I woke up in a cold sweat and shook my head as if to somehow help with processing my thoughts. I’d dreamt of a Welsh terrace house, not unlike the one I was currently living in. On the exterior wall of the house was a sign in white saying “For Rent;” next to it was a sign in red saying, “For Sale.” The dream summed up my circumstances perfectly, I was trying to work out if I should move into rented accommodation or buy a house and indecision was plaguing me. I was in my mid-thirties working enthusiastically at an overseas mission base in the UK. I had already moved houses five times in six years. I was tired of the instability of roommates leaving, forcing me to adapt to new people all the time or worse, move home. I longed for a house to call my own and lavish my decorative talents on. I also desired to be married and share that home with a missions-minded man, but that goal was proving elusive, too.

At the time, I also had family commitments I’d never expected—I was helping my mum care for my father, who'd suffered a debilitating stroke some three years earlier. This meant long journeys to the south of England and back again. I had no extra brain power for constantly negotiating accommodation issues and a revolving door of housemates.

Some close friends learned of these struggles and generously offered me a loan so I could have a deposit to get on the housing ladder. But I knew the properties I could afford (if I could raise a mortgage) would be old and difficult to maintain and I had no spare cash to do up a property. Added into the equation was a growing sense that the Lord was calling me back overseas, in which case would I want the hassle of renting out an old house whilst I was away?

In the end, the dream helped—I figured if God wasn’t leading me to either rent or buy, something else was called for. In part, I was helped by a prophecy spoken to me by a stranger at a church event, “Don’t hesitate, don’t hesitate, don’t hesitate.” The person giving me this word looked at me enquiringly and said, “I have no idea what this means.” I smiled widely and felt pressure lift off me both mentally and physically, “Oh, no worries, I know exactly what that’s about.”

A few weeks earlier, a young woman seeking a ministry partner to move to Muslim East Africa had come into my office and requested that I advertise her need on our website. But as I sat with the paper in my hand, I found it impossible to type into the computer—I wanted to go, my spirit was stirred. However, a few weeks later, I had still taken no action. How could I leave while my father was ill?

The prophecy was the confirmation and nudge I needed to step out in faith. I spoke to my boss, a Welsh man with an impressive baritone voice who boomed in lyrical reply, “Well, if that’s what the Lord’s told you, that’s what we’ll pray for; we’ll pray for your father’s health, and we’ll pray you into North East Africa.” And so, my prayer life changed from a focus on housing and marriage to getting back on-field.

The way my colleagues’ and my prayers were answered was not what I had hoped for. Shortly after that decision was made, my father had a second stroke from which he never recovered. Sitting at his bedside, during his final days in the hospital, my mum asked me, “Where do you want to go?”

“Go? I'm not going anywhere. You and Dad need me.”

“Oh, it’s just your dad, and I think perhaps you’d be better working overseas again.”

My mouth dropped in amazement—I had wanted to honour and care for my parents and so hadn’t even mentioned this fresh call to return overseas.

“Actually, your dad thinks you'd do really well in the Middle East. He said the other day that you'd look good in Middle Eastern dress because of your dark eyes.”

I continued to gawp like a goldfish. I had never mentioned an interest in the Middle East—but that was where I was going to have to go first to learn Arabic.

A few days later, he passed peacefully into eternity with Jesus. I felt at peace knowing I had my father’s blessing to move overseas again, and, with my mum’s encouragement, I moved six months later to start the intensely humbling course that is called “learning Arabic.”

Called Home

Some 12 years later, now engrossed in ministry amongst refugees, I received a message from my mum requesting a Zoom call. She was struggling with fatigue, and the doctors had discovered various growths that they were keen to remove and test. A few weeks later, my own health became questionable when a dull pain in my back turned out to be an impressive collection of gallstones. So, I returned home to care for my mum, who sadly turned out to have cancer, and sort out my own health issues.

By now, she had moved to a town I had never lived in, in a rather expensive area of the UK. I moved into her spare room and in record time for the NHS (National Health Service) nursed her through two operations, before having my own gallbladder removed.

This extended time in the UK opened my eyes to the rate of inflation in the UK that previous trips had not. The successive blows of Brexit and COVID-19 had hit the economy heavily and I calculated that whilst I could afford my rent in the Middle East fairly comfortably, I couldn’t even afford a room in a house in the UK.

