As missionaries, we live a strange, sometimes absurd, lifestyle. We have unique, God-ordained experiences on a regular basis AND we have ridiculously complicated “should-be-simple” interactions daily. All of it is mixed together in a beautiful mess! But one of the most extraordinary constants is being fully planted in a culture that (even after 10+ years) is foreign to us while still maintaining roots to our home culture. This reality is felt more acutely by our family when we return to America for HOME ASSIGNMENT (aka, “furlough”).

We recently spent over two months visiting America, and it drew attention to this tension that we feel. After being in Uganda for the past two full years without traveling back to the U.S., we were lovingly welcomed by so many people: family, friends, churches, mission committees, and even the weather! We could not have asked for more generosity, warmth, hospitality, flexibility, and abundant love as we moved from city to city, state to state (we drove 7,400 miles, plus additional flights). Every meeting, gathering, meal, or rendezvous we had was a genuine blessing. But one strange thing happened each and every time: “Welcome Home!”

Our well-meaning and loving family and friends were eager to make us feel welcome to the place they reasonably assumed was our home. But something strange twinged in us every time we heard these words…something simultaneously familiar AND foreign. Are we home?

America is our home; more accurately, Texas is our home. But at the same time, it isn’t. Uganda is our home! And it feels strange to call America “home” when both our family and America have undergone so many changes in the decade since we last lived there. It feels like a betrayal of our home in Uganda, almost dishonest. After all, I’ve lived longer in our house in Uganda than I have lived in any other house my entire life; our family has lived longer in Uganda than we have lived in any other place. This is even more magnified for our daughter who has called Uganda home since she was three years old, and has no memory of life prior to moving to Africa. Uganda is our home. Uganda is her home.

The over-simplified way to see it is that we don’t own a house, car, or any property in America (aside from a few boxes stored at our parents’ houses). At least in Uganda we own our own vehicles and we have lived in the same rental house for the 10 years we’ve live here. We own our beds, our couch, our kitchen utensils and plates, and our dogs all in Uganda. But it seems too easy to base it around our possessions.

I think it has more to do with our LIFE. When we visit America, we are visiting other people’s lives. We are visiting their church, their homes, their restaurants, their work places, their cities, their friendships and small groups. We constantly feel like visitors when we’re in America, even when we are amongst family and friends. Even when we are staying at “our home base,” we are still living out of suitcases, and it’s still someone else’s home, not ours. We are in their patterns of lifestyle, not ours.

Don’t take this the wrong way – we LOVED every minute of the time we got to spend with OUR people while in America! We were relationally, emotionally, and lovingly refreshed to the n-th degree! People did EVERYTHING to make us feel home, welcome, supported, and loved.

But we didn’t feel HOME until we set foot BACK in Uganda.

When we returned to our house here in Uganda, we all three looked at one another and said, without hesitation, “WELCOME HOME!” That’s a strange reality that defines our current life…we have two homes, and neither of them feels completely comfortable. I could try to spin that. I can “Jesus-Juke” my way to better understand that “this world is not our home, we’re just passing through.” And yes, it’s true. And yes, we learn and understand things about that spiritual truth in ways we didn’t understand before moving to Africa.

But what I want people to understand is the complication that four-letter word brings to us. “H-O-M-E” is a tension that is constant in our family; in our lives; in the lives of every missionary family I know. I think when we understand the tension other people feel, we know how to pray for and encourage them. (Side note: if you want to see our daughter light-up when we visit America, ask her about her HOME in Uganda.) Our family and friends know this tension and encourage us with their love every time we visit. There isn’t a wrong-way to welcome us. But understanding the mess that “home” is to us is the difference in feeling seen and feeling misunderstood. Because so many of our people in the States have taken the time to understand us in this way, we feel truly loved, understood, and known.

We feel this every day! And I pray that other missionaries can feel seen, understood, and known in the same way by their families, friends, and churches.

A regular part of our life as missionaries is returning to our passport country for home assignment (previously known as “furlough”). This will be our first time back to America since the summer of 2024 (two full years) and our sixth such trip since we moved to Uganda in January 2016. Like many other missionaries, our home assignment is filled with activity – visiting churches and supporters to report on our work, additional fundraising, spending time with family and friends, and attempting to recharge our hearts and minds. These trips help us stay in touch with the people who enable us to do our mission and provide a brief respite from the stresses and strains of everyday life in a (beloved) foreign culture.

But these trips also come with their own stressors: It means living out of a suitcase for a couple of months and staying in the homes of other people; It means being on our best behavior as the spotlight is shown on us whenever we arrive at supporting churches; It means trying to compact our whole life, heart, and ministry into two, five, or ten minute sound bites to take advantage of the opportunity we have to tell others the stories that give the ministry richness and meaning. It means many miles spent together in a borrowed vehicle as our family travels from one location to another. It means trying to split our time between family members who want to see us and the work we need to do while in America. It means still maintaining a spiritual “presence” and leadership role in Uganda while also preaching, sharing, and living in churches across several states.

As another missionary states: “We’ve been told that Home Assignment is meant for rest. We’ve also been told it’s meant for fundraising. And for reconnecting with family. And for sharing stories and photos at supporting churches. And for finding new people who might be interested in our ministry. And for reflection and prayer and rejuvenating ourselves before diving in again on the mission field. And…and…and…” (Click THIS BLOG for the full story.)

For us…we are blessed! We are blessed because our hosts, supporters, and meetings are with dear friends and loved ones. God blessed us with the honor of serving with partners who know and love us, so our time is more relational than many other missionaries we know. But it’s still hard to be away from home while also visiting “home;” and with several well-meaning people assuming we are enjoying an extended vacation stateside.

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For those who don’t know, a Third Culture Kid (TCK) is a person who has spent a significant part of his or her developmental years outside the parents’ culture. A TCK builds relationships to all of the cultures they experience while not having full ownership in any. Although elements from each culture are assimilated into a TCK life experience, the sense of belonging is in relationship to others of a similar background. A Missionary Kid (MK) is a subset of TCK – they are born or raised abroad, and have both the privilege and the challenge of growing up in their family’s place of ministry. Adalyn is an MK. She has spent 10 years in Uganda. She came to Uganda as a toddler and is now a teenager. She is part American, part Ugandan, with several of other cultures that have influenced her since living in an international community.

A TCK/MK has some unique needs. Here are some ways to pray for Adalyn as she continue to grow into the woman God has created her to be…

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