The surprising blessings of going on overseas mission as a family

Every parent fears the impact of a big move on their kids. Rachel Clarke tells how her family discovered God’s kindness, new adventures, and deeper faith by saying yes to a call overseas

“What’s your biggest fear about going overseas?”

This was perhaps the most common question that people asked me as we embarked on uprooting our family of five from their comfortable and happy life in London to move to Portugal as mission partners.

For me, the answer was easy: my biggest fear was for my children.

Was I going to mess them up for life by tearing them away from their wider family, their loving grandparents, their decent schools, their fun clubs, and their good friends?

Was I going to mess them up for life by tearing them away from their wider family, their loving grandparents, their decent schools, their fun clubs, and their good friends? Would they ever settle in this new environment where the people, the culture, and the language were so different from what they were used to? Would they be able to learn the language properly and integrate well? Would their education, something that we value so much in the UK, suffer as a result in comparison to their British friends? Would they hold us personally responsible for any future difficulties they may have and resent us forever? And most importantly, would they end up rebelling against the Lord, the one who created them and loves them, the one whom we, as their parents, so desperately long for them to follow?

Well, we have been here now for over ten years and ……