For a week last March we visited our son, Jeremiah, who is an X-ray technician on the Mercy Ship. The Mercy Ship is a surgical, hospital ship that offers free medical services to the forgotten poor of west central Africa. Two weeks ago the Mercy Ship completed a nine-month mission in the port city of Pointe Noire, Republic of Congo. We had a guest berth on the ship for the week we visited.
This was our first trip overseas and it involved a 28-hour flight from Minneapolis to Toronto to Addis Ababa to Pointe Noir. The effects of the jet lag were mind-numbing. When we finally got to the ship and sat at a table in the ship’s cafe, I remember asking Gayle a question and then falling asleep while she was answering me.
Everything was different. More precisely, in every place and in every encounter, we were different. We didn’t fit in anywhere. Every airport security and customs officer made me feel like a suspect in a crime that hadn’t been committed yet. We didn’t understand the French that was being spoken or the culture that surrounded us. Even on board ship surrounded by English-speaking westerners, we were clearly outsiders who needed constant direction regarding the disciplines and peculiarities of shipboard community living.
Above: Jeremiah Harvey has been serving on the Africa Mercy Ship, a giant floating hospital ship since March 2013. Left: Pastor Dave Harvey and his wife Gayle visited their son in Point Noire, Republic of Congo this March.
We had arrived late on a Friday afternoon. Our first foray off the ship was Sunday morning as visitors to the home of Jeremiah’s department assistant, Holland. Holland was a young man who served as interpreter, cultural liaison and allaround handyperson in the X-ray department. He was a resident of the Congo and lived in a village on the outskirts of Pointe Noire. For seven months, Holland had worked with Jeremiah as an indispensable part of patient care.
We were invited to dinner with Holland’s family. Holland’s mother and father were wonderful hosts from the very start. They were welcoming and warm and very willing to keep up a very friendly and even humorous conversation, despite the fact that Holland had to translate every sentence that passed between us.
When it was time to sit down for dinner, Holland’s mother stood and addressed us. Holland translated the French as his mother with smiling solemnity said, “We have one God and He is our Father. We are one family. Today, your family is part of our family. Welcome to our home.”
Her eloquence was genuine and so kindhearted that I felt the language didn’t really separate us. What mattered was that the warm heart of a mother of Africa and a sister in Christ was making her family’s home ours. Hers was a joyful hospitality and we were invited to celebrate it as an act of worship.
We were given a feast of fresh caught fish, boiled potatoes (their texture was more dense than our potato and it was mildly sweet and aromatic), boiled plantain, fried bananas, wonderfully seasoned greens, a purple vegetable that looked like a huge olive with a pit and flesh like a ripe, cooked avocado, and… I couldn’t believe it… fresh lobster (caught by the family fishing boat)! The best was saved for last… white rice with a bean mélange that was seasoned so wonderfully that I would have happily eaten it alone as the sole course for dinner.
But the best experience was the gracious attitude of Holland and his family that fed our spirits; a smiling assurance that, because of God’s Grace, we were now part of their family.
From that day forward, I felt like a visitor, not a stranger. Each month a member of the Cook County Ministerium will offer Spiritual Reflections. For June, our contributor is Pastor Dave Harvey, who has served as pastor of Grand Marais Evangelical Free Church since February 2008.
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