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Stories & Blog
Leaving a Trail
The disturbingly loud call of the roosters jolted Mary Van DeGevel awake at 4 a.m. that first morning in the Amazon city of Belém. She had just arrived on a British boat from her homeland, Belgium, and was still recovering from her third-class journey through stormy seas. The year was 1939 and that June day was her first of an amazing pioneering career in the jungles of Brazil’s rainforest.
1939: The year “The Wizard of Oz” and “Gone with the Wind” were released, the year World War II began, and the year Al Capone was released from Alcatraz. None of these was as important to Mary as reaching the unreached of the Amazon jungle.
It wasn’t long before this strong-willed woman met Douglas McAllister, another missionary who had recently arrived from Australia. They married in 1940 and true to the name of their mission, Unevangelized Fields Mission (UFM, now Crossworld), they headed up one of the Amazon’s many tributaries in search of the “unevangelized.”
Just five years prior, the wild and feared Kayapó Indians had brutally murdered three of UFM’s finest. But Mary and Doug were not deterred; they were pioneers! They were called to reach those who had never heard the good news of Jesus Christ. The dangers of this unknown jungle did not hinder them. For the next 40 years, Mary was known as the belovedDona Meri (a term of honor and respect). She explored rivers never seen by outsiders and she met fascinating indigenous peoples who had never seen anyone not clad in feathers and paint. She learned to live on wild boar, farinha, acai, catfish and monkey meat.
Inspired by the words of poet Ralph Waldo Emerson, she had decided long before to “not go where the path might lead, but go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.” More important, she knew that God’s call to “make disciples of all nations” included her — and this unreached, virgin region of the Amazon.
The Amazon is truly a workshop of God’s creation — a romantic place with the incessant croak of the frogs, buzz of the cicadas, splash of the diving cormorants, and call of the spider monkey by the river’s edge. It is a magical, eternal, silent and beautiful place.
But most important to Mary were places like Maracapuru,Abaetetuba, Buriticupu, Xingu and Altamira, accessible only by their river launch called the Arauto (“Herald”). They were important because there lived jungle peoples who had never experienced the love that Mary shared as she listened to their stories, heard their heart and served them in a myriad of ways.
They had never heard the gospel — some of them animists of the forest, some deceived by local priests who referred to her as the devil.
What kind of character brings someone to this God-forsaken region? What kind of person does it take? It takes a person like Mary, with passion, character of steel, courage, humility, love, determination, and clear vision despite the obstacles. Someone who goes to the ends of the earth without cell phones, Internet, television or even predictable mail service. Someone who never forgets the Christ who died for her — and for all peoples of the earth!
This year, 2013, Mary turned 100 years old. She is still that person of passion, determination and hard work as she serves her retirement community in Florida. She still is a model for us all.
Today, there are hundreds of churches in Brazil where pioneer missionaries lived and died. There are believers in all walks of life because people like Mary never gave up seeking to find them and win them to Jesus. Many Christian workers in churches and leading mission agencies today call Doug and Mary their spiritual father and mother. People leading businesses and teaching in universities, too, call Doug and Mary their spiritual father and mother. Some today even classify the cities of the Amazon as reached.
But what of the yet unreached frontiers of the 21st century? Surely these look different from the hot, steamy Amazon rainforest. Maybe they look like the “sin city” areas of Kolkata, Bangkok and Delhi, where thousands of men and women are trafficked to a destiny of hell on earth. Today’s frontiers look like the gigantic slums of Mumbai, Rio de Janeiro, Jakarta and other megacities of our rapidly urbanizing world, where man’s grossest of injustices prevail.
Today’s pioneer areas include upper classes in techy places like Dubai, Shanghai, Singapore, Beijing and Astana. They live in Muslim centers of influence in the Middle East and Africa, whose leaders attempt to isolate their people from Western culture and the gospel of Jesus. They live in the Buddhist-dominated regions of the Himalayan countries or that mega-country, India, with all its cultural and culinary delights mixed with generations of spiritual blindness. Or the war-torn and terrorist regions of Central Asia, the Middle East, North and Central Africa and the Balkans. These are the challenges for Jesus-followers in 2013.
What will it take to reach these places? Whom will it take?
It will take the same kind of person as the one who landed in Belém, Brazil, in June 1939 — a person of passion, courage, determination, clarity of purpose and vision.
Today, we follow the same God as Dona Meri did in 1939. We seek people who have never heard the good news, as did she. We have the gospel just as she did, and we, too, know that the God of the universe desires to be worshipped by all peoples.
Today, Crossworld workers from all professions serve in megacities, in war-torn countries, in citadels of influence in the Muslim, Hindu and Buddhist worlds. They demonstrate the love of Jesus in the great cities of Europe and bless people who otherwise think ill of Christians. All of these workers demonstrate to a world without hope that there is life and love in Jesus. They are modern day Dona Meris. They are making disciples 21st-century style, just like Mary did in another era. They are disciples who are learning to live and love like Jesus and helping others to do the same.
