“Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path . . . .”

 

Lomalinda’s first settlers must have possessed a strong dose of genetic material passed down from their home countries’ hardiest explorers and homesteaders. Something—faith, courage, DNA—propelled them into the unknown to take on the challenge of it all.

 

“Do not go where the path may lead,” wrote Ralph Waldo Emerson, “go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.” That’s what Lomalinda’s people had done, beginning with her first pioneers.

 

In Bogotá on May 25, 1964, six adults and one baby climbed into a couple of tottering old trucks loaded with supplies and building materials and set out for what would become their center of operations.

 

The journey, a hundred and fifty miles, took two days.

 

Full of energy and enthusiasm, they embarked on making their dreams come true—creating Lomalinda—while living in tents and cooking over a gas stove on the ground.

 

For bathing, laundry, and drinking water, they used lake water, warm and loamy.

 

They had dreams of building a school for the many children they planned to have and, since those doing translation work would also live in even more remote settings several months a year, they’d build a Children’s Home in Lomalinda to house school-age kids while their parents were away.

 

The new center of operations would be a place to base airplanes and pilots who’d fly those linguists to and from their work in isolated villages, and a place for radio operators who would keep in touch with them.

 

Translation personnel, working in those primitive (in some cases Stone Age) villages, would learn the indigenous languages and gather linguistic data.

 

After a few weeks or months of intense work, they would return to Lomalinda, reunite with their kids, catch their breath, and tend to medical and physical needs.

 

And while in Lomalinda, they’d analyze the data they’d gathered, meet with language consultants, work on their translation and literacy projects, and prepare for their next trip to those distant, primitive village locales.

 

Yes, Lomalinda was going to be quite a place.

Original temporary housing

And so, with those mighty dreams ever before them, and with more families joining them, they built six cabins, twelve feet by twenty feet each, with waist-high outer walls topped by screening.

 

With two families sharing each cabin, they put up inside walls to offer privacy, of sorts—they had a gap at the top that tall people could see over (but that didn’t seem to hinder anyone from making babies).

Sawmill used by Lomalinda pioneers

They fed their families by growing vegetables and hunting and fishing—even parrot showed up on dinner tables—though occasionally someone pedaled a bike several miles down the road to a small town to buy meat. Local farmers also sold sugarcane, bananas, and eggs.

 

By Thanksgiving, six months later, settlers had made progress on an office building, duplexes, and quadruplexes, as well as facilities they shared—a kitchen, dining room, and a bath/laundry house.

 

Twelve years later 

when our family arrived in Lomalinda, 

everyone lived in comfortable houses 

with running water, plumbing, and electricity, 

but her residents still possessed 

that can-do spirit—

self-reliant, steadfast, single-minded. 

Stubborn when they had to be.

 

They were just ordinary folks 

slogging along because of God’s grace, 

hearts on fire for what He called them to do. 

(From Chapter 15, Please, God, Don’t Make MeGo: A Foot-Dragger’s Memoir)

 

Living fun new stories with new characters

 

Given our remote setting, the Lomalinda bunch didn’t have many worldly ways to relax and refresh.

 

As a result, we created events—

parties,

skit nights,

parades . . . 

cantatas,

beard-growing contests . . . 

fancy hat contests,

office parties 

banquet events . . .

Karen and Linda on far left

surprise parties,

potluck dinners,

soapbox derbies . . .

fund-raising events,

talent shows . . . .

 

Remembering those events—

and especially those dear people—

makes me smile.

Our family was writing fun new stories,

with new characters,

in such an unexpected place.

 

To paraphrase 1 Corinthians 2:9  (CEB),

God had gone ahead of us 

and prepared good happenings

that would never have crossed our minds.

 

(From Chapter 15, Please, God, Don’t Make Me Go: A Foot-Dragger’s Memoir)

 

What could motivate someone to be a missionary?

 

Many people, when they think of missionaries, picture something like this: hairy, dirty people who live in huts, wear outdated clothes, and eat things no one in his right mind would eat.

 

And because of that, before moving to Lomalinda, I had little interest in missionaries. I mean—they seemed so strange.

 

“Admit it, you’ve looked at missionaries speaking in your church and thought, ‘Hmmm . . . kind of . . . well, weird.’ No one wants to say it out loud, but it’s true.” (Bremers in Bolivia)

 

But I must confess:

Eventually, living and working

alongside missionaries in Lomalinda

would turn out to be a highlight of my life.

 

Those missionaries’ work was not for wimps—it was a mighty challenging vocation in numerous ways.

 

What motivated those Lomalindians to carry out that work? What should every missionary’s inspiration be?

