Questions to Ask Missionaries in Letters

The questions

Open any question to see why it works.

1. 1

   What does an ordinary day look like from the moment you wake up?

   Missionaries get asked how it is going constantly and answer with a word. Asking for the hours instead gives them something concrete to write, and it gives you a picture you can hold onto for the weeks between letters.

2. 2

   Describe where you sleep. What can you see from the window?

   Physical detail is the easiest thing to write when you are tired, and it is the thing families most want. It also tells you, gently, how they are living, which is information you would otherwise have to ask about directly and awkwardly.

3. 3

   What do you eat, and what have you learned to cook?

   Food is a safe, funny subject and a reliable window into how someone is really doing. Someone eating the same thing every day and joking about it is fine. Someone who cannot remember their last proper meal has told you something without being asked.

4. 4

   What is the weather doing, and what are you wearing for it?

   This sounds like small talk and is actually practical. It tells you whether a package should contain warm socks or sunscreen, and it gives them an easy paragraph on a week when nothing else feels writable.

5. 5

   What word or phrase in the language did you get badly wrong?

   Language mistakes are the story every missionary has and most love telling. It also invites them to write about being a beginner, which is otherwise difficult to admit in a letter home to people who think of them as capable.

6. 6

   Who are you serving alongside, and what are they good at that you are not?

   Companionships and teams are lived at close quarters, and the relationship shapes everything else. Framing it around what the other person does well makes it possible to write honestly about a difficult pairing without complaining outright.

7. 7

   What do people there do on a Sunday?

   It invites observation about the local church and the local culture rather than a report on their own work. Missionaries often notice a great deal and are rarely asked, so this question tends to produce the longest replies.

8. 8

   What kindness has somebody shown you this month?

   Specific and answerable even in a hard week. It also quietly reassures the people at home that someone there is looking after them, which is the thing families most want to know and are least likely to ask directly.

9. 9

   What is the hardest part of the day?

   Naming a time of day is much easier than naming a feeling, and it usually gets a truthful answer: the first hour, the walk home, the empty evening. Once they have told you, you can write to that hour specifically in the next letter.

10. 10

    What has changed about the way you pray?

    A question about practice rather than belief, which makes it answerable without a crisis. Most people serving away from home find their prayer becomes shorter, more repetitive or more honest, and describing that change is often the most useful thing they write all year.

11. 11

    What did you believe before you left that looks different now?

    Ask this only once you are some months in and only if the letters have been open. It can be answered lightly or seriously, and either way it signals that you are prepared to hear about doubt without treating it as an emergency.

12. 12

    Who have you met that you find yourself thinking about?

    Missionaries are usually careful about writing details of the people they teach. Asking who stays in their mind respects that and still gets a real answer, and it often gives you someone specific to pray for by name.

13. 13

    What has surprised you about missing home?

    The word surprised does the work. It moves past the obvious answer, family and friends, and towards the odd particular things: a smell, a shop, a chair, a road. Those details are also easy for you to send back to them.

14. 14

    What is a question you have been asked that you could not answer?

    People on a mission get hard questions from strangers at the door and rarely have anywhere to put them. Inviting the question home turns you into a thinking partner rather than an audience, which is a different and better kind of correspondent.

15. 15

    What are you reading, and what has stayed with you?

    Study is part of most mission schedules, and this gives them a chance to write about ideas instead of activity. Ask what they disagreed with as well, since that is often where the more interesting letter comes from.

16. 16

    What made you laugh this week?

    Letters home can turn into progress reports, and a request for something funny gives permission to be ordinary. It is also the question most likely to get a reply on a week when they have little energy for anything longer.

17. 17

    What can I actually send that would help?

    Ask rather than guess. Postal rules, customs charges and mission policies limit what can arrive, and what people want is rarely what families assume. Ask about weight and delivery times too, since some places take two months.

18. 18

    What news from home do you want, and what would you rather not hear about?

    Some people want everything and some find it unsettling to hear about parties, jobs and relationships continuing without them. Asking directly saves everyone from guessing, and the answer often changes over the course of a mission.

19. 19

    How can I pray for you this week, specifically?

    The word specifically converts a polite offer into a real one. Ask for one thing rather than a list, then mention it by name in your next letter so they know it was not just a closing line.

20. 20

    What do you want to do first when you get home?

    Best kept for the later stretch, when the end is visible and the days are long. It is a hopeful question, and the answers are usually small and specific, which makes them easy to hold onto and easy to arrange when the day arrives.