Why South Sudan?

Argentina -> South Africa -> Haiti -> South Sudan?  My most recent mission trips were to orphanages in Haiti in 2010 & 2011, and I already knew I would be going somewhere different the next time.  For me, it had been too long in between trips, but my life had taken some unexpected difficult turns these last few years and I had to work things out on the home front.  So, why did I even choose to go to South Sudan in the first place?  Conventional wisdom would say, (and some did say to me), “it’s so far away”, “it is too dangerous there, aren’t they killing and kidnapping people?”, “uh, isn’t Africa having a problem with Ebola?”, and many other reasons why I shouldn’t go.

It all started on a weekend night, about 2 months ago.  I rented a movie based on a true story, The Good Lie.  The “big” name in it is Reese Witherspoon, and she does a great job at bringing in some comic relief to a very intense subject matter.  More importantly, are the movie’s main characters, the Sudanese actors, who were actually in the Sudan Civil War, placed in a refugee program, and made it to the U.S. before the program was shut down after 9/11.  These refugees are commonly referred to as “The Lost Boys”.  I had heard things about Sudan and the area was always on the back of my mind, but until I watched this movie, I had NO idea of the true terror the Sudanese people went through.  My heart was literally aching by the time the movie was over and tears were flowing.  Do I cry for others when I watch movies based on true stories?  Ah, yes.  My family can attest to my uncontrollable sobbing after Schindler’s List.  A lady sitting next to me asked me if I was ok near the end of American Sniper.  I barely made it through parts of Hotel Rwanda; however, I did not find myself on a plane to Rwanda a few weeks later (although I may still go there, you never know). 🙂

After watching this movie, something was different.  Usually before I go on a trip, there is a voice inside of me saying, “you have to go” and it never lets up.  I believe it is God telling me to go.  Either that night or the next day, I looked up the trips where e3partners.org was going and saw there was a Medical Mission trip to South Sudan in about 6 weeks.  “Well, that’s fast.”  Could I get the time off work?  Is it safe?  Is there room on the trip?  I’ve already come and gone on the mission trip, so the answers to those questions ending up being, “yes”, but there were times of unknown, A LOT of praying and trusting God to do the work.  So what is the “good lie”?  You’ll have to rent the movie to find out.  I HIGHLY recommend it.

Coming up in my NEXT blog post, The Adventure Begins…