Introduction

Yesterday, David Eller was a zealous, energetic young missionary in Venezuela, frustrated because the population of homeless children he served was growing larger, not smaller. Today, he's an international fugitive. And now David's confused priorities become clear: He must get his wife and son to safety. But how? Jerry Jenkins, co-author of the 65-million-selling Left Behind series, says The Missionary is “Taut and gripping. You'll be glad you made the investment.”

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Excerpt

The tall man guided his new Mercedes out of Avenue

Casanova traffic and pulled in behind a battered Volks -

wagen at the gutter; he had just seen the Ford van several

cars ahead of him pull over, its emergency flashers on. He

leaned to the side, straining for a clear view around the cars

and trucks honking, jockeying for position, crowding the

avenue. It was late—10:34, he affirmed with a glance at his

Rolex—and the glare of so many lights on the rainwashed

streets made him squint. He watched the van’s driver get

out, wait for a break in the traffic, and then jog across the

street toward some sort of commotion. There were children

running—one was on the ground, a boy. A heavyset man in

a dirty white apron was yelling at the fallen boy, kicking

him, and the boy curled into a ball. A girl threw herself between

the fallen boy and the man; the man pushed her

down. The van’s driver arrived and held up a hand, yelling

1k

at the man in the apron, who yelled back.

There was nothing unusual about the scene. It was

played out scores of times on this and many other Caracas

streets every night: hungry, homeless children scrabbling for

a living, treated as nothing more than human refuse by the

adults annoyed by them or who sought them for other purposes.

One needed no more excuse to kick—or exploit, in

any of dozens of unsavory ways—a street urchin than one

did a stray dog.

The tall man had seen the driver of the van, a missionary,

make several such stops over the past few days, usually at

night, chatting with groups of these children, teasing them,

making them laugh, talking to them as long as the children

were willing to stay. Twice the tall man had managed to get

close enough to overhear the missionary asking kids where

they lived, whether they had enough to eat, whether any of

them were sick or knew other children who were sick,

whether there were other homeless children nearby.

The name on the side of the van was Aldea Esperanza.

Hope Village. The tall man knew exactly where it was; he

had driven past it, slowly. It was a mission—a place that took

in young homeless ones.

The missionary stepped between the angry man and the

two children on the ground. The girl was talking to the

fallen boy. She looked worried. The man in the apron

pushed past the missionary and grabbed something from

the young girl’s hand, then brandished it at the missionary

—evidence, no doubt, that the children had stolen from

him. The missionary pointed toward the children, spoke to

the man, and then reached into his pocket and offered to

pay for what the children had stolen. The man grabbed it

and stalked away, still yelling back over his shoulder.

Three or four other children wandered back as the

aproned man disappeared. If any of these children had a

home with a bed, they would undoubtedly have been in it by

this time of night.

A group of young men walked by, their clothes and

voices loud, two of them taking swigs from their bottles of

beer. The avenue was crowded with those seeking thrills, as

well as the homeless. From across the street, a prostitute

caught the tall man’s eye and waved. He ignored her. Peering

around a passing truck, he watched as the missionary

knelt and placed his hand on the forehead of the young boy.

This was a good thing that the missionary was doing.

The tall man admired him for it. Yes, it was time to meet

him face-to-face. Maybe he was the right man for the job.

Maybe not.

The rain had stopped, at least for now.

“¿Hay algun familiar de este chico?” David asked. He removed

his hand from the child’s forehead. The boy was

burning with fever, gasping desperately; his chest rattled.

“Sí.”

David glanced up at the girl who had tried to protect the

boy; she could not have been more than ten.

“He is my little brother. He started coughing five days

ago,” she said. “And after he runs, he cannot breathe.”

“What’s his name?”

”Ricardo. My name is Angela.”

David smiled and touched her arm. “Angela, where are

your parents?”

Angela shrugged. David saw this response often. It meant

that the girl’s parents were drug addicts, or that they were

dead, or that she had no idea where they were and probably

hadn’t seen them in some time.

He brushed Ricardo’s lank hair from his forehead. For

five years now David had patrolled the barrios of Caracas,

witnessing the misery of an endless supply of impoverished

and sickly and homeless children. Was there no end to the

suffering here?

Swarms of Latinos hurried by in the warm, humid night,

seemingly unaware. Salsa music blared from one of the bars

down the street. Honking cars, trucks, and buses jammed

Avenue Casanova. The stink of urine rose from the gutter,

a bitter note blending with the fragrance of fresh arepas, frying

chilies, refried beans, and beer. “¡Vámanos, arriba!”

someone yelled from down the street.

Ricardo stared at David with sunken, panicked eyes, his

back rising off the broken sidewalk in his effort to pull air

into his lungs.

“How old is your brother?” David asked Angela.

“Siete.”

