The Missionary Who Wasn’t Ready

The air in the small Ethiopian village was dry and thin, scented with dust, firewood smoke, and eucalyptus. James sat on the edge of his narrow cot in the concrete room the local pastor had offered him, staring at his blistered feet. He had been in the country for only eleven days, but already the romantic visions he’d once had of “serving God in Africa” were starting to buckle under heat and silence.

He had imagined the mission field as a place of miracles and open hearts, of children singing Jesus songs and old men weeping as they found the Savior. But what he’d found instead was mosquitoes, stomach cramps, and conversations that went nowhere. Even the local believers were distant with him, polite but guarded. They had seen too many Westerners come with eager eyes and leave when the first hardship came.

James had always been the star of his church back home—young, gifted, passionate. People said he had “a calling.” He’d believed them. At the send-off service, they’d laid hands on him. He’d cried. They’d cried. It had felt holy.

But now, a week and a half into his first real mission assignment, all he could feel was tired. Tired and confused.

He picked up his Bible, the one with underlined verses and worn pages, and opened to where his ribbon lay. Isaiah. The verse stared at him like a challenge: “Here I am, send me.”

He whispered aloud, “You did send me, Lord. But I don’t think I was ready.”

Outside, the tin roof crackled under the sun. Children’s laughter echoed faintly from a nearby clearing, but he didn’t feel invited into their joy. Something in him, something deep, had gone quiet.

The door creaked open behind him.

It was Teklu, the local pastor. “Brother James,” he said, smiling gently, “you rested today?”

James nodded, though it wasn’t true.

Teklu stepped in, his eyes warm but penetrating. “I would like to visit an elder from our church. She is ill. Will you come with me?”

James hesitated. His stomach still churned from the water he’d drunk two days ago, and he hadn’t eaten more than a banana that morning. But something in Teklu’s tone made it impossible to refuse. He slipped on his worn sandals and followed.

They walked in silence through narrow dirt paths, past children chasing chickens and women carrying jerrycans of water on their backs. The sky was a heavy blue, with clouds pressing in from the west.

The elder’s home was small, with mud walls and a thatched roof. Inside, the air was thick and cool. A woman lay on a straw mat, her eyes closed, her breath shallow.

Teklu knelt beside her and whispered a greeting in Amharic. She stirred slightly. James stood awkwardly behind him, unsure of his role.

“Her name is Mulu,” Teklu said softly. “She helped plant the first church here. She cannot speak now. But she listens.”

James stepped forward and knelt beside her. He felt like a fraud. What could he say to this woman who had lived the Gospel through suffering, who had endured more than he could comprehend?

Still, he opened his Bible, and began to read—not to preach, not to explain, but simply to let the words be heard.

“The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want…”

Teklu closed his eyes. Mulu’s lips moved faintly, echoing the psalm from memory.

James’s voice faltered. He felt the lump rising in his throat. Not because of homesickness this time, or failure, but something else. Awe. Shame. Reverence.

He read on.

“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death…”

His voice cracked. He paused, then continued, quieter now.

“…I will fear no evil, for You are with me.”

When he finished, there was a silence. Mulu reached out, her thin fingers brushing his wrist. It was the gentlest of touches, but it felt like fire.

On the walk back, Teklu said little. Just as they neared the village edge, he stopped and looked at James.

“You thought God sent you here to teach us,” he said, not unkindly. “But maybe He sent you here to learn first.”

James looked down at his feet again. They were still blistered. But now, they didn’t hurt quite the same way.

That night, he didn’t write his usual blog post for supporters back home. He just sat under the stars, listening to the distant drums from the other side of the hill and watching a bat flit silently across the moon. He didn’t have anything profound to say. But in the stillness, something inside him finally unclenched.

The next day, he woke early and asked Teklu if he could help fetch water.

And for the first time, the children ran to meet him.

They laughed when he spilled the first jug, and he laughed too, and he didn’t care that his shirt was soaked through. He sat with them afterward, his arms streaked with red dust, and let them braid grass into his hair.

Over the weeks, the village remained the same. The road was still rough, the food still strange, the language still a barrier. But something had shifted. James stopped trying to be the answer. He started to listen. To serve quietly. To pray without writing about it.

He visited Mulu weekly, reading Psalms or just sitting with her, sometimes in silence. And one day, Teklu told him Mulu had passed away during the night. Peacefully. Eyes open toward the window.

James wept.

Not with guilt this time, or pressure to prove himself—but with love. He had known a saint. A true one.

Months later, as his time in the village drew to a close, the elders held a small gathering for him. There was no pomp, just a meal and a prayer. Teklu handed him a bundle wrapped in woven cloth. Inside was Mulu’s Bible—old, pages browned, corners curled.

“She asked for you to have it,” Teklu said.

James held it close.

On the flight back to America, surrounded by headphones and glowing screens, he read from that Bible. Its margins were filled with tiny handwritten prayers, some in Amharic, some in broken English. One stood out near Psalm 23:

“Jesus, help me love even when it costs everything.”

James closed his eyes. And this time, when someone asked him how the mission went, he smiled and said, “It was hard. But it changed me.”

And he never again used the phrase, “called to the mission field” lightly.

He knew now: the field is not a stage. It is a garden. And sometimes the seeds are planted in your own heart.