From India, With Love

We recently returned from a family trip to India – a trip meant mainly to introduce our kids to the place their parents had called home for four years – and ended up with much more than we bargained for. Instead of just a trip down memory lane, we found ourselves in the middle of what great things God can do with what little we allow him to use.

We set out starting a bible college in India right after receiving our ministry degrees in the U.S., and were plunging into this pioneer project with enthusiasm and fervor. The next four years were filled with wonderful encounters with our growing student body. We taught about the grace of God, and our Indian students soaked up the message of unconditional love. They played with our babies, swept us up in their wonderful community, generously forgave us our ignorance about their culture and the arrogance that so quickly seeps in when Westerners interact with people from other places of the world, and in general treated us with much more kindness and respect than we deserved.

At the same time, small warning signs started to appeared in our hearts concerning doctrinal matters held with great conviction and rigor by our U.S. school’s leadership. But more than doctrinal issues, we realized that our idea of leadership differed greatly from that of the U.S. school. We believed in the potential of our Indian students, and wanted to celebrate how God had created each of them with their unique expressions of faith, and how their background and dreams contributed to who they were today. Our Indian school was marked by authenticity, teamwork, honest conversations and the space to talk about doubts and failure in a compassionate way.

Meanwhile, the leadership of the U.S. school went in what seemed to us the opposite way. Hierarchical leadership, financial growth, and loyalty to doctrinal statements seemed to be their idea of success. The storm clouds in our hearts darkened. There was no way to grow vulnerability and compassion in a setting like this. Our efforts to seek conversation with the U.S. school about our differing leadership style was met instead with more – culturally irrelevant – rules and lack of personal interaction. The whole situation made us feel abandoned and micromanaged at the same time – a phenomenon many missionaries will know too well.

We drew hope from our amazing student body. Their gratitude, willingness to serve, and eagerness to learn touched us deeply. They were open both when we applauded some of the school’s messages and when we challenged others. We enjoyed everything from the conversations and debates to the songs, food, and fellowship with our Indian family.

At the same time, living in India weighed on us – on me specifically. While the balancing act with the U.S. school kept my husband up at night, what weighed me down was the challenge of raising a two-year old and giving birth to her sister in Chennai. Too many things were foreign – especially since I, at that time, lacked real appreciation for the culture of India. After all, we had been steeped in a Western, Evangelical environment that was convinced of its own superiority in spiritual matters.

After four years, something had to give. For the sake of our family and our own health, we had to leave. And we did so very hesitantly. For one, everything was not black and white about the school. To this day, we believe that some of its foundational teachings are both liberating and life-giving – the reason we had joined the movement in the first place. So we didn’t want to leave and never look back. We loved people in this movement, and we still agreed with many of the things they believe.

What grieved us most was knowing we were leaving not only students, but friends and team members behind. And we hadn’t been there long enough to raise up a leadership team of Indians who could take over – at least not to the satisfaction of the U.S. school. There was still so much to do, so many dreams to pursue, so much potential in our team to develop. Leaving felt like the least loving thing to do, and yet we knew we had to give our own emotional health and our family preference.

Our decision further strained our relationship to the U.S. school, although we kept working with the ministry for several more years. There seemed to be no interest to find out how we were doing, why we left in the first place, or how we could assist the person who replaced us. On the contrary: to “ease the transition”, the school told us we were no longer allowed to speak to our team in India, even though many of them were our friends.

So, over the course of the following years, we watched – mostly from a distance as we now lived in Switzerland – our Indian friends struggle with the new U.S. leadership that had replaced us. The new leader introduced strict rules and executed top-down leadership. It nearly broke our hearts.

I think many readers can relate to these feelings. We forge plans, and plunge into projects we believe God told us to accomplish with conviction and passion. But many of us know the moment when it all falls down around us – be it painfully slow or crashing down like an avalanche – we’re left with existential questions and disillusion. Add to it the guilt we personally felt, since it was our own decision to leave our students and team, and you can imagine that our feelings towards this mission were ambivalent at best.

Fast forward 13 years. Over time, my husband and I worked through what happened in India in our own ways. We continued doing ministry in different forms and with various communities, and while I wrote a novel, David continued to lead people, now in environments that encouraged authenticity and compassion instead of hierarchies. We both learned to see the mistakes that happened on both sides, knowing that all of us come with our own brokenness and shortcomings. But overall, at least in my heart, I saw our time in India as “an example of how not to do ministry”.

Until a month ago, when we had our first ever reunion with our students in Chennai. Only afterwards did I realize how much I had held my breath, wondering if we would encounter indifference, or even bitterness, from the people we felt we had abandoned?

Some of them came from far away, some still affiliated with the ministry, others having moved on. But they all came. And it was an evening I will never forget.  The love and appreciation showered upon us was overwhelming and humbling at the same time. The story of the prodigal son came to mind. At last fully realizing his shortcomings and his pride, he doesn’t get far with expressing his remorse, because the embrace of his father stops all his excuses. In the same way, I experienced my apologies lost in hugs and laughter. Instead of explanations, married students who met at the school wanted to show us their kids, and family members of students told us how our work had forever changed their lives. All evening long, our Indian friends shared stories and memories, celebrating the community that had survived our mistakes and limits. It was profoundly moving to hear our students talk of what they had learned from us as a family, and to experience the friendships that still connect our students all these years later.

It took a few days for it all to sink in and for me to realize the gift I had been given that night. Over the years, these people had gone through all kinds of hardships in connection with the ministry we started. But they focused on celebrating the good that had come from it. They chose to let joy and love define their memory. Yes, in the days following there were many one-on-one conversations where students told us of the hard times as well. But even these stories were laced with humor and hope.

In a culture where so little can be controlled, these people look at their blessings in the midst of the mess that is life. In my own culture, where seemingly so much can be controlled, I get upset at the slightest bit of life that doesn’t go my way. No wonder India, where most things slipped out of our hands, was a difficult memory. And yet, in the meantime, God was creating something beautiful out of the mess we had to leave behind. Those people, whom we felt we let down – God used their hugs and stories and laughter and friendship to remind us that whether we perceive our work as failure or success is irrelevant. The truth is, our own efforts will all fail eventually, but his grace will make something beautiful even with the clumsiest of our efforts.

I returned with profound thankfulness. What good news that while I can repent of my mistakes, regret my shortcomings and work on not repeating them, I can at the same time rest in God’s embrace – because as my own plans and ideas fail, His plans are coming to pass quite outside of what I can understand or imagine.