As I sit in my room on the last day of my trip to Kyrgyzstan, I have mixed emotions. These are incredible people. Materially their world is not horrible compared to places like central Africa, but it is not close to Europe or other developed countries. The biggest challenges they have are non-material, it is spiritual, emotional, and cultural.
I had dinner the other night with three incredible young ladies; two were college-educated, and the third was in college. All three of them were exactly the type of person you would want working for you. They were intelligent, positive, and driven to make something of their lives. Their challenge was that they lived in a world that did not value that. They lived in a post-Russian, Muslim, male-dominated society that did not value educated, independent women.
All three of them were faced with the prospects of either leaving their family and country to pursue their dream or staying where they were and living someone else’s. For them, life started with hard choices. For them, life started with a deep dive into the black pool of uncertainty. Even the prospect of meeting the right man and raising a family required moving away; there are not many Christian men their age. They are not the first nor the last to face this dilemma.
This is the discussion we had, and you can scold me for an older man advising young women.
I have never lived a day in their lives. I have never walked a mile in their shoes. I have never been raised in a culture that puts a constraint on what a person can be. The only experience I have is the Word of God that says He has a plan for us. It is a plan to prosper. He has made us unique creatures explicitly created to use all He gave us to glorify Him. If they compromise on that belief, they compromise on the joy, fulfillment, and impact for His Kingdom that he has written for them.
All this week, we have been teaching hard lessons. We have spent our time telling new business owners the hard truth of managing their businesses. These are Christian business people living in a predominately Muslim world. These are hard lessons because they do not conform to the rules of the world. These hard lessons teach us to do what is right, not what we have a right to do. They tell us that we should love those who hate us, serve those who despise us, and give to those in need that do not value us. Through this, we glorify the One who made all this possible. We do it not as a command but as a form of worship.
We have to apply this teaching to incredible young people with their whole lives in front of them. I am incredibly excited for them and, at the same time, worried and concerned. These young spirits full of energy and hope are the story of fairy tales. They are the forgotten maiden searching for their prince. They are the heroin of God’s story for humanity. Yet like all great stories, it has to start with hard choices.
The sadness is that when I come back, and I will, there can only be one sad ending or another. These young women will have chased God’s vision for their lives, and I may never see them again. Or they will not, and I will see a shell of the person they could have been. My selfish prayer is that God’s plan for them will be revealed in a way that brings us both joy.