David Ford's Blog

Ah…Lord!

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

I’ve just arrived back from the costliest aspect of missionary work. It’s not the earthquakes, nor eating ants, but saying goodbye to the family. Rebecca, Steve and the girls have returned to Scotland. It’s been a doubly emotional time as, recently, Liz’s Julia was hospitalised. You can Skype them and email them, but that’s little compared to seeing them.

I’m not sure why the separation is so painful: distance? Sentimentality? Frail humanity? Thankfully, it’s something our national colleagues can empathize with - because, in their culture, what’s more important than family? Unfortunately, sometimes sending churches struggle to appreciate what all this fuss is about. A colleague in another mission was prevented from attending his mother’s funeral: it wasn’t budgeted for.

The only reason why missionaries endure the pain is because of Christ’s calling. Missionary work itself is dead easy, and so is eating ants (with your eyes shut); any Christian can do it. But leaving father or mother, daughter or granddaughter for the sake of the Gospel needs a lot of help - even after 15 years.

Photo: Rebecca, who lives far away, and Luisa, who lives nearby