 

Should they hope to earn their salvation?

 

No. Nobody earns salvation.

 

Should their motivation be appeasing God and averting His wrath?

 

No.

 

Do they need to impress God?

 

No.

 

Do they want to impress others? Do they want to make a holier-than-thou statement?

 

No.

 

Should missionaries’ motivation be adventure?

 

No—although life on the mission field can include amazing adventures.

 

Should their incentive be to help backward cultures become more like us—civilized?

 

No, no, no!

 

If you were to ask someone—a trainee or a new recruit—why he wants to be a missionary, he might answer:

 

• I want to teach missionary kids, or
• I want to evangelize, or
• I want to be a church planter, or
• I want to serve as a doctor, nurse, or pilot, or
• I want to be a Bible translator or literacy specialist.

 

But those are not core reasons to become a missionary.

 

So what’s the most important reason for people to go to the mission field?

 

The answers could fill—and have filled—many books.

 

Ministers preach sermons, people pen articles and host podcasts, and authors craft devotionals, blog posts, and websites to inspire Christians to work on the mission field. Entire corporations exist to recruit personnel for the mission field.

 

But we need to sift through all those books and sermons and articles and podcasts and devotionals and blog posts and websites and organizations and find the starting point—the core reason to go to the mission field.

 

Can you think what it is?

 

Jesus stated the correct reason—the basis, the motivation, the springboard that propels people into all the other reasons—and many others—to work on the mission field.

 

 What do you think it is?

 

Come back next week and we’ll continue to explore this topic.

Even if you’ll never work as a missionary,

the message applies to you and your everyday life, too—

to your very reason for being.

See you next week!

 

“Without change, there would be no butterflies”

 

“Some of us [overseas workers] think we need to be strong all the time,” writes Monica. “We have to go hard, and not let anyone see our struggles.” 

She was describing me during my first month on the mission field.

 

I was pretty hard on myself, thinking I had to be perfect, convinced that every error, every hiccup, every flop made me a failure.

 

Monica continues, “Mere humans . . . often feel the pressure to keep it together. . . . But when I read Scripture, it doesn’t always seem like Jesus is keeping it together. . . . He lets us into his tears and fatigue.

 

“And for goodness sake, read the Psalms!” Monica continues. “The emotional pendulums of the Psalmist . . . are a testimony of the pain, joy, anger, and doubt we experience. . . . It’s okay to get real! God can handle it!” (from “Let your heart exhale” at Velvet Ashes).

 

Sometimes I reasoned the way Monica recommends, but I didn’t always succeed. I had wobbly faith. Nevertheless, that was not the end of my story.

 

I didn’t recognize it at the time but, by God’s grace, I was transitioning out of my “fight-or-flight” mode (wanting to flee from Lomalinda and return to Seattle) and instead, settling into a contented, meaningful life. (Don’t miss my earlier post, “In the fight-or-flight mode.”)

 

Though I only vaguely sensed it, God was constantly embracing me in His very capable arms and working out His good plans for me.

 

Katie Schnack writes of those turning points when God calls you to start over:

 

“Be patient, give yourself grace.

New chapters [in life] can be . . . tough.

But with time, effort and some serious leaning on God,

you may realize your scary-crazy-insane life change

was one of the best things 

that could have happened to you.

Life never follows our plans,

 but sometimes what God brings us instead 

is even better.”

Katie Schnack

 

And this is mind-blowing: God often works in simple, everyday ways to accomplish His big things in us and for us. We humans often don’t notice it at the moment but, in looking back, sometimes we do see—and when we finally recognize Him, we need to thank Him. And rejoice in His goodness to us!

 

One of the ways the Lord helped me settle into our family’s new home and routines was through a yard sale—yes, a simple yard sale. And a grater from my mother. And a few inches of red thread.

 

Let me tell you about it.

 

After we’d lived in Lomalinda almost a month, I wrote this letter to my parents:

 

Dear Mom and Dad,

 

This afternoon, Matt and Karen complained of boredom, so I sent them to the post office—we usually get mail on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but a plane flew mail in today, Saturday.

 

While the kids were gone, big black clouds blew over, a wind whipped up, and rain poured down. Soon over the top of the next hill, I saw the kids bringing home the mail, but it was only damp when they arrived because Matt had put it under his shirt.

 

We got [our first] letter from you! Now we know you’ve received our first letter! Today we got your letter of August 31, and about four days ago we got the package you’d mailed on the same day.

