A New Adventure Calling

Jan 03, 2012

leiseth

Students often ask the Rev. Tessa Moon Leiseth and Jon Leiseth for advice on vocation. The questions they ask students were all too familiar when they came face to face with God’s next calling for their lives.

Tessa will serve as the South Africa country coordinator for the ELCA's Young Adults in Global Mission program. The Leiseth family, which includes the couple's two children, will live in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa, for at least four years.

Tessa, a campus pastor at Concordia, says half-jokingly that God spoke to her through the Internet. One day when browsing the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's Facebook page, she became curious about a post on global opportunities.

"What began as a curiosity about global opportunities became a Pandora's box," she says. "You open it up, and it has a life of its own."

The Leiseths had God's call confirmed through a series of subtle "aha" moments and jolts, says Jon, who works in the college's Vocation and Church Leadership office.

They initially applied to serve in a different location, but it soon became clear God wanted them in Africa.

"When we got the email about South Africa," Jon says, "it was definitely more of a lightening bolt, 'I can't breathe' moment."

In post-apartheid South Africa, they will experience questions that they have asked with students – questions of economic inequality, racism and privilege. Tessa's ministry background and Jon's storytelling and theatrical background will lend themselves well in working alongside the people there.

When they look back, they can see many ways that God has prepared them for what is ahead. Even before they married, Jon talked to Tessa about how he wanted to travel with her. Tessa recalls always wanting a global life and for her children to be shaped by a global world.

"I didn't think that meant we would move overseas," she says.

Still, the Leiseths can't let go of the lingering feeling that moving to South Africa is exactly what they need to do.

"We hold a radical belief in faith that God is up to something that we don't understand whatsoever," Tessa says.

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