This morning, I woke to a voice text that sent me into the all too familiar ache. The voice came all the way from Africa and hit my ears, “Mama. Mama, I very much miss you.” I didn’t need to see the name; I would know that voice anywhere. It was the voice of a young girl, our house girl from Burundi. Tears welled in my eyes and flowed down my cheeks.

My heart is in turmoil because I still feel like I left her and so many others. They text and say, “We love you, we miss you, family.” They speak their broken English, and I smile, and my heart physically aches to hug them again.

As I’ve been working through a missionary-specific re-entry group each Tuesday morning, I’ve realized something. My guess is somewhere between 98-99% of what missionaries are going through and the life they are living is unknown to the people who love them and support them. This is not a bad thing; it is neutral in my opinion. As missionaries, you simply live your life overseas, and do your best to communicate with those who support you as they wish and hope to be communicated with.

The problem I am realizing is when the missionary or global worker comes back. This is where the struggle is real. Suddenly, you realize those who love and care for you most understand 1-2% of the life you had been living overseas. You also tend to realize, once you’re back, that some of the things you dealt with overseas were so intense you survived but never processed, so now you’ve got things to unpack, relive, and regurgitate to be in a healthier spot mentally, emotionally, and relationally. Can you imagine not living life with people you love for a year and then coming back, to them having 1-2% understanding of the life you lived the last year? It can be a very lonely place.

There are so many aspects that a missionary can’t express. It’s not all because people are ignorant and not listening, either. Sometimes the deepest struggles are with teammates or leadership, or very often the biggest struggles are unsafe to discuss or share. There is also the sheer effort it takes to scratch the surface of the culture you live in as a missionary; it is exhausting. I started imagining some of the things I could say when there’s no context, and laughing at how absurd it sounds!

“We got hit by a bicycle today. Josh was relieved it was in the back. “

“Josh went to get gas down the road this morning; hopefully, he will be home tonight.”

“Josiah just took a bowl to the guards.”

“Neil’s gecko is loose again. Hopefully, it eats all the mosquitoes.”

“Samuel is down the mountain on the container unit.”

“We just smile and wave at checkpoints despite their weapons.”

“I’m going to go get my shower before the sun goes down.”

The point is, being in a foreign country, the foreign becomes familiar to you who live there, but it is still foreign to everyone else who doesn’t live there. Coming back to the States, most think it is supposed to be the easier transition, and I have yet to meet a missionary who finds that to be true. There are definitely wonderful and amazing conveniences coming back. I can take a shower whenever I want in the States, and that is still crazy to me. But overall, I wrestle everyday with memories, longings, and an ache that this isn’t how I saw this journey going.

I think this is part of why we’re here ministering to and with refugees from East Africa. We know their culture, their language, and we understand what they miss. We also understand it is best that they’re here right now. We know they’re longing and we know they’re thankful to be in the States. We’re both unsure of where we belong, and we both ache because this isn’t how we saw the journey going.

As a family, we are settling in a lot more in Oklahoma. We’re healing a lot. And we’re still ministering in Burundi, though we’re not on the ground anymore.

The orphanage had no tables or chairs; the kids would sit on mats on the floor to eat. We were able to send funds for tables and chairs. We were also praying this month, because at the end of September, we knew the orphanage’s food was running low. We’re so thankful for an unexpected donation that just came in, and it will provide more food for the children this month.

Our dear friend, Boaz, is working to raise support to get back to Burundi to serve as a medical doctor. Their missionary home in Burundi only needs $15,000 more to be completed! We would love to go visit them and the orphanage early next year, and we are working to raise $7,500 to purchase airfare. We wrestled with how expensive it is for our entire family to visit, and the immediate thought is, if we just send that money, it goes further. But then again, we’re growing in our knowledge of Burundi culture, and we know without a doubt if we show up what we’re speaking to them is deeper than dollars can go. We’re reminding them: we have not forgotten you, you’re valuable and worthwhile, we won’t forget you, and we love you. We can’t make their problems go away, but we can show up in the midst of them and remind them we love them. If God chooses to provide this opportunity, we will go and remind me and come back with better understanding of how to serve them better through World Renewal Burundi.

We left Burundi due to conflict, and the US embassy told us to leave. That situation is very difficult to explain. It is “stable”; we do feel it is stable enough for us to go in. You will not see news about Burundi even if you search for it. We did feel safe, and yet we also knew things were…different and changing. There were numerous other things, but that was the final straw that was so clear that God was opening doors for us to return.

Another reason we returned is that Neil was struggling a lot. Just this week, we were able to get him tested, and he has an auditory processing disorder. I have no bandwidth to expound on this except that he struggles in ways that were sometimes amplified when living in a 3rd world country.

So, we feel a visit would be refreshing for our family, and also, yes, we do feel it is safe enough.

If you are led to give to our Burundi trip, please put Burundi 2026 – Josh and Michelle Krumenacher in the memo line of a check and mail to World Renewal at P.O. Box 399 Greenfield, IN 46140 or give online here:

https://app.aplos.com/aws/give/WorldRenewalInc/joshandmichellekrumenacher