Kids love to play. That’s true everywhere on the planet, but even in games you can find cultural differences that alter the experience. Since I work in children’s ministry, the issue of games and children’s play comes up a lot. As a teacher, how much effort do I need to […]
What Does It Mean to Be “Teacher” in Cambodia?
Kids are kids everywhere, but in different cultures there are different cultural practices around teaching, learning, and even play. As a missionary focusing on children’s ministry, I wanted to develop for myself a style of children’s ministry that would fit naturally into Cambodian culture and be easy for Cambodian Christians […]
Guiding Young MKs: Adventuring Out of the Fortress
It’s a unique thing, growing up in a country where you look different. In the previous post, “Looking Different,” I explained what it’s like for many missionary kids who live in countries where they are in the extreme ethnic minority. It can be hard to deal with the realities of […]
Guiding Young MKs: Looking Different
Many missionaries in my circles serve in countries where their family is ethnically different from the nationals of that country. A lot of these missionaries are citizens of Western nations where the population is a lot more multi-ethnic than the country in which they serve. What does this mean for […]
It’s Baffling Being Bilingual
I grew up with two languages, Khmer and English. My first word in Khmer was the word for “banana,” ចេក, and my first word in English was “cup.” I think of being bilingual as having two language trees growing in my heart. One tree is English. It is a strong, […]
A Christian Philosophy of Writing Fiction: God’s Reality
In Part 1, What to Do with Sin, I discussed objectionable elements in fiction, and three reasons that writers tend to include them: for realism, for hedonistic purposes, and to further an agenda (for or against). Using principles from God’s Word, I evaluated whether or not these reasons are valid […]
A Christian Philosophy of Writing Fiction: What to Do with Sin
We all know good stories, the ones that endure, that break your heart and change your life—that get told and re-told across centuries, ones children beg for at bedtime. Stories are powerful. No one denies this. They strike deep, and they linger; they enchant, and they slap us with reality; […]