 

Thank you for sending the grater. I was tickled to get it. Grating has always been one of my least favorite chores, but I immediately grated a bowlful of carrots for a salad. Thanks, too, for sending the piece of red thread. I needed it to mend the hem of a blouse.

 

Donna, the gal I’m replacing, is selling household items because she’s leaving to work with Wycliffe in the States. I bought a whole bunch of stuff—strainer, cake pan, muffin tin, pitchers, silverware holder for our kitchen drawer, and her ironing board.

 

I’m also buying her dining room furniture. She purchased it in Bogotá and it’s much nicer than locally-made furniture. It includes a hutch and four wooden chairs with leather seats and backs.

 

AND I bought her classic old Singer Featherweight sewing machine (!!) which came with an instruction booklet, pinking shears, scissors, lots of bobbins, thread, needles—all kinds of stuff. I’m so excited!

 

Settling well was imperative--settling into our new lives, our new home, and our new routines.

 

On the mission field, we’re taught to develop coping mechanisms, for good reason. God is not a God of disorder and confusion (1 Corinthians 14:33) and it seems He passed that on to people: We do best when, for the most part, things are ordered and predictable and run smoothly.

 

I was trying so hard to get our home and routines running smoothly, and those few small items—the grater, the snippet of red thread, and the kitchen items Donna sold me—helped me function less chaotically as a homemaker and mother.

 

And God knew, too, that a smidgen of encouragement and a morsel of progress made a huge difference to an immature, wimpy twenty-nine-year-old woman, a work in progress, a gal who heard God ask her to change, to set aside her own plans and move to a remote plot of land at the end of the road in the middle of nowhere in South America.

 

Perhaps it was the Lord Himself 

who inspired Walt Disney to say, 

“Without change, there would be no butterflies.” 

God saw me as I would someday be: 

as beautiful as a butterfly. 

But it took a lot of effort to get me out of that cocoon! 

He was patient. 

I needed to be patient, too.

Blue Morpho butterfly, a Lomalinda beauty

 

Feeling like a big baby

 

Looking back now, I feel overwhelming gratitude for the people who helped my family and me settle in Lomalinda—people like David Hockett, our neighbor Ruth, Karen Mac, and Lois Metzger. And today I’m going to tell you about Linda Lackey.

 

Each person gently oriented me, offered valuable and practical how-to information, and modeled for me how to live in that foreign place.

 

My days and duties were getting less unfamiliar. Chaos was calming down (emotional, mental, spiritual, and literal) and my homemaking efforts were slowly making a big difference. Each day my young family and I were making progress.

 

But then. . . . But then. . . Rufina began working for us. Dear Rufina.

 

There was nothing wrong with Rufina. But there was something wrong with me.

 

You see, a Lomalinda lady named Dorothy had arranged for a pleasant older woman, Rufina, to work at our house one day a week.

 

I’d never imagined a person like me would have a maid, but in Lomalinda it was the thing to do for several reasons.

 

First, local people needed jobs and, second, because of the intense heat, we all worked at a slower pace than we did in cooler regions of the northern hemisphere—it was a health issue—and that meant we had a hard time getting household chores done.

 

Third, having a maid freed mothers, like me, to fill jobs that contributed to the task of Bible translation, the reason we all lived there.

 

And fourth, it cost little to hire a maid.

 

A few years earlier, Rufina’s husband, a church pastor, had been gunned down by someone waiting for him to step off a bus. She’d worked for several other Lomalinda families and had never stolen from them, which was not the case with some maids.

 

And so, a week before school began, at seven o’clock on a Tuesday morning, Rufina arrived at our door. She stood only two inches taller than our first-grader, Matt. (See photo, below.)

 

Dorothy had given me a mimeographed sheet in Spanish listing common household chores—Rufina spoke no English—and I had made a list and rehearsed it several times. When she arrived, I read her my instructions and let out a big sigh—I was finished! I turned to go—but she had questions. I hadn’t anticipated that.

 

I couldn’t make sense of anything she said so I took a deep breath and told her I didn’t understand. “Yo no comprendo.” Then I asked her to say it again. “Repite usted, por favor.”

 

She did, but she talked twice as fast and twice as long. She was a soft-spoken, gentle lady with a sweet smile that lit up her face, but that didn’t help me understand her. I hoped to catch a few words and look them up in my Spanish dictionary, but I didn’t understand even one.

 

She waited for my answer. I trembled. What was I to do? I felt a panic coming over me. I fought tears.

 

But then I remembered—oh, yes, then I remembered!—that on another day of the week, Rufina worked for the Lackey family. God did that for me—He helped me remember how I could find practical help.

 

I looked up the Lackeys’ number and dialed.

