In March 2022, my wife Meghan and I arrived in the South Pacific with our four children to help the Apostolic Ministry in Oceania. Two years of dreary COVID lockdowns were finally behind us and we reached our new tropical home bursting with grand expectations of what projects and programs we might accomplish. We both had varied professional experience, but this was the first time for us to participate in Ierapostole[1], the Sacred Mission of the Orthodox Church.

Immediately we could see that there was much to do, and we expected that we could plow through the tasks one by one – efficiently and systematically, just how we would do it back home in the United States.  

Our first big realization – and it didn’t take long – was that, as “strangers in a strange land,” we were much less capable and efficient in this new cultural landscape than at home. Contrary to the culture we grew up in, speed and efficiency are not at the top of the hierarchy of virtues, so our sense of what work would be considered “valuable” or “meaningful” was completely misaligned with people here.

A second realization came to us gradually, almost imperceptibly, and it is even more critical to understand: that the work of establishing new Church communities is not dependent on us having big accomplishments at all. Everything good and blessed that happens in our lives or at the Church has been a product of the simple, everyday interactions with the people around us.

This principle is equally true at home in Alaska as it is in the mission field, of course. But our lengthy immersion in a new and unfamiliar culture, 10,000 kilometers away from our family home, demands that we can’t hold it as a nice sentiment to share with friends on social media.

We came across a passage from a book on cross-cultural mission work that captures an essential element of this unique and special work of Ierapostole:

Every interaction we have with other people – ALL other people – is at its root a silent answer to a silent, universal question:

“Do you actually care about me?”

We are reminded of one profound bit of wisdom encountered on, of all places, an episode of the famous American TV show Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood. The gentle, soft-spoken pastor once explained to the little ones in his audience:

“The greatest thing that we can do is to help somebody know that they’re loved and capable of loving.”

As Orthodox Ierapostoles we stand in the gap between the God of perfect Love and His fallen, pain-ridden creatures. These souls struggle to perceive His Love yet deeply yearn to participate in it – both as recipients and as givers of His unselfish, life-giving love.

But how can one help a person come to know that they are truly loved and that they are capable of loving?

Here in Oceania, we have the example of His Eminence Metropolitan Amphilochios, the founder of this Ierapostolic work. His Eminence, who retired in 2017 after a decade of untiring mission work in the South Pacific, has the gift of loving and helping others to become capable of loving par excellance. Every person – truly without exception – that had met His Eminence during his decade here in the Islands told us emphatically: “No one I ever knew loved me as much as he did.”

Through the relationship of love and obedience he cultivated with our Lord, His Eminence was able to answer the unspoken question “Do you actually care about me?” with perfect clarity:

“Yes, I love you because Christ loved me first, and it is His Love that I share with you.”

Because his answer was so complete, so genuine, many were drawn to faith in Christ, or to a deeper relationship with Him. This deep love was the fuel that propelled the Ierapostolic work forward for over ten years.

It is in that spirit we continue here in Tonga, remembering that the word “Love” is a verb, implying action, just as St. John the Evangelist wrote to us: “Little children, let us love not in word and speech, but in action and truth.” (1 John 3:18)

Pray for us all in Oceania that we continue to grow in Christ’s love, and that the small actions we offer may be multiplied by our loving Lord for the sake of those here in the Pacific Islands.

Anagnostis Micheal Jones

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[1] The term “ierapostles” and “ierapostole” derives from the Greek words ἱερός (hieros, meaning “holy” or “sacred”) and ἀπόστολος (apostolos, meaning “one who is sent”). This word emphasizes the sacred and apostolic nature of the work, aligning closely with the Orthodox understanding of being sent by Christ to share the Gospel in love and humility.