I had a great chat with Louis Carter at the Global Missions Healthcare Conference. If you don’t know Louis, he spent time as a missionary in Nigeria, and for last 20 years or so has spent a month or two, three or four times a year at mission hospitals teaching plastic and hand surgery techniques. He is now completing a book on those techniques for the Pan-African Academy of Christian Surgeons.

It’s been 30 years, but I can still recall his look of disappointment. James was a medical student who had looked up to me when I had surrendered my life to God’s call for international healthcare missions. It hadn’t worked out. We hadn’t lasted. Back after two years in Nigeria, seeking a career like other doctors who had never heard the call, I had let him down.

I was checking my email in the family room with the Wimbledon Tennis Championships on TV in the background when a phrase the announcer used grabbed my attention. He said Nick Kyrigos, an Australian tennis player, was a “spot server.”

We were seeing him in the hospital because his blood counts had dropped, probably nothing serious. As we talked, I learned he was a Korean War veteran and asked him if he was at the Chosin Reservoir, in that “Coldest Winter” where more than 100,000 Chinese poured over the Korean border and drove U.S. soldiers south though cross-fire and frostbite.

Blessed are those who have their act together and are spiritually with it, for they illustrate what God’s reign in this world really looks like. Blessed are those who are healthy, wealthy and happy, for they’ve found the true meaning of life.

Sugar cane-sweet, juicy. Anyone familiar with the taste will salivate at the mention of the word. During our years in Kenya, a fresh stalk of sugar cane trumped all other treats as far as our children were concerned. Eagerly they watched us cut away the tough outer layer with a sharp knife.