As my role has evolved over the last four years in Asia from a roaming theological educator to a manager, I’ve grown in my appreciation for what it takes to be the Church overseas.
It seems like a simple thing, right? Pack up, move to a new country and start sharing the Gospel. Sure, culture shock, language acquisition, etc. But otherwise fairly straightforward.
Hardly.
Just being the Church in our home country is complicated enough. Synodical structures. District structures. Regions. All the way down to circuits and individual congregations. And all along the way there are necessary elements that must be created, filed, updated, audited and ultimately reported on. Congregations need to have constitutions that align them not simply with Lutheran doctrine but the expected practices and requirements of the municipality and state they are located in. Officers have to be maintained. By-laws adopted. We’re an orderly bunch, we Lutherans. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it is a bit more labor intensive than how we imagine the early Church in Acts must have functioned.
And if you want to do things in another country, there are all sorts of things to take into account. How to get there? How to live there? What kind of visas can you get, and for how long? How do you have money to survive? What happens if you’re sick? What if you need to travel? What about your kids’ schooling? What about taxes? Tons of questions at the civil level.
And then there’s the matter of the larger body of Christ. Countries can be wary of churches and church bodies. They’ve had experiences with cults. Experiences with Christians who couldn’t keep politics and the Gospel separate (or at least separate enough for government tastes). Christians who couldn’t get along with other Christians, or other legal religious groups. Abuses & neglects.
So just setting up shop in another country is not so easy a matter as you might think. In Asia, we often rely on partner church bodies or potential partner church bodies to assist in ensuring we enter a country properly and set up operations legally and in a way that is viewed by the government as healthy and helpful.
Relationships are critical. This shouldn’t surprise us as Christians, and yet it does. Over and over and over again.
And that’s before you factor in matters of language and cultural differences!
All of which is to say it takes a lot to keep things functioning as the Church overseas, in a dozen or more different countries. There are a lot of moving pieces to put it mildly. And as one of three Area Facilitators in Asia, our role is to assist with the local logistics as necessary to ensure our staff can do *their* work of building relationships with local church partners and assist those partners in sharing the Gospel, planting Lutheran churches, and showing mercy.
Facilitating relationships can be complicated and take twists and turns that, while not bad, may not be what you might have assumed them to look like.
So it is that I’m boarding multiple planes today, flying from Medan to Singapore, then Singapore to Beijing, and finally Beijing to Ulaanbaatar. I’m still not even sure how to pronounce that last one. Locals often refer to it as UB, I’m told. Why am I going there? To the capital of Mongolia? A country that isn’t even technically part of the Asia Region, but rather part of our Eurasia Region?
Firstly, as a favor to our church partner in the Philippines who I work closely with. Part of my work with the Lutheran Church in the Philippines (LCP) over the past four years has been providing theological education, both by teaching at their seminary as well as creating, facilitating and delivering deaconess trainings in conjunction with other LCMS workers. I’ve built relationships with some of those students over the years. And it’s one of those students – a guy from Mongolia – that is precipitating my visit to Mongolia. The seminary dean asked if I would visit this student during his vicarage assignment back home in Mongolia.
That required figuring out if we have any workers in Mongolia already (we do, but from our Eurasia team not our Asia team). Then working with them and two different Regional Directors to determine if my visiting UB would be helpful or problematic. A secondary opportunity in my visit is to meet with the president of the Lutheran church body this student is a part of, and hopefully to be able to offer an encouraging word, another name and face for them to remember, and some practical suggestions for how we might partner with them.
Tangentially, it also required me to acquire an alternate wardrobe for the much colder, still-wintery weather in UB. Going from typical temperatures in the low to mid 90’s (with equivalently high humidity) to temps in the single digits – or even negative numbers! – is not something I’m equipped for. I think I found and bought the only winter coat in Medan! And a hat and gloves.
I’m nervous about this trip – a new place, transiting through mainland China and other risks known and unknown. But I’m also excited to see a new place, connect and reconnect with new and familiar people, and try to help pave the way for our continued work and perhaps even expanded work. It’s kinda crazy, but it’s pretty much how my time overseas has gone from the beginning. I’m grateful for the flexibility and adaptability to respond to these sorts of unusual opportunities when they arise!
The Nelson Family Indonesia 