DMM: Becoming the Loving Kind
For more than a decade, I have had the honor of praying with men and women serving on the mission field in many nations. Through these conversations and times of intercession, I have learned that life on the field is neither simple nor easily understood.
Cross-cultural workers face the obvious challenges of language and cultural differences. Yet some of their deepest struggles arise closer to home: relationships with teammates, spouses and children, organizational pressures, unmet expectations, and profound loneliness.
If we desire to see Disciple-Making Movements launched among the nations, we must give attention not only to what missionaries and local leaders do, but also to who they are becoming.
Becoming Transformed Ones
We may possess extensive knowledge and accomplish many ministry tasks, but if our hearts are not being transformed and healed, we can quickly burn out. We may become easily offended, disappointed, or bitter.
We can also find ourselves serving from obligation rather than love. God invites us to receive His love as His precious sons and daughters so that we can pour that love into others. Yet we often become preoccupied with getting everything right. Without realizing it, we may slip into striving—attempting to earn God’s love rather than receiving it and resting in it.
This does not mean that someone who feels burned out or has reached the end of their strength has necessarily done something wrong. Burnout can result from prolonged stress, trauma, inadequate support, unhealthy systems, unrealistic expectations, or simply carrying more than one person was created to bear.
Our desire is to see women and men experience as much healing and transformation as possible before entering the mission field—and to continue receiving care after they arrive. If wounds from the past remain unaddressed, the pressures of the present may intensify them.
One of the great sacrifices made by “sent ones” is their willingness to pour out their lives for others. Yet they may continue pouring until they have nothing left to give.
Missionaries need more than resilience training and ministry strategy. They need deep intimacy with God, safe relationships, healthy boundaries, compassionate pastoral care, and, when appropriate, professional counseling.
We have repeatedly heard misguided Christian leaders suggest that believers should never need counseling. As a result, some workers arrive on the field carrying hidden “land mines” from their past. Under the pressures of cross-cultural life and ministry, those wounds may suddenly be triggered.
Seeking wise, trustworthy help is not evidence of spiritual failure. It may be one of the most courageous and responsible steps a person can take.
Hearts Transformed, Hearts Released
How can hearts be transformed and further damage prevented?
The issues that surface most frequently among cross-cultural workers are often connected to earlier hurt and pain. Experiences of not being heard, validated, protected, or valued can leave significant wounds.
Unforgiveness is another recurring struggle. It may grow out of severe trauma, a painful offense, accumulated disappointment, or small hurts that have been rehearsed until molehills become mountains.
When left unaddressed, unforgiveness can become fertile ground for bitterness and spiritual bondage. Small offenses accumulate and eventually affect how we interpret new situations and relationships.
In my own experience of feeling misunderstood and unheard, I have seen how quickly those feelings can develop into hurt, rejection, resentment, anger, and unforgiveness. Once woundedness becomes the lens through which we see, even ordinary interactions may appear threatening.
Transformation begins when we bring these wounds honestly into the light.
Launching Movements—or Taking on Water?
Cultivating the kind of heart God can use is crucial to the launch of cascading movements to Christ among the world’s unreached people groups.
In reality, all of us will be misunderstood at times. Our intentions will sometimes be misinterpreted. Our contributions may go unnoticed, and our voices may not always be heard.
How, then, do we respond?
We can begin by recognizing the moments when we have felt misunderstood and taken offense. If similar wounds from our past remain unaddressed, present conflicts may intensify them. We may begin to feel rejected, hopeless, or trapped in self-pity.
Once we recognize what is happening within us, we can take it honestly to God. We can tell Him what happened, how it affected us, and what we fear it means about us.
The Lord has repeatedly reminded me how deeply Jesus was misunderstood. He was falsely accused, rejected, and condemned. Yet He continued to respond with truth, compassion, and surrender to the Father.
As I yield to the ways of Christ, He empowers me to release the need to prove or defend myself in every situation. This does not mean that I should never clarify the truth, establish a boundary, confront wrongdoing, or seek justice. It means that I do not have to be controlled by self-defense or retaliation.
I can entrust my reputation and my wounded heart to Him.
Practical Steps Toward Healing
The following practices can help us recognize and address wounds before they deepen:
- Ask the Lord to reveal hidden hurt or offense.
Invite the Holy Spirit to show you where pain, resentment, or self-protection may have taken root. - Name what happened.
Describe the event honestly without minimizing, exaggerating, or excusing it. - Acknowledge how it affected you.
Identify the emotions connected to the experience—perhaps rejection, fear, shame, anger, grief, loneliness, or powerlessness. - Share with a safe and trustworthy person.
Talk with a mature friend, pastor, mentor, coach, or counselor who can listen without dismissing your experience. Ask that person to pray with and for you. - Seek specialized help when needed.
Trauma and abuse should be addressed with a safe, qualified, and compassionate counselor. Spiritual practices should never be used to avoid appropriate psychological, medical, legal, or safeguarding support. - Ask what response belongs to you.
