Everyone brings different strengths and weaknesses to the table, leaving plenty of room for disagreements and conflict. Being a missionary in another country, where your team is the only ‘family’ you have, and where the majority of people living there have never been told the story of Jesus, can be even more difficult.

In fact, team conflict is one of the number one reasons that missionaries leave the field. Cafe 1040 recognizes this and provides students with the experience and knowledge of what working in a team really looks like.

As two of our recent students explain it:

“A huge takeaway from this summer has been team unity. Learning how to work together was a big learning curve and has randomly popped up throughout the summer. This last excursion, however, taught me a lot about being united as one body of Jesus. It’s so easy to get frustrated with each other when people don’t agree, even on little things that ultimately don’t matter. The biggest lesson that I learned on that excursion came from one man who was praying with me and a few other people. He said, “We will not succeed if we are not united.” That hit me so hard because it is true. We are not going to share Jesus’s message adequately if we are not showing love toward our own brothers and sisters.”

“Spending literally every waking moment with same people can get wearing, but we welcome the challenge and pray often for peace. The main reason workers leave the field is because of team conflicts. So, this is a time for us to learn about one another with an open mind and heart and how to forgive quickly and bring everything to God.”