It calls you back

Africa.
In less than two hours I will again fix my eyes on Africa. I can feel the engines running below where I sit, we are getting closer. This morning I woke up to the sun rising for the 8th morning in a row. I knew when I felt the sun, already burning warm at 6am, that today was the day.
Before I closed my eyes to pray last night I realized that we were only hours away from seeing the very first glimpses of God's plan for us in Togo. He knows every single person we are going to see and touch. He knows who He will call home while we struggle again with letting go. He knows who will go home victorious, carrying His name on their lips. He loves every baby that this society has cast away, He knows their name, He knows the number of hairs on their heads. They are so precious in His sight.

That familiar excitement, unlike any other, is back. My eyes are wide, my heart is ready.
In one and a half months I have been on three continents, sailed for a total of 22 days, and now I have returned. I can't believe my story was written like this, I am so honored to have this life.
I opened my email this morning to read this;

"Measure thy life by loss and not by gain,
not by the wine drunk but by the wine poured forth.
For loves strength standeth in loves sacrifice
and he that suffereth most hath most to give."
-Ugo Bassi, priest in Italy in 1848

There is word going around that there are some cleft lip babies and their mamas waiting on the docks for us already. They were in tough enough shape that the advance team has arranged in advance for the nurses in our infant feeding program to have formula ready to hand out right when we get there.
And there are those familiar tears threatening to fall.

'They' say; "Africa calls you back".
That makes me smile. It stirs something deep inside of me. Since the day I left, it has been calling me back.
And now, I'm here.