Mother’s Week 2021: Day 5
By Jesse Chang
Jesse Chang with his mom and older brother.
Tears were streaming down my mom’s face as the credits finished rolling to the 2006 film, End of the Spear, a Christian movie about the famous story of five white missionaries who went to evangelize a remote and hostile Amazonian tribe and were martyred in 1956, leaving behind their wives and young children. Through her sobs, she was finally able to share why she was crying so much: “those men were willing to give their lives for the Lord--what have I done in comparison?”
Growing up, my family always signed up to host foreign missionaries our local congregation supported to stay at our house or provide dinners for them. They were guests of honor and we kids had to make sure we vacuumed and picked up our toys or we would get a good talking to from mom as she busily made a multi-course Chinese meal. We would always go to ALL the mission conference meetings, even on school nights! At one of these conferences, I remember fondly trying the dried grasshoppers that were part of a Bible translator’s display table--they were actually a “prop” of common food from the Zapotec people, but the missionary said I could try them; I felt like John the Baptist as I chewed on them (they needed some wild honey)!
When my dad officially retired from his work and they were empty nesters, my mom pushed hard for them to go overseas on short-term mission for at least a year in Africa. My mom was excited at the prospect of finally being on the “front line,” not just a supporter on the sidelines cheerleading. But it never ended up happening, and they settled on supporting a sending agency based in Charlotte, NC. Eventually, that didn’t pan out as well as they had hoped, and I remembered a conversation with other family members during those early retirement years that my mom was in a funk, disappointed that her life didn’t seem like it amounted to anything meaningful. I remember saying in response, “so working outside the home and raising three incredible children wasn’t an amazing accomplishment?” (OK, I didn’t say incredible).
It’s probably a truism that most first generation immigrants sacrifice their own dreams and goals for the sake of their children’s future. It certainly was true in my family, as I emerged from my undergrad program with only $2500 in debt because my mom kept working through our college years. But as I reflect on this dream deferred of “going on mission” for my mom, I realize a bit more on how she had to die to those dreams multiple times just to help give the kids the support for them to live their dreams. It’s been a costly sacrifice for my first generation parents, and as I reflect on what we have been learning about Jesus in the second half of Mark, I see Jesus even more in the contours of my mom’s sidelined--but great--life.
“Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all.” Mark 10:43-44
