Brave Missionary

By Daisy Jung

I always was a coward.

When I first moved into an academy dormitory in South Korea, I had to listen to Christian music to fall asleep at night. When some unkind students robbed me of 10,000 South Korean won (about U.S.$10) in the bathroom at the train station, I was scared to enter the train station’s bathroom again.

Image © Pacific Press

My fears peaked when I served for a year as a student missionary in rural Philippines. Young men who were curious about me, a young foreign woman, gathered around my candle-lit house at night, whistling and sometimes peering into the windows. I began to suffer insomnia and could only fall asleep at dawn after listening to Christian music and reading the Bible.

My anxiety followed me to southern Asia, where I now live with my husband and two sons. Many times my husband watched me carefully check my surroundings on buses or trains before closing my eyes to sleep.

“Daisy,” he said, “I’m really curious how a person as scared as you ever signed up to be a missionary.”

It was true. I was a coward missionary. I preferred to stay in safe places.

But something changed my mind. One day, my sons and I were discussing war over a meal. I told the boys that many wars were going on around the world, and 7-year-old Saint, who has many fears like his mother, asked with interest, “Mom, then we can’t go to places like that as missionaries, right?”

“Yes, we can’t go to dangerous places,” I said.

“Then does that mean that people there don’t know Jesus?” Saint said.

“Yes, many people are dying without knowing Jesus.”

Saint said firmly, “Mom, then let’s go to those places. Let’s go there and be missionaries.”

How could I reject to such conviction? “Let’s do that someday,” I agreed.

Deep down in my heart, however, I had many questions. I wondered: “I’m here as a missionary, but am I too worried about myself? I say I believe in God, but do I trust Him only when I feel that my own safety is secure?”

My daily prayers have changed since that conversation with my sons. Now I pray, “God, please give me a mighty faith. Give me a heart and a faith to love people, to go near them, and to take care of them that is bigger than my fears about my safety.”

This mission story illustrates Mission Objective No. 1 of the Seventh-day Adventist Church’s “I Will Go” strategic plan: “To revive the concept of worldwide mission and sacrifice for mission as a way of life involving not only pastors but every church member, young and old, in the joy of witnessing for Christ and making disciples.” Learn more at IWillGo2020[dot]org.

Produced by the General Conference Office of Adventist Mission. Find more mission stories at adventistmission[dot]org

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Further Thought:

“Christ is watching. He knows all about our burdens, our dangers, and our difficulties; and He fills His mouth with arguments in our behalf. He fits His intercessions to the needs of each soul, as He did in the case of Peter. … Our Advocate fills His mouth with arguments to teach His tried, tempted ones to brace against Satan’s temptations.

Image © Stan Myers from GoodSalt.com

He interprets every movement of the enemy. He orders events.” — Ellen G. White,  The SDA Bible Commentary, vol. 7, p. 931 (Letter 90, 1906).

“It was Satan’s purpose to bring about an eternal separation between God and man; but in Christ we become more closely united to God than if we had never fallen. In taking our nature, the Saviour has bound Himself to humanity by a tie that is never to be broken. … This is the pledge that God will fulfill His word. ‘Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon His shoulder.’ God has adopted human nature in the person of His Son, and has carried the same into the highest heaven. It is the ‘Son of man’ who shares the throne of the universe. It is the ‘Son of man’ whose name shall be called, ‘Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.’ Isaiah 9:6. The I AM is the Daysman between God and humanity, laying His hand upon both. He who is ‘holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners,’ is not ashamed to call us brethren. Hebrews 7:26; Hebrews 2:11. In Christ the family of earth and the family of heaven are bound together. Christ glorified is our brother. Heaven is enshrined in humanity, and humanity is enfolded in the bosom of Infinite Love.” — Ellen G. White,  The Desire of Ages, pages 25, 26.

Discussion Questions:

<–Thursday

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