TCK Voices: Grateful for Grace and Faith in My MK Life

Today we have Andrew with us. Welcome, Andrew!

Can you tell us a bit about your family and yourself?

My parents are missionaries, which makes me a missionary kid (or MK).

Both my parents grew up at our home church in Illinois, where my dad’s father has pastored for about 38 years now. Both my parents felt a burden for missions in their teens. They attended Crown College in Powell, Tennessee, and my dad graduated with a degree in missions in 2006. They were married soon after.

After serving in our church for about seven years (in which two of my sisters and I were born), they felt it was God’s timing for them to become missionaries. They took their first survey trip in 2014, and in 2017, our whole family went for a month. We moved in 2018 when my youngest sister was only a few months old.

Therefore, I spent the first nine years of my life in America. Five years in my small hometown surrounded by the cornfields of Illinois, and the other four all over America, literally from coast to coast. My parents attended the Baptist Bible Translators Institute near Bowie, Texas, so I spent nearly a year down there. Then we moved overseas when I turned nine.

My last seven years have been spent in Cabo Verde (a group of 10 islands off the west coast of Africa). I lived about four years in the capital city of Praia on the island of Santiago, and the last three (up to the present) on the island of Sao Vicente.

I am currently 16 years old, though I still don’t have a driver’s license. We have not been to America recently, where I would be able to get it, and it will probably have to wait a few years.

I’ve been homeschooled my whole life through Sonlight, and I’m currently in 11th grade. I enjoy both reading and music. My favorite book is The Bronze Bow by Elizabeth George Speare, and a few of my favorite artists are Andrew Peterson, Ron Hamilton, Andy Gullahorn, and Fernando Ortega. I also enjoy writing and intend to get a degree that is in some way related to that area. 

Among other things, I am a mediocre Minecraft survivalist, a french fry enthusiast, a professional Ticket to Ride player, a puzzler, an amateur guitarist, and older brother to four sisters. I’ve been a Chicago Cubs fan for over a decade, and I’m just about the biggest one this side of the Atlantic.

What is one memory from your time in your non-passport country that you would like to share? 

I was baptized in September of 2021, right here in Cabo Verde (in the Atlantic ocean actually). That was pretty special. While I was walking back to the shore where the church was gathered, the people sang, “I Have Decided To Follow Jesus.”

What is an advantage of being a TCK?

I feel very lucky that I am an MK because of the unique opportunities and experiences it offers. Not only have I been well-traveled in Cabo Verde and America, but I’ve learned a new language, a new culture, and have attended a truly Cabo Verdean church. As a result, I feel my worldview has been broadened and that my faith has deepened in a way that will no doubt be beneficial in later years. 

Who was someone that you met in your non-passport country that made a difference in your life, and how? 

There are many people I have met over the years. Friends in America, other MKs, friends here in Cabo Verde, and even our mission’s director when he visited us a few years ago.

Someone who has had an especially large impact on my life is the local pastor here, Pastor Eudo. One of the first things my dad and I did when we moved to Mindelo was to get routed in ping pong by Pastor Eudo and his son, who are both very good players (we have both gotten better since then, but we still usually lose). It was also Pastor Eudo who taught me to play the guitar. 

He is someone I would classify as a superpastor because there is hardly anything he can’t do. He is a very good preacher, both formally in church and informally on the street. He is very good with kids and people of all ages, and he is also a very talented guitar player and songwriter. Many of the songs he’s written bring tears to people’s eyes.

I’ve had the chance to tag along with him to various places for numerous missions, and just by watching him and listening, I almost always learn something new.

How has being a TCK influenced your faith?

Living overseas has taught me a lot about the realness of God in everyday life, as well as about His provision and guidance. Aspects that certainly aren’t overlooked in America, but that take on a new dimension when you live overseas. 

I’ve seen prayers answered and many things, both great and small, with God’s visible fingerprints on them.

Recently, we sponsored a medical missions team from America, and we needed to get some papers that approved the medicines they would be using. Paperwork is notoriously slow to track down here in Cabo Verde, and we weren’t having the best time of it. We got the papers a day before the team landed (a few hours after they had left America), just when we were beginning to think we’d not be able to get them in time.

Another time, just over a year ago, one of the ladies in the church here shared a story with us. Her son had left to go to the men’s Bible study (which happens every three weeks on Tuesday night). He had been gone a while when she heard a noise in his room. Upon investigating, she found a piece of the ceiling above his bed had fallen. If there had been no meeting that night, he most likely would have been in that bed, and he very well might have died.

Things like this are great reminders that God is real and that His timing is perfect.

What is one thing you would like to tell your fellow TCKs?

I’d just say to be thankful for where you are, and don’t grow up wishing you were somewhere else. You have been given an awesome and unique opportunity by God. Take advantage of it, be active in it, and enjoy the journey.

I honestly don’t know what happens next when I return to America for college and, most likely, to live life. I do know that God will never let go and that the memories and friends I’ve made in Cabo Verde will be ones I’ll cherish and benefit from for the rest of my life.

Thank you so much for sharing with us, Andrew!