Choosing to be Known

I serve as a missionary in Kyiv, Ukraine. I love my job, but I wasn’t expecting it to come with so much pressure. You might think I mean the war in Ukraine, and that’s certainly worth mentioning, but the pressure I want to discuss today is deeper and more personal. As a missionary, I feel this pressure to look good. All the time. With the people I serve, I feel compelled to look good so that God looks good. I’m a spiritual leader, after all. These peoples’ faith and spiritual growth feels like my burden. I feel forced to be a good example, to give the right answers, and to keep everyone on track. If I show weakness or brokenness, it could all go wrong.  

And the urge to look good doesn’t stop there. I am supported by ministry partners who give money so that I can do my ministry. In short, a whole new group of people to impress. When I send out my monthly newsletter, it’s as if I’m proving that my work is worthy of their investment. I need to show that I’m a person they can believe in. That I’m doing well and making a difference. And no matter how well I pull this off, the pressure doesn’t let up. There will always be next month’s newsletter. 

The whole thing is very ironic. Here I am, a missionary. I’m getting paid to spend time with people, tell them about freedom in Jesus, and urge them to go deep in Christian community. Meanwhile, my life isn’t feeling very much like freedom, and I’m starting to see community as a burden, not a support.  

Of course, for the longest time, I was hardly aware that any of this was happening. I assumed I was in pretty good shape.  

Then my wife and I started meeting with a Christian counselor. I thought we were there for my wife, but suddenly the counselor started picking on me. He called me out for my lack of curiosity: “You think you’ve got it together, but you need to go a lot deeper. You need to start asking yourself more questions: How did I get here? Why do I stay? How do I get out of here?” 

The words hurt, but I needed to hear them.  

As we kept meeting, I started to see that I was living under a performance mindset. I had to do enough to be enough. And stealthily underlying it all was a baseline level of shame. I secretly knew that I was inadequate, and I was afraid of being exposed as such. It was this fear that made me work so hard to prove to others, to myself, and even to God that I had it together.  

Not that I was succeeding. I had inherited Adam’s curse. To work the ground and find that it produced thorns and thistles. Futility. No matter how hard I tried to perform, there was always a sinking feeling that I wasn’t good enough. Sooner or later, I knew I would be exposed.  

All of this meant that I was hiding from people, from God, and even from myself. When hiding behind my good efforts wasn’t working, I would hide in general. I would choose isolation over connection. Instead of pursuing a healthy balance of relationship and solitude, I did what I could to escape it all and lose myself in unhealthy coping strategies.  

Then my counselor challenged me with a quote from Ray Ortlund: “You can be impressive, or you can be known. It can’t be both. The choice is yours.”  

It didn’t click at once, but this was the beginning of a big revelation. I had a choice. I could be impressive, or I could be known. I sensed that God was calling me to step out and trust him by choosing to be known. And I longed to say yes. But I also feared it. What I needed to see was that either decision would cost me.  

It’s not wrong to say that being known is dangerous. When I put myself out there in an honest way, I’m making myself vulnerable. If I share my true lows, then people might not accept me or support me. They might withdraw. Or if I share my "mountaintop" moments, the things I really care about—what if people think I’m stupid, and they devalue or dismiss me as a "dreamer"? What if I get rejected?  

On the flip side, if I keep hiding, I will never experience true acceptance and belonging. It’s only when people know me that they can support me and challenge me and celebrate with me and help me press into my God-given purpose.  

I’m grateful that as God challenged me to choose being known, he also provided the courage to try. I started small, with my wife and our counselor. Then I joined discipleship groups with men who didn’t know me. It was such a relief to share my burdens without a thought for my reputation. As I grew, God challenged me to be more vulnerable, even with people I did know. My own weakness became the context for spiritual conversations with those I served. The more I chose to trust God, the more opportunities he provided.  

I’m still on this journey of choosing to be known. It still takes effort. It’s not always safe. I need to be wise about what I share with whom. But the reward is great. I finally have hope for real connection and real community. I’m no longer quite as desperate to look good. And I’m starting to understand what God meant when he said, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” I’m allowing God’s grace to enter my brokenness, and I’m getting to share that grace with others. 

Ultimately, God is teaching me to believe in his unconditional love. To release control and simply trust what he says about who I am. Jesus died for my sin, but my sin didn’t kill Jesus. Jesus chose to die because he loves me. He knows how unimpressive and broken I am, and that’s where he meets me with his grace and transformation. God has good works for me to do, but they are not tied to my identity in Christ. God loves me because he loves me, and that makes all the difference.