the mindset of “fixing” everything, to make it efficient, or to stick our chest out thinking we have accomplished something by trying to change things because, in reality, all that we have actually done is degrade the ministry and our ministry host in addition to dampening our light in their lives.
We are going to these countries to serve, not to take pictures of serving.
– [ ] We WILL take pictures, but only to tell the story of the people after receiving their permission.
– [ ] We WILL NOT take pictures of the people we serve in a mock photo session as if we have the right to parade our acts for the approval of people back home.
We are going to each country to learn how to love as Christ loved all, not love the way we want to love.
– [ ] We WILL learn how to love the people the way they need to be loved rather than the way we wanted love by listening to their needs and doing our best to love that way.
– [ ] We WILL NOT make any person dependent on us. Jesus taught us how to live as prescribed by God. We will help to enable that same dependence on God rather than on us.
So on a weekly basis our schedule will look something like this…
Ministry will be 5 days a week, 1 Adventure day, and 1 Sabbath day.
The first six weeks will be a social media detox. We will only be able to get on social media on our Sabbath day, if we choose to spend it that way. Posts from our blog will still be pushed to social media during this time.
Adventure day is the day we will intentionally interact with the culture outside of the ministry site. We will explore and sightsee around the country, taste the food, and do adventurous things. It is very likely I will post pictures on these days because we will take them of the places we see and of ourselves.
Pictures from ministry will be hard to share. The goal of a picture during ministry is to tell the story of the person, not to show me doing ministry or to show poverty without respecting the person affected. Our goal, as we take pictures during ministry time, is to help you get to know the people and ministries we are partnering with around the world. Through photography, we hope to help us all see that we are not the center of the world, that we have so much more than we recognize, that God is real, and He is still doing amazing.
I greatly look forward to sharing these stories and as many visualizations of this journey through pictures and videos with the main intent of respecting the people and culture around me.
It’s one of the ways I will love wherever I go…
