How do missionary children support their parents in the family business? Can they help make disciples for Jesus? How can they play a proactive role in outreach?

Our children are still very young. Our daughter, Eliora, is almost four years old, and our son, Elie-Dana, is nine months. Even as we raise them to be disciples of Jesus, they are growing up in the Muslim culture that surrounds us here in Kandi. Our home is hemmed in by four mosques. Eliora knows some of the Arabic calls to prayer that blare five times a day from the mosques’ megaphones. On occasion, I have seen her pretending to put on a veil and trying to pray on a mat as she sees the Muslims do.

How deeply will the host culture influence our children? How much should we allow it to do so? These are difficult questions, especially in light of our outreach strategy here, based on tolerance, acceptance and religious freedom.
Will our children feel entirely at home in our host culture? Because of their young age, they have not yet experienced the reverse culture shock that older missionary youth face when they return to their homelands.

In our family life, as Elmire and I instruct our children and encourage them to adopt our values and the positive values of the society in which we live and minister, we are gaining credibility in the eyes of our Muslim neighbors. Strong family life is a basic tenet of Islam. Ideally, Muslim children are brought up to become productive members of their society. To achieve this, they acquire education within the family and, later, within the institutions of the society.

As our children grow and learn to be open-minded and tolerant of many diverse cultures, we want to make sure that they are instructed with great diligence and care, to awaken and enliven a missionary spirit in them (Prov. 22:6).

Even at her young age, Eliora is already contributing to the advancement of our project. She attracts many children to our home. They don’t hesitate to come into our house to play with her and her toys. By allowing their children to visit us, the parents are signaling their acceptance of us and toleration of what we stand for. Likewise, we take our children with us when we go visiting, and people’s hearts are opened, and they welcome us as a family.

In African culture, parents receive identity from their children, especially their firstborn. For example, people call me “Eliora’s father,” and Elmire is “Eliora’s mother.” This carries a strong message. In a fundamental sense, our children’s witness will continue to identify us among the Dendi people and be our color guard as we march forward.

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