I started becoming interested in Mercy Ships in college, but even after I started my career on a general surgery floor… Mercy Ships sounded scary. It was this big, lofty, ambitious idea. A friend told me the founder of Mercy Ships wrote a book about how the ministry got started. I thought maybe if I started at the beginning, it might help me get a better grip on the idea.

Here’s an excerpt from Ships of Mercy by Don Stephens. This speaks to the first time Mercy Ships, an openly Christian organization, went to serve Guinea, a predominantly Muslim nation. (Guinea is where I will be serving in January.)

Many people don’t think of African nations as being Muslim. But West Africa, sub-Saharan Africa, is a land of Muslim countries. Many are 50 to 90 percent Muslim. Several, such as Guinea, are almost 100 percent Muslim. And Africa hasn’t escaped the same inbred tensions between their own Christian and Muslim factions, equally as bloody and explosive as the rest of the world’s, and growing alarmingly more so each year… And that makes the questions concerning our motives even more loaded from a geopolitical point of view. 

You can imagine, then, how sensitive and doubly cautious the Mercy Ships crew has to be in a Muslim nation when our motives are questioned, “What do we have to do to be helped by your surgeons?” the ask, waiting for the hook. 

“Nothing,” we reply, as always, “We do it for free. There is no catch.” In a Muslim context, though, the question then takes on another dimension: “Is there a religious creed I have to subscribe to?” 

“Absolutely not,” we answer, as we always answer. “We will perform the surgery on you or your child without any prequalifications whatsoever, and we will send you home.” 

Then we explain that there has never been any pressure or coercion on an individual as a precondition to receiving our services or help of any kind, and there never will be…

Interestingly enough, I initially declined the very first invitation we received from a Muslim nation. The nation was Guinea, which is almost 100 percent Muslim. The invitation came during our first trip to Togo. I decided not to accept it. And soon I received a visit from a handful of the nation’s civic leaders and health authorities who were in Togo for a World Bank meeting. 

“What might we say to persuade you to bring your hospital ship to our people?” they asked. 

I had a list of reservations, I told them, trying to be as polite as I could. 

“Would you mind sharing them?” one of them asked.

“First,” I explained, “I don’t think we are ready.” We had just experienced our very first year in Africa. At the time they visited us, we had eighteen different nationalities in the medical department alone –  doctors, nurses, and lab technicians from Africa, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, the Dominican Republic, and the United States. And while we were learning quickly how to adapt and work with each other’s many different cultures and languages, I truly didn’t think we were ready to work in a Muslim nation –  yet. 

“Second,” I admitted, “I’m not certain we could get the assurances needed that we won’t be the targets of the radical Islamic elements within a Muslim nation.” Even then it was a threat worldwide. 

On I went, going down my list, one by one. One by one, they countered every concern. Still, I was very hesitant, and told them so. 

Then one of them said perhaps the one thing I could not ignore: “Do you know of the hospital ship Hope?”

“Yes,” I said. “It’s one of the models we studied to become what we are.”

“Did you know the Hope visited here twenty-five years ago?”

That got my attention.

“And did you know,” he added, “That our nation’s families still talk about the wonderful work the ship did here, to this day?” 

As you might imagine, we went to Guinea. In fact, we went the very next year. That encounter taught me a valuable lesson about the common ground of medicine, its incredible power, and the hope it offers as a basis on which mutual trust can grow.

We all start scared. We all start with questions, reservations, and “what if”. I’m grateful for founders of big, lofty, ambitious things that are honest enough to share their hesitations and internal struggle. Because if they wrestled with the questions and fears, if they counted the cost and weighed the options, but they still decided to love anyway, to go anyway, to serve anyway… maybe I can too. Maybe you can too. Maybe we can too.

Even if we’re still pretty scared.