A friend stopped me the other day at a church function. She looked at my sweetly and said, "Do you feel like you are on the outside looking in when you come back to America?". She said that when she visits the city they used to live in, she sometimes feels that way.
What sensitivity. That was exactly how I was feeling. Granted, this shy-borderline-extrovert usually has a hard time mingling with a large group of strangers. But on home assignement, we often feel like we are on the outside. We spend the year trying to work our way in. We want to (and know we need to) connect to people. Especially at our home based church. We want people to know us and us to know people, so we can truly be connected. We don't just wanted a check sent quarterly in the mail, but we want a relationship of prayer and fellowship; a real support network where we bring blessing to them and we are blessed.
When we've been gone for 3-4 years though, it's often hard to just jump right in with friends and aquaintances where we left off. Many of our "friends" that we worked hard to get to know last home assignment have moved or worship elsewhere. To be honest, it's a slow process that starts to get easier just about the time we pack up and move back to Japan. Sigh.
Even in Japan though, we feel like we are the outsiders. We ARE the outsiders....foreigners...trying to win the trust and friendship of a people we often can't fully understand or relate to. We are trying to get in enough to love them and share the seeds of salvation's message.
So, to be honest, I sometmes get tired of being on the outside, looking in. It's something I have to accept though and not grow gloomy about. I can't give up and just stay on the outside, that isn't what God has called me to. So, like last night, when I faced another full room of unknow faces, I tried again...to get to know people, even just a few...to choose to be thankful and encouraged with the connections made and other's friendliness...I tried to try help others feel a little more like they are on the inside.
