Our first book selection of 2011 isn’t a light read. It’s tough to study the life of people who have really suffered. But books like this teach us so many things. I think it is worth our time to discover what those lessons from the Burnhams’ lives might be.This week, we’ll read the intro to this book and chapters 1 and 2. I wonder what your thoughts will be as you follow Gracia Burnham and her husband into the abyss of their captivity.
My husband and I lived overseas as cross-cultural workers for 12 of our 28 years with MAF. During that time, we lost colleagues to airplane accidents, malaria, and hepatitis. We visited co-workers who served in high risk areas. Two pilots that we served with were held by guerillas—one for a few hours, one for a few weeks.
There were three events last November that reminded me that suffering happens all the time. On November 8, an MAF pilot/mechanic, a devoted husband and father, died when he and another adult tried to rescue two teenage orphans they’d taken to the beach who were swept out to sea. On November 10, the Court in Bhubaneswar, capital of India's Orissa State, sentenced to death Dara Singh, ringleader of Hindu mob that burned and killed Australian missionary, Graham Staines, and his two , Philip and Timothy four years ago. On November 26, a friend posted on FB that another friend who is pilot/mechanic with NTM and a wonderful husband and father was in a coma from his liver disease.
Opportunities to suffer because of where we live as cross-cultural workers abound. How do we think about the potential to face prison or death for our Lord? That’s the question I’d like you to comment about this week.
If this is your first time to read a book with us, may I also ask that you not be shy? Our book club functions best when we all participate in posting our thoughts and responses in the comment section.
I’ll look forward to hearing from you
3 comments:
Linda, thanks for being willing to lead this study! I guess for me, part of my decision to serve cross-culturally included the possibility that something like this could happen. It has always been in the back of my mind, but like Gracia said - it is something that happens to other people. I know it is possible and I pray that I would have the strength to endure it and to be a witness for the Lord if something like this happened to me.
At the same time, it seems like I see suffering all around me in the lives of the people I live among. It is part of life. I think evaluating how I have lived and witnessed in my "little" sufferings would help to prepare me for any "bigger" sufferings that may come along. I also would be praying for God's grace to help me be and do what he would want in whatever situation comes along.
Hi, Lynn! Welcome back! I'm so happy you are joining me again. I always look forward to your thoughtful comments. I'm thankful you mentioned praying for God's grace to help you be and do what he would want. Such a key prayer and from a heart that is surrendered. I think I need to remember that prayer in my daily life when little things bring "suffering" into my life. I can blow things way out of proportion, and this book helps me realize that. Still, I really do need His grace every moment!
ARGH! I had so wanted to do this book study with you, but... life... well, and I forgot that you would be starting already, and it is over! :(
I read her book a few years ago, and recently picked up a second one she wrote. I'm going to read that here coming up because the first book left me disturbed about some things with her response to trauma...
... then this year, God called us to walk through some trauma. Little compared to hers, but still trauma. I was surprised by some of my responses. I want to read her second book to see how she has moved on from the end of her first.
To answer your question here briefly. I grew up as a MK. My first memory of a death of a missionary was a MAF pilot. Since then I have lost more friends and coworkers. It became to me not a distant remote thing that happens to others, but something that has happened to ones I knew and loved.
Because of who my husband is, facing the possibilities of something happening was something very real to us. So real that before we got engaged we sat down and discussed if we could handle living with those risks. In many ways, that very frank, open discussion at the foundation of our marriage has helped us live that commitment.
I used to live in more fear of the "what if" happening. I used to until my first daughter died... God used that time, as awful as it was, to show me clearly that it was IN the time of need that He would meet me with the strength I needed to make it through, and not before. He didn't meet me then because I was being super spiritual or even had remembered to have my quiet time for three months without skipping. He just was there - with the help I needed in the time I needed it.
I didn't need to flex my spiritual muscles and hope they were strong enough to face the "what if". When, if, it came, God would meet me with what I needed. That is the only way I can survive and think about the potential for prison or death that we face.
Quiet trust day by day. Not a trust that trusts that God will keep all bad away, but that He will be there. That and a firm knowledge that this life is not all that there is. I am still learning this.
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