FAQs: But Are You Safe?

My family is back in the States this summer on our home assignment that comes every two or three years. It’s been a sweet time of reconnecting with family, friends and church partners that we love and miss terribly when we are in North Africa. It’s been fun to introduce our girls to American culture and see their amazement over things like water fountains and traffic lights and hear the things that strike them as unusual (“Mama, why are there American flags all over the place?”). Mexican food, air-conditioning and worship in our mother tongue have all been balm for the soul.

But it can be a bit disorienting to step back into a world that is equal parts familiar and foreign all at once. It’s so good to be back. And so weird. In seasons like this it’s interesting to hear the questions we get from people. For the next few weeks I’m going to look at the ones we are asked the most often. If you have ever asked me one of these in a church foyer as I wrangle little ones wild with the joy of Bible class in English while I am trying to reacquire the art of standing in heels, and if in that moment I have responded to your well-meant question with a look that ranges somewhere between panic and utter fatigue, please forgive me. It’s because you’ve asked a good question. One that I have often felt is very difficult to answer in three minutes before the opening song. But I deeply appreciate your interest. And I’m going to do my best to answer it here.

But are you guys safe over there?

I’ll start with the doozy. It’s perhaps an understandable question for a family with a few dramatic evacuation stories under their belt. And it’s by far the one we get the most often. But even so, every time we are asked that question, in my mind I am thinking, safe from what?

Usually when we are back in the States I get together with a group of friends from college. And to be honest, I always head into that weekend braced for the inevitable wave of jealousy I am going to experience. Most of them live in big houses in nice neighborhoods where the socio-economic gap between them and the people across the street is non-existent (every time one of my North African neighbors asks to pick some of what look like weeds in my compound for their family’s dinner I die a little inside). They live in worlds where grandparents live close enough to enable regular date-nights and they have never had to figure out how they are going to explain to their kids that the looters made off with everything, even the bikes (and no, baby, we don’t know where the cats are). In my mind, their lives represent stability, comfort, and predictability. All the small groups from church, gymnastics lessons for kids and shopping sprees to Target I could ever dream off.

But without exception, I come out of that time with friends almost weak in the knees with gratitude. I come away feeling so incredibly saved. Jobs that pay well but leave you feeling empty, loneliness at full churches, assaults from every direction on marriage, nine to five in traffic, the search for true community. On and on I hear stories of incredibly dangerous things that I haven’t had to battle. Because even on the hardest days of my life in the past eight years (and let me tell you, there have been a few) the crud has forged community, purpose and gratitude in ways I never could have imagined. And though my marriage hasn’t always been easy, I get to wrestle out work and ministry hand in hand with my husband. And though for a while it was in a mud hut that I kinda felt like burning down because I wasn’t sure I could keep living in it and stay sane, I have gotten to eat almost every meal with my husband throughout the course of our marriage. Stuff like that has literally saved us.

All that to say, there are so many dangers lurking in this world. And not all of them are as easy to spot as rebel soldiers at the front gate.

In Matthew 16:23 Jesus snaps at Peter. “Get away from me, Satan!” he says. “You are a dangerous trap to me.” (NLT) This biting response all because Peter seems to be (quite rationally one might argue) suggesting a way of safety. Suffering and pain? Jesus, don’t do it. There’s got to be another way. And part of why Jesus responds so vehemently is probably because Peter’s suggestion is really appealing. It’s what part of Jesus really wants. But to Jesus, the true danger lies not in Jerusalem, but in the safety Peter is pointing to. And Jesus won’t be trapped. He takes the risk of obeying God, trusting in God to take care of the end of the story.

At the end of the day, our physical safety is still something we take really seriously in North Africa. We travel with malaria medication and take our vitamins. We have satellite phones to communicate when there is no cell network. We make contingency plans and filter our water and write with pseudonyms. We evacuate. But safety is not the primary value with which we evaluate what we think God wants us to do or where he wants us to be. There are other questions. Bigger risks.

In taking certain kinds of risks out of obedience to God our family has collected some pretty amazing stories of God’s salvation. This past December when all hell was breaking loose at our doorsteps my children slept peacefully in their own beds for two nights because a construction project meant that hundreds of cement blocks were stacked on both sides of their room making in the safest place on our compound from stray bullets. They didn’t witness a single act of violence with their own eyes. He has saved us from physical harm, emotional trauma, and spiritual danger over and over and over again. So many times, he has met our timid, terrified baby steps of faith with sweeping gestures of incredible faithfulness.

And then other times, he hasn’t. We also have a collection of stories of losses and heartache along the way. Our much-loved teammates had to leave the field because their baby faced serious and heart-breaking health complications, and I believe with all my heart they were victims of spiritual attack. Sometimes, the step of faith feels like a drop into wide open air.

But even then – and I don’t say this tritely – even then, we have been awestruck at the sweet gifts still waiting for us on the other side of disappointment. Gifts that are deep and still and true.

If someone came to me today and laid out everything we have sacrificed on this road so far it would be a sizeable pile. Lots of household stuff in the two homes that have been lost to war. Lots of people we have had to say goodbye to before we were ready. Lots of people we didn’t get a chance to say goodbye to. Lots of dreams about how all of this would play out, hopes and ideals and plans. Things that weren’t kept safe.

But without a doubt, that whole massive loss is a drop in the bucket compared to what we have been given. And I wouldn’t for a moment think of trading it back in.

So are we safe? Yes. No. Maybe. Depends. I’m still not entirely sure how to answer that question simply. What I do know, is the one who holds it all in the end is trustworthy. And if whatever risks we may be asked to take are in line with his Kingdom, we are safer than we could ever imagine.