What I Learned in My African Internship

By David Reisner

In Luke chapter 5:31-32, Jesus says, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (New International Version). My African Internship helped me to realize that I am a sick man who needs his doctor. If I were able to only keep one lesson from this internship, it would be that I deeply need Jesus. I could have told you that before I went to Africa! I think that all true Christians would acknowledge that they need Jesus! But it is one thing to cerebrally know that you need him, and it is another thing to get a clearer picture of what you are really like and getting a clearer picture of how much you really need Jesus and his help. I would rather not have learned that lesson the hard way, yet I would rather learn it through something painful than never really learn it at all.  I’m glad I’m re-learning it, even though I’m learning it the hard way.

That being said, there were things that weren’t so challenging to me in Africa. The intern team got to engage in language learning. The language was very interesting, and my fellow interns and I had opportunities to use it with locals. I might have sounded like a three-year-old there (and maybe that’s generous), but it was still fun to use the language, to talk with people, and to be encouraged by them. I’ve even gotten to text some people I met there through WhatsApp in the language. I also got to see giraffes, hike partway up a mountain, drink coconut water straight from the coconut, and eat part of a cow’s stomach!

There were also challenges. Shortly before starting the internship, I was diagnosed with a mental health condition which deeply affected my wife and me. In addition, I have some immaturity to grow out of and I have ugly sin to repent of as I was sometimes antagonistic toward my leader. Through my internship, I saw both a need to slow down before speaking and a need to get better at speaking up at the right time. I want to let these things teach me that I desperately need Jesus, for healing from my mental health condition, for maturity that he will grow in me as I dwell with him, and for strength to repent. Even if he allows me to keep a condition, he is faithful, and he will never leave me in a situation where I’m powerless against worry. As Paul said, “No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it” (1 Corinthians 10:13), so I repent, and I know God will help me to repent.

But, amid my weaknesses, God still used me. I had the opportunity to give a couple devotional messages to a group that had both Muslims and Christians in it. I focused on the gospel in the first one, and by the grace of God I got to share the gospel boldly, clearly, and respectfully. I shared about Jesus washing the disciples’ feet in the second devotion I gave. A girl from our sending church made bracelets for my wife and I to give away, some saying, “Jesus loves you” and others saying, “God is good.” We also visited an orphanage to encourage the children who are being discipled to follow Jesus by the lady who runs the facility. We were able to write translations for the phrases on the bracelets and give them out to the children in the orphanage.

I think God can use the experience I had this summer to teach me. Moreover, he can use me despite my weaknesses, and he can use my weaknesses to give me a better picture of how much I need him. Through my summer internship in Africa, God encouraged me to seek him with all my heart, regardless of my weaknesses or challenges. And that’s what I plan to do.

David Reisner is a recent graduate of Ozark Christian College.