Go Beyond

   I am at Incheon International Airport in Seoul, Korea, having just completed two of my four flights to Cambodia. I am traveling alone to meet Kurt Dillinger, the President of Life International, in Singapore. We will meet other friends and a film crew there, and then we’ll fly to Phnom Penh where we will spend several days speaking to national pastors about the sanctity of human life and other related topics. Then we’ll make our way across the country to look at land that has been donated for a pregnancy help center and orphanage. It will take us a full day to drive to the location for the proposed new center and a full day to drive back to Phnom Penh. And then, back on a plane for the long journey home. I will enjoy four restful days at home and then off to Uganda.

   People often ask me if I still enjoy flying, how many frequent flyer miles I have, if I have ever flown first class, and lots of other questions about my travel. My answers are always the same. The thing I enjoy most about flying is meeting people from all over the world. An airplane is a great place to engage the nations. I do have lots of frequent flyer miles on too many airlines. And sometimes, because I purchase really cheap tickets from my consolidator, I am not eligible for frequent flyer miles. I have never flown first class and don’t intend to – that’s a matter of stewardship. Those seats are just too expensive. However, that does not mean that I have not looked enviably at a first or business class seat.

   On this flight across the Pacific, I started thinking about the different forms of transportation I have taken as I have traveled the world. You can’t get from here to there unless you use some form of transportation. So, here is a quick summary of the various forms of transportation I have used in order to get to the other end of the Great Commission.

   Airplanes | Airplanes are the primary way to get from home to anywhere on the planet. I fly on lots of really big planes and occasionally on small planes. I have flown on planes I thought would never get off the ground and on planes that never should have left the ground. I have had more than my share of scary moments in the air.

   Trains | I have been fascinated by trains ever since my Mom and Dad gave me a model train set for Christmas when I was a kid. I have traveled by train across the Gobi Desert, through the Andes Mountains in Peru, and across vast stretches of Ukraine, Bangladesh, and Mexico. Like airplanes, trains are a great place to meet and talk with people.

   Automobiles | I have traveled by taxi cabs in urban areas and wedged myself in to public buses crammed with humanity, animals, and overstuffed-bundles. I have bounced across the African bush in Range Rovers, crossed the frozen steppes of northern Mongolia in an old Russian jeep, nervously inched my way through the foothills of the Himalayas in a vehicle almost the width of the narrow mountain road, and once hired an old bus about to fall off its frame to take my weary team across Bangladesh. All this and more just to reach Macedonians crying out for help (Acts 16:9).

   Boats | I have spent days on a boat on the Brahmaputra River in Bangladesh in order to reach remote Muslim villages – and was robbed along the way. I have taken an old ship across the Bay of Bengal to visit people on a remote island who had not heard about Jesus. I once hired a motor boat to escape another interrogation by local officials in South Asia. That didn’t work — but that’s a story for another blog! I have traveled by ferry boats up and down the Padma River in Bangladesh and reclined on shikara boats in Kashmir.

   Rickshaws | I have profound respect for Asia’s hardworking rickshaw wallas. These guys are scrawny but muscular and can navigate with ease through the most crowded streets. Our missions ministry currently supports an initiative in New Delhi to reach 100,000 rickshaw drivers with the gospel of Jesus Christ by using a creative Bible-storying comic-book. When traveling in Asia, I look for every opportunity to ride rickshaws and to minister to the hard-working guys that power them.

   Horses | On occasion, I have found myself in situations where a horse was the best option for getting from point A to point B. I remember riding a horse across a frozen Mongolian lake in late winter in order to reach the Reindeer (Tsaatan) people. I don’t think I have ever been as cold. At the end of the day I took my boots off and put my frozen feet near the fire. My feet were so cold and I put my feet so close to the fire that I failed to notice that my thermal socks were melting.

   Walking | Finally, I have been in places where walking was the only option. In Pakistan, my friend Lee Pullin and I hiked to a mountain village at the insistence of a man who refused to take no for an answer. It was a month after the 2005 earthquake had claimed almost 80,000 lives. When we finally arrived at his village he took us to the rubble where his home had once stood. He pointed out the place where he and his small son had been buried. And then he asked us to tell the world about what had happened there. He was sure the world had not yet heard because no one had come to help.

   I will arrive in Cambodia at 8:55 AM on Sunday morning. Traveling to far-away places is long, hard, and often challenging and inconvenient. But, that’s ok. Regardless of how we get from where we are to the other end of the Great Commission, we need to get there. The people living in difficult and far-away places deserve an opportunity to hear the good news. So, I hope you will join me in chasing rickshaws – in other words, in venturing to the places where people are still waiting to hear the good news about Jesus Christ.