There was no point calling an ambulance. They refused

to pick up the homeless. David pulled out his cell and called

his wife. “Christie, call Dr. Vargas and see if he can meet us

at the clinic in forty-five minutes. Tell him I have a sevenyear-

old boy I think is in the acute stages of pneumonia. He

can barely breathe.”

There was a pause. “Is he wheezing?” she asked.

“Big-time.”

“Okay. Get him here quick.”

When David clicked off his phone and reached behind

the boy to lift him, large olive-skinned hands reached down

to help. David looked up to see a tall, well-dressed man.

“Can I please help you?” The stranger spoke in English.

“We can put him in my car just down the street if you need

transportation to the hospital.”

“Thank you,” David said, “but my van’s right here.” He

nodded toward the white nine-passenger Ford van he used

as both bus and ambulance. It was double-parked, emer-

gency flashers blinking, Aldea Esperanza painted in bright

red letters on the side. “I’m taking this child to my clinic.”

Before David could object, the tall man lifted Ricardo’s

thin little body into his arms and headed for the van. David

grabbed Angela’s hand and, weaving through honking, halting

traffic, hurried ahead to open the back doors. Inside lay

a mattress neatly wrapped with clean white sheets. The man

gently laid Ricardo on the mattress.

David motioned for Angela to climb into the back of the

van with Ricardo. She hesitated. “What about my friends?

Two of them are also coughing.”

David looked back across the street, where seven children

stood watching. He glanced at the well-dressed man,

who shrugged.

“We don’t have room,” David said. “I’m sorry. Right

now, I can only take your brother and you. And for your

brother’s sake, we must hurry.”

“Then take Maria instead of me. She has been coughing

for three days,” Angela replied.

David looked at the stranger, then across the street

again. “Jesus, help . . .” he whispered, then asked, “Which

one is Maria?”

Angela yelled, “¡Maria, ven!” motioning Maria forward.

A girl David guessed to be about the same age as Angela

wove her way through traffic toward them. Without asking,

Angela quickly shoved Maria up into the back of the van

next to her brother.

Always choices, David thought, and most of them are bad.

How can it be the will of God to simply choose among the least

bad alternatives?

He put his hand on Angela’s shoulder, urging her into

the van with Ricardo and Maria. As she scrambled in, she

smiled. Already a skilled negotiator, David thought.

David shook the stranger’s hand and hurried to the

driver’s door. “Thank you for your help.” He grabbed a business

card from the dash and handed it to the man, then

cranked the engine and slammed the door. “Why don’t you

visit us?” he hollered through the window, over the engine

noise.

“I would like to. Perhaps soon.”

David waved over his shoulder and inched out into traffic,

his headlights reflecting on slick, wet streets. Ricardo

hacked a loud, racking cough.

David took a sharp right, leaving the business district

and entering a darker, less congested area, a faster way

home. Big raindrops began again, slowly at first, then

pounding hard and fast against the windshield while the

wipers beat like rapid rubber drumsticks. And there was another

sound. At first David thought that the windshield

wipers were broken—the motor giving out, wheezing . . . and

then he realized that the sound was coming from the back

of the van. It stopped. David glanced in the rearview mirror.

The boy’s sister hovered over Ricardo. “Angela, how’s your

brother back there?” David asked. “Everything okay?”

Angela’s little face tilted up, her eyes frightened.

“Señor!” she said. “He cannot breathe! He is choking!” view abbreviated excerpt only...

Discussion Questions

1) Which character in the book did you identify with or “like” the most? Did you like the way the story ended for that character? If not, what would you change?
2) Clearly, David Eller struggled with the best way to fulfill what he felt was God-given desire-his calling, in fact-to help the homeless. Regardless of how David's story turned out: What do you think of the way he chose to try to help? What other options could he have considered besides getting involved with Carlos Edwards and simply continuing with Hope Village?
3) Do you think it's possible to “legislate” righteousness and morality?
4) “What we do at Hope Village is like spitting in the ocean,” David lamented at the end of chapter 4. Do you agree? Do you see why he was tempted to risk much in order to do more?
5) We know that bad things happen to good people, to innocent people. Is it ever the will of God for us to suffer? What do you think of Cecil's arguments in chapter 7 that suffering children are everywhere and will continue to be, and that our best response is to simply love and help the ones where we are?
6) What is your answer to those who say that if God was a god of love, there would be no starving children in the world, no suffering?
7) What issues regarding communication and honesty in marriage do you see acted out in this book? Were there scenes in which the words or actions of either Christie or David caused you concerns or uneasiness-where you wanted to see them choose another way?
8) The book ends with Christie reunited with David. What should her response be from this point on? Should she trust David ever again? Should she put conditions on her forgiveness? If you were in her shoes, how would you respond?
9) As shown in chapter 9, many influences factored into David's decision, including his sense of wanting to please his father and do something significant like his older brother. How do our childhood experiences, our parents, and our siblings influence our decisions and our responses to life? Have you ever faced a moment of complex sorting of conflicting influences, as David did here?

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