"The Missionary"

You’ve never heard of a Christian mission like this one.

David Eller and his wife Christie serve as missionaries in Caracas, Venezuela. The parents of a 4-year-old, he’s the administrator and she’s a nurse for a home that rescues abandoned children from the streets. They are missionaries doing good work against almost impossible odds, saving a handful of children while watching so many others slip away.

During one particular street rescue of a sick child, David meets Carlos Edwards, who’s impressed enough by what the home is doing to write a support check. Rather quickly, he convinces David to help in another endeavor, one that will make a significant impact for the children. The endeavor turns out to be the removal of Venezuela’s dictator. And, expectedly, the plan goes bad.

It would be easy to say that The Missionary by William Carmichael and David Lambert is a pulsating suspense story that grabs you by the throat and doesn’t let go. And it is that – a terrific suspense novel, with sadistic torturers, calculating bureaucrats and mercenaries who form the web that ensnares Eller and his family.

But the novel is also something else – a story of the temptation to rely upon our resources instead of God’s; a tale of how people rationalize all kinds of behavior; and a story of how one man, focused on rescuing and helping the street children of Caracas, becomes a street child in need of rescue himself.

The website for the novel is located here.