The suddenness of my forced return to the UK was a shock. I had only one friend in the area and no family members nearby. And despite my best attempts at getting married on-field, which in the Middle East with a ratio of about nine single women workers to one male worker was fairly impossible, I was also still single.

Here I was in my mid-forties, having lived an extraordinary and adventurous life for God, rich in relationships, daily challenges, and superior quality hummus and falafel, finding myself living in my mother’s small spare room in a town mostly known for its retired population, churches, and museums. I felt better equipped for a terrorist incident or imprisonment than middle-class England. Was my identity too bound up in being in wildly exciting locations? I had to come to terms with the fact that this may now be my future. Could I serve and love my mum through illness as I had my father? Was this my new calling? Probably yes. Could I do that whilst living in the same house? If I was honest, possibly not.

At a suitable interval, I escaped for a few days’ retreat. I have often found that at such crossroads in life, God provides me with a good book to help me. This time was no exception. Scanning the house’s bookcase, I came across a missionary biography of a woman in her early 50s. She, too, had struggled with health, hormones, and loneliness but had found herself “re-deployed” after an enforced period of time off-field. I felt the Spirit’s whisper to me that I would go out again. And so it was—mum’s check-up a few weeks later revealed she didn’t need chemotherapy and the cancer was, as far as they could tell, completely removed. I found myself released for a second season of service. More surprisingly, after years of feeling a pull to East Africa, the Lord led me into a change of location.

However, my time in the UK and my mum’s health issues continued to perturb me. Previously, during holiday or home assignment, I had lived with single friends in London. Now, I found my friends had no spare rooms and, sadly, a dear friend died. Quiet places to rest between tough stressful seasons had disappeared and even retreat places for missionaries felt well out of my budget at almost £100 a night. I also had to change my sending church, which was complicated. Being their first missionary for a long time (as opposed to a Christian charity they donate to), most people thought I was paid a salary. The economic difficulties of being single on a low income and spending any time in the UK became a black cloud. Recently, in a passing conversation with some very experienced workers in the Middle East who were preparing for retirement, they asked how I found returning home, and I remarked, “It’ll take more faith for me to return to the UK, than it would to stay overseas—back home I will be in my fifties, jobless, homeless and single. On the mission field, I have the social status of ‘Aunty,’ housing is cheap, and friends are plentiful.”

Sitting with an old friend, incidentally the friend who had offered a loan all those many years ago, drinking coffee, catching up, my fears spilled out of what my future would be if I had to return home again to care for my mum in the years ahead. She listened with great sympathy and a few days later texted me this message: “Hi, a few days before we met I was praying and it came into my mind that we should offer to help you with accommodation in some way… What we talked about on Saturday felt like confirmation, so I spoke with my husband, and he agrees. Could we chat?”

The chat revealed that they’d just been given a large inheritance and would like to not only give me the tithe of that inheritance but also a loan, to help get me on to the housing ladder. The pieces of the puzzle are not quite all in place yet, the numbers don’t quite work, but the hope is that I can buy and let a small property that, when I come off-field in the years to come I can live in, near my mum. Perhaps in part I agreed to write this article as a kind of prayer, as well as wanting to highlight for others the struggles of single workers in this area.

What Can You Do?

How can churches and mission agencies help? Here are some ideas to consider for your (single) missionaries:
•   If you don’t own property, have you considered buying a home and renting while you are gone so you will have a place when you return? If you need funds, could family or friends help?
•   Churches and mission agencies, consider having some housing available for returning workers.
•   Above all, ask regularly, “What is God saying?”
•   If people in your congregation are wealthy, ask if they’d consider gifting a property to a missionary.
•   Challenge single missionaries to not hold back from buying an investment property until they’re married. Help them be aware they may not be able to get a mortgage.

Missionaries, realise that God may call you home one day or for a season to look after family members or help yourself. This isn’t failure. Our identity is not in being a missionary. It’s in being a child of God in any season. Allow yourself to enjoy it. Get good rest. Let the Lord lead your steps. When you are back on furlough, keep investing in friendships back home. Ask God for where your homebase should be. Is it a number of towns or one? Try not to spread yourself too thin. Focus on a region or area, so, if you return home, you’ll have community.