A Time to Go and a Time to Stay

It felt weird going to the airport and not getting on a plane. Not having to say goodbye. Normally, when I go to the airport in Ouagadougou, I have to leave, but this time I was on the other side of things. I was there to drop off the interns and say goodbye to them. 

They have had a wonderful summer, but now it's time for them to go back home, and it's time for me to stay. 

The following week while out in a village, our team found a woman with a suspected ruptured appendicitis and secondary peritonitis. In need of a possible emergent surgery, Geoffrey passed the baton to me and asked me if I wanted to take this medical case. Up until this point, he had been managing all of our medical cases. "I will try," I said, and I loaded the woman in my car an took her to the hospital in our city. I helped get her in to see a doctor, and then I helped arrange her transport in the ambulance to the nearest large city capable of echography, radiology, further consultation, and surgery if necessary.

At the end of the day, I felt like I had blumbered through it all like a mess, but I had partially done it. My first medical case. And I remembered that this is why I have come as a missionary nurse to Burkina Faso, to help our team with their load by taking on medical cases. So it's time for me to stay. 

That same week, we had our habitual weekly prayer meeting up on the hill where our church property is located. This is the property that our church association has been given to develop for the purpose of building God's kingdom in Burkina Faso. We want to start a church up on this hill by the end of the year. And we hope to start construction on a center for infants in distress by November. 

Right now, it's just an empty piece of land. A field of dreams. We meet up there every Thursday morning as a team to study the Bible, pray for each other, and walk the terrain as we commit the land to God and pray for him to be glorified through every building and activity that takes place on it. 

This Thursday in particular, after reassembling after our prayer walk, Rebeca took a stone, placed it on the ground, and said, "This will be the first stone that we will build upon!" 

Spontaneously, each member of our team took a rock and placed it on the pile, creating a visible demonstration of what God is doing among us. He is building a team. He is building a work. We are living stones placed on the Cornerstone, Jesus Christ, working together to build his kingdom on the earth among the dagara and their neighbors. 

I am a stone. So it's time for me to stay. 

Someone once said, "Wherever you are, be all there." I don't know who said it, but I like it. There is a time to go and a time to stay. But wherever you are, be all there. Wherever God has placed you for this season, be all there and don't leave until you have left your mark and placed your rock.