October 1st, 2026, 2:41 pm
“He came back!” the elder exclaimed, staring at the man who served with his tribe over a decade earlier.
“Year after year, student missionaries came to work with you and your family. They worked alongside your mom to treat our sicknesses. They helped your dad build drinking water systems and translate books to help us grow. They played basketball with us on our mud court and ate the tubers that we eat. And when the sun set over the jungle, they sat on our split bamboo floors and studied the Bible with us by the light of the cooking fire.
“But at the end of every year they returned to your homeland. We begged each one to come back and visit us. Many of them promised to return. But for all these years, no one ever came back.
“It made us so sad. Didn’t they love us? We realize that life happens and money is always short. But we could not understand why none of them even came to visit.
“But now Marc came back! He brought his family to see us. He visited our homes and spoke in our churches. He called a meeting of the leaders and charged us to be faithful to the mission that God had called us to. Now we know. The student missionaries that we loved so much really did love us, too. Marc came back, and now we see that the deep friendship that we shared with all of the other student missionaries was real.”
Student missionaries go for a year. The friendships they forge last for decades. The lives they bring to Jesus, though, endure for eternity. Is God calling you to serve? Is He asking you to come back?
Somewhere there is a village waiting for you.
