Meet Abigale – A Grad From South Asia

Q: What was your biggest obstacle that you had to overcome in missions before going through Cafe 1040's program? 

A: I was lost because there were so many choices. Every agency has their different systems. I was really looking for the focus of the organization. I was careful to look at the mission’s values and what they believe about the Bible. I knew where I was in my faith and I knew what the Bible said and how the Holy Spirit would guide me to right organization. I looked a countless websites, blog posts, went to the Lord in prayer, along with my parents being involved in the process. 

My heart will forever be gripped for the people in the 10/40 window. For me they are no longer numbers of unreached statistics on a page. They are names with faces—friends I know and love deeply. They are visibly broken and lost hearts professing in false idols or nothing at all. They are beautiful people that our Father desires to be his own again.

Ramadan is 30 days set aside every year for Muslims to fast from sun up to sun down. For some places in the world, this could mean over 18 hours of fasting each day. Fasting is one of the five pillars in Islam. It’s a time set aside to focus on prayer and the reading of the Qur’an in an effort to seek God.

What could happen if Christians all over the world began to see Muslims the way God sees them?  What if we all joined in asking Ramadan to be a time Muslims sought God and found His Son Jesus for the first time?

2017 was the year I quit the comfort of a set salary with benefits, and the false security of finances shattered in front of me. It was the year I embarked on the greatest, craziest adventure of my life: support-raising. As with most missions organizations, we are responsible for raising funds to cover our salary and ministry expenses. God has led Cafe 1040 to this model of ministry funding and has provided in significant ways for many years. 

Written by a Cafe 1040 student.

I wasn’t expecting vulnerability here, but this culture is searching for something harder than anything I’ve ever seen. They have generations and generations of being deceived.

Q: Why did you choose Cafe 1040?

A: “After looking at Cafe 1040, I also explored some other organizations. It was really eye opening for me to see a mentorship is something people actually do.  Honestly, the reason I picked Cafe 1040 is I felt heard, and understood and identified with by Cafe, more than other organizations that have similar program.” 

What would it take for you to unapologetically, unreservedly decide to move your life to Saudi Arabia to share the gospel? We believe this next generation of missionaries is uniquely positioned to complete the Great Commission, but the ever-shifting roadmap of missions makes it a difficult task.
 

From the beginning of the trip, we have been told repeatedly:

Life is not about doing things for God--even good things. It's about seeking and knowing Him.

So I've asked God to strip away my agenda, my life, my plans...I've essentially asked to die to self (we always underestimate prayers of this kind!). And He is answering. 

Standing over the banks of the Ganges River - the most holy place in Hinduism to bring the dead – I took in the most graphic image of death my eyes have ever seen.

Body after body was being burned and lowered into this river for its remission of sins.  It was a picture of imminent death with one last grasp for hope.

Sometimes the most empowering lesson we can learn in missions is just how small we are in His story.

Over one short month with days that seem as long as weeks, I have spent living my life in a foreign country with foreign people while learning a foreign language and culture.

Raising support to sustain a life of missions can be overwhelming. It can be a major obstacle that keeps people from ever obeying God's call on their life. We know God controls every resource in the world, but do we truly believe He can provide in this way for our life? We've put together a series of support raising stories from people in different stages and viewpoints of life as a way to remind you that God is at work and He loves to show off in this way.

This is a guest post from our friend Joe at Pioneers.

Sensing God calling you to something crazy, but, in the immortal words of Will Smith, parents just don’t understand? In this, the first of a series exploring barriers to serving in mission, a mission candidate coach explores what is—for many—the first and trickiest obstacle.

Setting down my chopsticks after yet another dinner of chicken and rice, I looked up to see three rough, wrinkled fingers waving in my face. “Three… three”, she says in her best English. Although we couldn’t communicate verbally, I knew what she meant. She was planning for me and my team to wake up at 3:00 a.m. to go fishing with her family, a daily routine for most people in this remote fishing village. She seemed overwhelmed with excitement to be hosting three American girls in her home for the weekend to experience their culture first hand. 

Do you ever feel like there are so many books you’d like to read, but then you go to pick one and you never really know where to start? Should you pick up a work or fiction or is non-fiction a better use of time? The sheer amount of choices keeps you from reading all together. At Cafe 1040, we love sharing resources that keep us growing and learning so we polled a few of our staff to see which books they’d recommend.

With a day dedicated to love approaching, we rounded up three articles that radically counteract the way the world views love.  We know, outside of Christ, love is always self-seeking. But how do we love as Christ loves us? What is the source of this love?

When did you first hear the story of Jesus? Who told you? Where were you? How were you changed?

Whether you realize it or not, the context in which you live shapes the way you think. Culture shapes the way you see the world. Culture can be defined as the social behavior and norms of a group of people.

One night our team was praying in our apartment. We took a minute of silence to listen to whatever God was trying to tell us. I started feeling really convicted that I needed to share the gospel with my friend Samir. I had kind of written him off as uninterested. All he ever seemed to want to do is goof off.

The missions world can be complex and quite confusing. There are long lists of questions, endless applications, hundreds of organizations. How do you know where to begin? Where do you get started?

Meet "Ryan"… (Gotta use code names). He’s a friend of ours that we met at the basketball courts. One day after playing, we were sitting waiting on someone and I just starting asking what we call "invasive questions" to start some religious conversation. I was asking what he believes, why, how he feels about it… all kinds of things.