 

Linda Lackey answered. Struggling to steady my voice, I asked if she would talk to Rufina and help me figure out what she was saying.

 

“Oh, of course.” Linda spoke so kindly. “Rufina is hard to understand because she’s missing so many teeth.”

 

I handed the phone to Rufina, and, after a long conversation with Linda, she handed it back to me, smiling.

 

Linda, bless her heart, had helped Rufina understand me

and helped me understand Rufina.

 

A huge relief washed over me as Rufina turned and got to work.

 

Local maids believed it was bad luck to finish the day’s work by doing anything other than ironing so, late that afternoon, Rufina ironed the laundry she had washed that morning. She did an exquisite job. She even ironed things I would never have ironed myself. And best of all, she sang while she worked. That in itself was a lovely blessing.

 

Dorothy had told me to pay Rufina at the end of each day, putting her pesos in an envelope, and to have her sign a notebook in which I recorded the date and amount I paid her. She wrote slowly, the letters large and childlike. It struck me that she probably couldn’t read or write anything more than her own name.

 

The memory of that day still stands out. I hadn’t recognized anything Rufina said after the call to Linda Lackey.

 

Each time I had asked her to repeat herself, she did the same thing she’d done in the morning, telling a story twice as long and twice as fast, with lots of hand gestures and arm-waving. I lost track of how many times I snuck into my bedroom to dry my tears.

 

After Rufina left the phone rang, and Linda Lackey asked how Rufina did the rest of the day.

 

By then I was a big bundle of nerves—

I’d never had a stranger in my house all day

—in my home, my refuge—a stranger!

And I burst out sobbing.

 

I apologized,

but Linda interrupted with comforting words

and a promise to pray for me.

 

Afterward, I felt like a big baby. I reminded myself that Rufina was a lovely lady—sweet, hard-working, and always smiling.

 

Rufina didn’t do anything to make you cry, I told myself. You simply need time to get accustomed to her.

 

Nevertheless, I was giddy with relief

because I had an entire week to pull myself together

before she returned.

(From Chapter 10, Please, God, Don’t Make Me Go:

A Foot-Dragger’s Memoir)

 

Karen second from left; Matt far right; with Rufina

A boa constrictor’s smile

 

We soon learned that Lomalinda’s young people were truly remarkable—they possessed a zest for life and were keen for adventure.

 

And living in rural South America gave them a number of opportunities kids back home in the States seldom had.

 

One of the high school kids, Chris Branks, told the following story about a time he and his siblings lived in the dorm for a few weeks while their parents, Bible translators, worked in an indigenous village:

 

“Hector's boa constrictor had thirty-two babies, and he said anyone that wanted one could have one,” Chris said. “There was a stampede as we all rushed over to pick out our boas.”

 

Now, let me interrupt Chris here to remind you that boa constrictors squeeze people and animals to death. And then swallow them whole. Granted, we’re talking about baby boas here, but still. . . . (If you missed it, click on A boa constrictor story you won't soon forget.)

 

“For the next couple of days,” Chris continued, “the dorm sounded like an industrial zone as we hammered together cages. Not all of them were very secure, and there were some long faces on the kids whose snakes escaped.

 

“There was also a lot of horse-trading going on. Boys traded Swiss Army knives and other treasures to accumulate more snakes.

 

“For weeks, every boy in the dorm wore a snake around his neck or arm or had one squirming in his pocket.”

 

Even at school! Can you imagine?! Read on . . .

 

“Eventually, the school principal banned the boas—

they caused too many distractions

for both students and teachers,

who more than once found a smiling boa

in their top drawer.

(If you look closely at a boa,

you’ll see they’re always smiling,

which is how you know they're friendly.)” 

(From Chapter 13, Please, God, Don’t Make Me Go:

A Foot-Dragger’s Memoir)

 

We were only beginning to realize that

Lomalinda’s teens lived with gusto, pizzazz, and few fears.

 

What an example they were for me—cowardly, wimpy me.

 

A boa constrictor story you won’t soon forget

 

In a quiet jungle valley in Lomalinda, our friend Mardty raised chickens in a little red barn, but she was troubled—she was bringing home fewer eggs and counting fewer chickens than usual.

 

Then one day she spotted a boa constrictor inside the barn—with a chicken just disappearing down its throat.

 

Boas grow up to thirteen feet long and can weigh a hundred pounds. Rather than poisoning their prey—sometimes as big as a deer—they coil around, squeeze them to death, and swallow them whole. Lomalindians took boas seriously.

