Arlene Schuiteman has a lifetime of stories to tell. They ramble across the Iowa fields of her farm-family childhood, they settle into the one-room schoolhouses that nurtured her first years of teaching, and they sweep away to Africa, where her gentle hands nursed thousands.
Sioux Center Sudan is the story of a missionary nurse's eight years on a tiny mission station in Nasir, Sudan, during the 1950s - the golden age of missions in America. There, Arlene faced immense challenges and yet learned to trust God in spite of the difficulties, including her unwanted expulsion from the country in 1963. Only decades later would she finally see the fruit of her work.
Filled with fascinating details of intense medical situations, stories of God's faithfulness, and periods of deep and personal grief, Arlene's journal entries could serve as a chapter in any textbook on the history of medical missions. Arlene's story also intersects with those of other contemporary women missionaries including Elisabeth Elliot, Eleanor Vandevort (A Leopard Tamed), and Betty Greene, pilot and co-founder of Missionary Aviation Fellowship. Quotes from letters between these women are included in the book.
