Don't be discouraged by inconveniences

Yes, it's cold and rainy in chicagoland, but it isn't that inconvenient. Not like what a CM&A missionary named Lisa spoke about at women's Bible study today. I was surrounded by women who visited warmly. My kids were just fine in the "nursery" with other kids their ages because of the national holiday today, that is Veteran's Day. Lisa spoke of her role in Gabon West Africa. She is a nurse who grew up in New Church and is here on a break from the field. She spoke of eating bush meat (i.e. porcupine), termites eating everything (including her clothes), and constant car or motion sickness/ nausea. She is a strong, young lady who works to stay healthy even when she is in the field a world away from her mom and caring family/friends. Something she relayed from her supervisor there in Africa for CM&A struck me profoundly. He claims that the goal is not so much to bring the west to the rest, but for the local reached to be used to witness to the unreached. Sure it's a tough job if you consider the mom home schooling her kids right here in suburbia, but imagine the horrible work it takes for locals there in the witchcraft run west African jungles to share hope to people with AIDS/HIV+ and all kinds of other life-threatening, painful ailments.