And we need many more of them!
1939: The year “The Wizard of Oz” and “Gone with the Wind” were released, the year World War II began, and the year Al Capone was released from Alcatraz. None of these was as important to Mary as reaching the unreached of the Amazon jungle.
It wasn’t long before this strong-willed woman met Douglas McAllister, another missionary who had recently arrived from Australia. They married in 1940 and true to the name of their mission, Unevangelized Fields Mission (UFM, now Crossworld), they headed up one of the Amazon’s many tributaries in search of the “unevangelized.”
Just five years prior, the wild and feared Kayapó Indians had brutally murdered three of UFM’s finest. But Mary and Doug were not deterred; they were pioneers! They were called to reach those who had never heard the good news of Jesus Christ. The dangers of this unknown jungle did not hinder them. For the next 40 years, Mary was known as the belovedDona Meri (a term of honor and respect). She explored rivers never seen by outsiders and she met fascinating indigenous peoples who had never seen anyone not clad in feathers and paint. She learned to live on wild boar, farinha, acai, catfish and monkey meat.
Inspired by the words of poet Ralph Waldo Emerson, she had decided long before to “not go where the path might lead, but go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.” More important, she knew that God’s call to “make disciples of all nations” included her — and this unreached, virgin region of the Amazon.
The Amazon is truly a workshop of God’s creation — a romantic place with the incessant croak of the frogs, buzz of the cicadas, splash of the diving cormorants, and call of the spider monkey by the river’s edge. It is a magical, eternal, silent and beautiful place.
But most important to Mary were places like Maracapuru,Abaetetuba, Buriticupu, Xingu and Altamira, accessible only by their river launch called the Arauto (“Herald”). They were important because there lived jungle peoples who had never experienced the love that Mary shared as she listened to their stories, heard their heart and served them in a myriad of ways.
They had never heard the gospel — some of them animists of the forest, some deceived by local priests who referred to her as the devil.
What kind of character brings someone to this God-forsaken region? What kind of person does it take? It takes a person like Mary, with passion, character of steel, courage, humility, love, determination, and clear vision despite the obstacles. Someone who goes to the ends of the earth without cell phones, Internet, television or even predictable mail service. Someone who never forgets the Christ who died for her — and for all peoples of the earth!
This year, 2013, Mary turned 100 years old. She is still that person of passion, determination and hard work as she serves her retirement community in Florida. She still is a model for us all.
Our World Today
Today, there are hundreds of churches in Brazil where pioneer missionaries lived and died. There are believers in all walks of life because people like Mary never gave up seeking to find them and win them to Jesus. Many Christian workers in churches and leading mission agencies today call Doug and Mary their spiritual father and mother. People leading businesses and teaching in universities, too, call Doug and Mary their spiritual father and mother. Some today even classify the cities of the Amazon as reached.
But what of the yet unreached frontiers of the 21st century? Surely these look different from the hot, steamy Amazon rainforest. Maybe they look like the “sin city” areas of Kolkata, Bangkok and Delhi, where thousands of men and women are trafficked to a destiny of hell on earth. Today’s frontiers look like the gigantic slums of Mumbai, Rio de Janeiro, Jakarta and other megacities of our rapidly urbanizing world, where man’s grossest of injustices prevail.
Today’s pioneer areas include upper classes in techy places like Dubai, Shanghai, Singapore, Beijing and Astana. They live in Muslim centers of influence in the Middle East and Africa, whose leaders attempt to isolate their people from Western culture and the gospel of Jesus. They live in the Buddhist-dominated regions of the Himalayan countries or that mega-country, India, with all its cultural and culinary delights mixed with generations of spiritual blindness. Or the war-torn and terrorist regions of Central Asia, the Middle East, North and Central Africa and the Balkans. These are the challenges for Jesus-followers in 2013.
Open Doors Today
What will it take to reach these places? Whom will it take?
It will take the same kind of person as the one who landed in Belém, Brazil, in June 1939 — a person of passion, courage, determination, clarity of purpose and vision.
Today, we follow the same God as Dona Meri did in 1939. We seek people who have never heard the good news, as did she. We have the gospel just as she did, and we, too, know that the God of the universe desires to be worshipped by all peoples.
Today, Crossworld workers from all professions serve in megacities, in war-torn countries, in citadels of influence in the Muslim, Hindu and Buddhist worlds. They demonstrate the love of Jesus in the great cities of Europe and bless people who otherwise think ill of Christians. All of these workers demonstrate to a world without hope that there is life and love in Jesus. They are modern day Dona Meris. They are making disciples 21st-century style, just like Mary did in another era. They are disciples who are learning to live and love like Jesus and helping others to do the same.
And we need many more of them!
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