Cross-cultural workers are a strange bunch. We don’t climb career ladders. We often live far from family and give up the comforts of our “home” culture. We give our time and resources to a people who don’t think like us or share our same values. Our children grow up as Third Culture Kids – not exactly fitting in anywhere. We also find ourselves strangely “out of place” – sometimes more at home in our adopted culture and yet not fully absorbed because we look different or speak with an accent or simply will always be somewhat outside.

This obedience in cross-cultural lives is a dramatic declaration of believing God.

In Luke 19:11-27 Jesus tells a parable about servants left in charge of some money that belonged to their master while he went away on a trip. He told them to engage in business while he was gone. When he returned, he rewarded the servants who had used their money to gain more money and punished the one who had kept the money safe and not gained any more. The servants who invested what they had been given to make more money showed that they believed their master was coming back, believed he would take an accounting of their business, and believed he meant what he said.

When we live our lives fully invested in Jesus’ return, fully believing that He means for us to share His good news and make disciples, fully believing there is a spiritual harvest of people ready to believe and worship Him, we live lives of obedience that don’t make sense in any other context. Paul says, “If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.” (1 Corinthians 15:19)

We aren’t asked to live safe, careful lives. We are asked to live lives that don’t make sense in this world because we are day-to-day walking in greater obedience, leveraging our resources for God’s purposes, and looking with hope to seeing God’s kingdom coming.