You don’t need to quit everything and live a nomadic lifestyle to have an impact. I’ve been interested in how to live a life that impacts others for Christ for a lot longer than I've been a missionary. Sometimes missionary life feels very foreign, but my time in Romania felt similar to life in America.
The hurried pace of work, the long work hours, the access to whatever you need at a grocery store, it didn’t feel foreign. There were a few days when I would wake up and ask myself “what am I even doing here”, was this really progress? Was I actually making an impact? Before I left my pastor and I were having a conversation where she said, “Don’t mistake movement for progress.”
That never left me, cause no matter how much movement or what cool place I get to go to, I still need to be intentional about what I’m doing with my time there and answering the call of God that brought me there.
In Romania I assisted the same pastor as before, (read about my first experience here). I did a lot of admin work, some teaching, a lot of spreadsheets, and way more accounting than anticipated haha. It was simultaneously some of the best and hardest times. Missions in Europe doesn’t always feel like “missionary life.” You can flush toilet paper, go to an industrial gym, and there’s a Starbucks in the mall. However, in this life that felt so familiar, I think God showed me a lot of ways to live missionally that translate over to life in America.
Levity
I love any book that has to do with the crossover of sociology and communication. I know that’s specific, but those are the books that especially if they have a business bend, I’m hooked on. I’ve read books on levity before, like “Humor, Seriously” (this one I found when I was searching “top books lawyers read”. if you click this link I may get paid and it will fund more missions, yay!!), so I knew it was important and a powerful tool, but I didn’t realize until I truly experienced it just how important it is.
When our car broke down while on convoy to Ukraine (that blog next) I realized I had no mechanical knowledge to offer so I might as well start lightening the mood
Why do people feel they don’t make an impact? A lot of it is that they do the same thing every day. They don’t see the ways they are influencing those around them. That joy you bring to the workplace? That makes people feel like their workplace isn’t full of coworkers but is full of friends and even work family? That’s important. One thing I’ve noticed about gen z in particular is that we can and will make a joke about anything. Sometimes, it’s not what’s needed, but often it lightens the day to day tasks and brings joy into someone’s life.
Something I’ve been really considering is “Do I make Jesus look attractive?” In the early church the disciples had people coming to them asking what was different about them. They had something in their life that looked so attractive, other people wanted the source of it to. That’s how Christianity should be spread. Not by arguing and trying to convince people that my faith has something that is worth them changing their whole life for, but by showing them a Jesus that is so attractive they can’t help but want the life He’s offering them.
A lot of stressful things were happening but we convinced ourselves to go to a soccer game in freezing weather. I cried laughing cause they do things very different (like trying to burn the opposite goal down) from the states. Hands down one of the best nights ever
You know what’s really attractive in an anxiety and stress ridden world? Joy. Levity. The ability to not be shaken and not have circumstances decide if you’re going to be kind or if you’re having a good day that day.
If you want to make an impact in a 9-5, start noticing where there’s opportunities for levity.
Community
This a little bit goes along with levity. Before going on the world race I would’ve said community was my top 10 most important things in life list, but now I would say it’s top 3.
Everyone is a people person, it’s just the amount of people that change if you’re an introvert or extrovert. But we were created to live life together, I’ve heard it said, “If the gospel was just for you you’d be raptured as soon as you accepted Jesus.” As believers we get to represent the Kingdom of God and the family of God.
There’s something about being a foreigner in a foreign land by yourself that is deeply lonely. It makes you seek out community really quick. Days I was tired? Didn’t matter I was still going to worship nights. Tons of work? I’d go out to dinner with people and then back to the ministry to get the work done. Now, Romania was a little different cause there wasn’t one day I didn’t have people around me. At home, I do this at a much lesser extreme. I take days where I see nobody, there’s less pressure I put on myself to make sure I’m always around people. I think it all depends on your situation. But community is crucial, and it’s what makes leaving any place or season so hard.
Dana came for a few weeks!! She did the race with me and it was the biggest treat to have her in Romania with me.
Community also doesn’t always have to be that deep. If you approach it with an open mind and open heart, you can receive and pour into whoever’s in front of you, and it doesn’t have to be someone who knows your life story or has been through everything with you. Some great perspectives come from people who only see your life from the shallow end.
If you want to impact people, create and appreciate community, whether shallow or deep, there’s reasons and seasons for both.
Listen, don’t agree
One thing that I did a lot of in Romania was listening without agreeing. I think this is somewhat of a lost art specifically in America.
When someone is upset or passionate, we can often fall into the habit of agreeing with them to their face in order to soften the emotions they’re feeling. I don’t think this is loving, as it’s not truthful. I picked up on my habit of doing this in Romania and had (and still have) to consciously change it. I’m a listening ear always, I will hear you out. But I will not agree with you, and add flame to your fire if it’s not something I actually agree with. What this does I’ve found is sends the person into a deeper spiral because they believe they’ve been justified in their big emotions and it pushes them deeper into the hole they’re trying to work through.
True community = being able to disagree
I’m by no means perfect at this, but I’m trying more and more to be conscious of agreeing to seem nice instead of listening and redirecting (or letting them redirect) to actually be kind.
To make an impact at your 9-5 I would suggest first noticing when this happens, and then trying different ways to kindly listen, without agreeing.
Compassion fatigue
This one I felt a lot nearer the end of my time in Romania. This topic has been studied a lot, and is something I’d encourage everyone to look up. Specifically when you have resources that people can use to solve problems, not just money but energy, ideas, levity (see above), work ethic, etc. it can be easy for people to want to use those resources to solve the problem they’re passionate about. When multiple people do this, the result is a burnout where it feels you don’t care about anything that deeply cause your compassion has been spread so thin. It also can lead to the feeling that nothing you are doing is making an impact, cause every victory is met with self criticism of how many more things need your attention. I definitely fell into this, and had to remind myself often, of why I was there.
I needed to let my compassion be moved whenever people told me things, but let my focus only be on the things God had called me there to do.
If you want to make an impact that runs deep, one of the best things you can do is narrow where your compassion leads you to actions. This doesn’t mean to give up compassion for other things, and it doesn’t mean to be unkind, it means asking God how you are best used in the situation you’re in, and letting that narrow your passion projects.
It also means, acknowledging the success of your day, if all you did was the one thing God called you to do, that’s all that was needed. It reminds me of a quote I love from the Talmud
I hope this contained something that resonated with you on how to make an impact no matter where you are. As representatives of Christ we are called to bring His Kingdom everywhere, however He calls you to do it that day.
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