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March and April 2007 

What do you do when everything seems strange? When nothing is familiar? Do you want to run and hide? Feel like a fish out of water?

As missionaries, we receive training to live in and reach different cultures. We try our best to observe the local customs, and like the Apostle Paul said, “become all things to all men”.

Before coming to Zambia, a certain missionary family had been trained to recognize and adapt to different cultures.

One Sunday after arriving in Zambia the family was invited to a church service. The African pastor asked the missionaries to come late because in his culture, the honored guests always come late.

Wanting to be sensitive to the culture, the family came an hour after the service started, just like the African pastor said they should. A bench had been reserved for the missionary guests in the middle of the congregation. The husband and wife and their children sat down.

The African pastor said, “Let’s all stand and sing another song”. Then he said something else in the local language which the missionary family didn’t understand.

Everyone stood and sang, and before they sat down all the men in the congregation moved from one side of the building to the other side, and likewise the women moved from where they were sitting to the opposite side.

What the missionaries didn’t notice was that the husband had sat down on the women’s side and his wife had sat down on the men’s side. Rather than shame these two new missionaries and have them adjust to the culture, the kindly Zambians all switched sides to adjust to the missionaries culture!