You are not responsible for another person’s sin, but you can ask God whether there are reactions, choices, or patterns in your own heart that require confession and repentance. - Replace false conclusions with truth.
Ask God to reveal lies you may have believed about Him, yourself, or others. Receive the comfort and compassion your heavenly Father desires to give you.
Identifying the Usual Suspects
Among both expatriate and local mission workers, I have repeatedly encountered three areas in which unresolved resentment or condemnation tends to remain:
- Unforgiveness toward people or organizations that have caused harm
- Resentment or distrust directed toward God
- Ongoing self-condemnation over personal failures
Each area requires honesty, grace, and a willingness to bring what is hidden into the light.
A Step-by-Step Path Toward Forgiveness
Forgiveness is often a process rather than a single emotional moment. These steps can help us begin:
- Name the person who hurt you.
- Identify the specific event.
Name each event—large or small—that God brings to mind. Acknowledge the effect of the wound.
Verbalize how the experience affected you. For example:“My father did not come to my graduation. I felt unworthy, unloved, rejected, and unimportant.”
- Resist the urge to rationalize the pain away.
We may immediately list all the reasons the person acted as they did. Understanding the context can eventually be helpful, but explanations should not prevent us from acknowledging that we were genuinely hurt. - Release judgment and retaliation to God.
Forgiveness does not call evil good. It relinquishes personal vengeance and entrusts ultimate justice to God. - Establish appropriate boundaries.
Forgiveness does not automatically restore trust or require renewed access to an unsafe person. Reconciliation requires truth, repentance, safety, and the willing participation of those involved. - Return to the process as needed.
Pain may resurface. When it does, bring it back to the Lord rather than interpreting its return as failure.
This does not mean digging up and ruminating over every wrong ever committed against us. We can focus prayerfully on what God brings to our attention.
Forgiveness is essential, but forgiveness alone does not resolve every effect of trauma. Healing may also involve grieving, counseling, establishing boundaries, reporting abuse, receiving medical care, or walking through a long process of restoration.
When We Feel Angry with God
Why might someone need to acknowledge resentment toward God when God Himself has done no wrong?
Sometimes life does not unfold as we imagined. A prayer appears unanswered. A child suffers. A ministry collapses. A teammate betrays us. Years of obedience seem to yield little visible fruit.
When life becomes far more difficult than expected, a wall of distrust may begin to form between our hearts and God.
I have personally experienced resentment toward God. Healing began when I stopped pretending and admitted my anger to Him. He already knew what was in my heart. Honest lament opened the way for me to release what I had held against Him and begin trusting Him again.
We do not forgive God as though He has sinned. Rather, we acknowledge our disappointment, surrender our accusations, and allow Him to meet us in our grief. As we bring our true hearts into His presence, healing can begin and freedom can flow.
Receiving Freedom from Self-Condemnation
Another common struggle is our inability to release ourselves from past failures.
In prayer with others, I have seen workers condemn themselves when their ministries do not succeed as they expected. Parents may also blame themselves—or blame God—when their children experience difficulty or make destructive choices.
Certainly, we should take responsibility for our mistakes. When we have sinned, we need to confess, repent, seek forgiveness, and make amends where possible.
But once our sin has been confessed, Christ does not call us to live indefinitely beneath the weight of shame. He invites us to receive His forgiveness and walk in the freedom He has purchased.
We may describe this as “forgiving ourselves,” but the deeper invitation is to agree with God’s verdict of grace. We stop appointing ourselves as a higher judge than God and receive what He has freely given.
Forgiveness, Love, and Kingdom Witness
When our relationships remain burdened by unresolved wounds and offenses, our Kingdom witness is weakened. Pain clouds our vision, causing us to interpret life through the filter of rejection, suspicion, or fear.
We also have an enemy who seeks to fuel woundedness, offense, and self-pity. He tempts us to define ourselves by what others have done to us and to take offense at every turn.
Christ offers another way.
Andrew Murray writes in With Christ in the School of Prayer that when God’s forgiving love takes possession of our hearts, we begin to live in love. His forgiveness becomes a living reality within us that overflows toward others.
Jesus said:
“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”
—John 13:34–35
We advance God’s Kingdom not only through effective strategies but also through the way we love one another—with forgiveness, mercy, grace, truth, and compassion.
Becoming the Loving Kind of People God Uses
God births movements.
We do not manufacture them through human effort, strategic brilliance, or flawless execution. Yet as followers of Jesus, we are invited to become surrendered vessels through whom His Spirit can work.
The health of a movement cannot be separated from the health of its disciples and leaders. If we carry untreated wounds, cherished offenses, and hidden bitterness, those patterns will eventually influence what we reproduce.
But when we allow Christ to heal, transform, and release our hearts, we become increasingly free to love others as He has loved us.
Disciple-Making Movements need more than skilled practitioners. They need women and men who abide in Christ, walk in humility, seek healing, forgive freely, receive grace deeply, and love courageously.
May we become the loving kind of people God delights to use as He launches cascading Kingdom movements among the nations.
No comments:
Post a Comment