 

But Mardty, determined to save her hen, dropped to her knees, seized that snake below the chicken bump, and held on. I’ll drag it up the hill to get help, she told herself.

 

Before long, though, the snake’s cold, scaly body had wrapped around her legs, winding ever higher, locking her in its grip.

 

She put up a good fight, but the boa toppled her to the ground.

 

Mardty knew it intended to wring the breath out of her.

And swallow her.

Whole.

 

She let go of the chicken bump—she had more important things to do. “I need a weapon,” she told herself.

 

Scanning the room, she saw nothing but a feed barrel.

 

But it had a lid!

 

“I stretched up and was barely able to grab it. I held the boa with one hand and rolled the lid back and forth with the other, trying to cut its head off.”

 

Lying there in the chicken poop and its stench, Mardty must have looked like she was rolling a giant pizza cutter over the snake’s neck.

 

“But the rim was rounded and smooth,” she said, “and I had to give up.”

 

Knowing she was in a life-or-death situation, Marty yelled, hoping someone up the hill in the dorm would hear—the house parents, Rosie and Dan, or one of the kids—but no one came.

 

Sprawled on the ground, Mardty wondered if she was taking her last breaths.

 

The boa continued winding ever upward on her body.

 

But she was not a quitter—she kept hollering until she heard the sound of feet pounding down the jungle path.

 

Rosie burst through the door brandishing a machete.

 

Dan followed, wielding a shotgun—but Mardty saw a problem. “Don’t shoot! If you shoot the snake, you’ll shoot me, too!”

 

Once Dan lowered the gun, Mardty and Rosie pointed the machete at the boa’s neck and stabbed, sawing until they nearly cut off its head, leaving it almost dead.

 

Dan unwound the snake and dragged it to the chicken yard and finished it off with a shot.

 

“We carried that big long body up the hill to the dorm,” Mardty said.

 

“He measured more than eleven feet. After skinning him, we opened him up in the kitchen. The hen was intact but dead, and so many of her bones broken.

 

“And we did, by the way, start getting more eggs again. We're sure the egg thief was that boa.” (from Chapter 13, Please, God, Don’t Make Me Go: A Foot-Dragger’s Memoir)

 

At times like that,

I’m tempted to question God’s wisdom

in creating creatures like boa constrictors.

And yet, He said:

“Let there be critters and creepy-crawlies,”

. . . or something close to that

(Genesis 1:20-25).

Even boa constrictors.

 

Swimming with anacondas: they eat monkeys, dogs, cats, calves—and sometimes people

 

. . . And then there were anacondas, also called water boas, which live on land and in water—including our lake at Lomalinda.

 

Anacondas eat monkeys, dogs, cats, calves, and sometimes people.

 

They can grow to thirty feet long and weigh over five hundred pounds and, like boa constrictors, they squeeze their victims to death, open wide, and swallow their prey whole. (See photo below.)

 

Lomalindians admitted to fearing anacondas, but they went swimming anyway.

 

(Are you noticing a pattern here?!?  . . .

If you missed recent posts, click on

Swimming with stingrays and piranhas

and

Our lake: A place for high adventure.)

 

At night, if anyone on the lake or swamp spotted green eyes glowing in the dark, they were looking at an anaconda—which meant they’d better turn and run.

 

People liked to tell the story of workers at a nearby farm who, hearing a pig squeal, ran to investigate. By the time they arrived, they found an anaconda with a pig-shaped bulge so big that the snake couldn’t slither through the pen’s slats.

One day a friend of mine, driving her Honda 90 motorbike to the lake for a swim, came upon an anaconda stretched across the road, so long she couldn’t see its head in the grass on one side of the road or its tail on the other.

 

Knowing she couldn’t stop in time, she drove right over it.

 

The snake probably wasn’t even fazed. My friend was, though, and suddenly she wasn’t all that interested in swimming.

 

I just couldn’t understand it—I mean, swimming with stingrays, pirañas, and anacondas? That was just too much adventure for me.

 

We lived in the llanos, a vast low expanse of steaming plains with an azure sky stretching to eternity, clean and searing and clear. It’s one of the world’s most lush tropical grasslands, an immense savanna in the Orinoco River basin.

 

The llanos hosts “an alluring combination of pristine biodiversity and traditional ranching culture seemingly lost in time.

 

“Anacondas, howler monkeys, capybaras and crocodiles live alongside ranchers, farmers, and thousands of cattle. . . ” (You can kiss your cell phone service goodbye).

 

You don’t want to miss my story about

boa constrictors.

Next week!

It’s a story you won’t soon forget!

Anaconda photo by Tim Lambright (used by permission)