A Missionary Call

Whenever I am asked about my call into full-time ministry, I always answer that (besides coming from a good Christian home where my mother faithfully brought me to church and taught me about Jesus, a family where we had nightly devotions and read the Bible together) I really began to hear God's call on a mission trip to Russia.

Which then should bring up the question of my call into missions.

My call to mission came early. When I was little, our Children's Church offerings went to "Little David in Africa" - as far as I can remember, "Little David" was the child of missionaries we supported (I believe he was older than we were, maybe not so "little" anymore. Also interesting was that I don't remember ever seeing a picture of him, but I always pictured him being African).

But more important in my call to mission was my church camp experience at Pearson's Mill Christian Assembly, later Rainbow Christian Camp. Rod Cameron, the amazing camp director, was not only a great director of the camp and was not only a fantastic ventriloquist (how could you not love Gabby?).

He was also a missionary. Yes, he and his wife Bev had been missionaries in Africa, and I thought it was amazing that we got to meet a real missionary to Africa, but he had the heart of a missionary. He was all about sharing Jesus in culturally relevant ways. His purpose was evangelism - sharing the good news of Jesus Christ, no matter where he was, in Africa or in Converse, Indiana.

The missionary of the week was always my favorite part of church camp (well, besides the girls). I remember several of the missionaries - the Randall family from Australia  was one of my favorites (it didn't hurt that their son, Nathan, was my age), but I most remember Bob Pemberton, who ministered in Africa (and who told an amusing and gross story about something he was given to eat when he first got there - something that tasted fine but after he heard what he had just eaten, he got sick) and taught us a dance and a translation of a Christian chorus that I still remember.

As I was preparing to go to Zambia, I went and found Rod Cameron's web page. What I hadn't remembered from my childhood was exactly where he had ministered. I found out that it was Rhodesia... which is now Zimbabwe... and Zambia. In fact, the map in Rod Cameron's book "A Dummy Goes to Africa" includes Zambia... I was excited that I would get to go to the land where one of my heroes of the faith had been.

As I began to write this blog, I went again to look up Rod Cameron's web page, and then I found the sad news; while I was in Zambia to meet the people I will be working with, Rod Cameron passed away. Kind of ironic that while I was in Africa, one of the people who moved me to go (even so many years ago), got to take his final, amazing journey, this time not to Africa, but to Heaven.