When we left that nice hotel at launch in January, P Squad had no idea what would be ahead. We went through training camp and most of us even thought, “Oh yeah, I can do this for 11 months: sleeping on the floor, walking with my huge pack in the rain, gross food…no biggie.” What we once thought was extreme is now a normal part of every day life and the real extremes are things God has brought us through that we never imagined we would live to tell about: a car accident, a 7.3 earthquake, poisonous jellyfish attacks, just to name a few. Another life-altering event happened last week.
Nothing is unseen by God or out of His control. He is sovereign.
Last Thursday was our third night in Zambia. We had a movie night with our amazing hosts and I retired early for the evening. Every night on the Race, I have slept with ear buds and an eye mask which have served me well and allowed for peaceful nights of sleep in the midst of chaos. This night was no different, but around 1:30am, I heard muffled screams from our living room, which I thought was a person scared of a spider or the guys playing a game. When I realized that I heard my teammate, Zach in distress and other male voices that I didn’t recognize, I took my ear plugs out, listened for a moment and then immediately got on my knees beside the bed to pray. I prayed that the men in the house would not come to the back bedroom where all of us girls were or to our host’s bedroom with his wife and two young daughters. My first thought was the verse that God had given me last month to pray for month eleven:Psalm 27:1, “The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life, of whom shall I be afraid?” So I prayed that over and over again as I listened for a cue to get up.
Nothing is unseen by God or out of His control. He is sovereign.
When we mustered up the courage to go into the living room, Zach and another American staying with us were covered in blood running down their heads and blood was all over the living room. I’ve never witnessed a crime scene, but this was just like Law & Order…except in our house. The guys told us that three men bypassed our two teammates sleeping in tents on the porch and entered the open front door and smashed Matt with a machete in the back of the head before he knew what was happening. They hit him several times and grabbed all of the electronics on the desk nearby. When Zach woke up and realized what was going on, Zach grabbed his computer and saved it. The men grabbed Matt’s two backpacks, all of Grant’s electronics and journal and Zach’s hard drive, then bolted into the bush across the street.
Nothing is unseen by God or out of His control. He is sovereign.
We took Matt and Zach to get stitches and as the shock wore off, they were determined to find their stuff. Our neighbor said they saw a Zambian with a backpack come out of the bush and then go back in. They offered to go search and when they did, they found some of Matt’s clothes and Grant’s journal! The guys decided to go on a manhunt. At one point, they were running with a knife and wine bottles in their hands after men with machetes. Those men got away and we later found out they were escaped convicts, but not the men we were looking for. It was 10am and we were feeling hopeful, so we all headed into the bush to find evidence. We recruited ten kids to help us search and five minutes later, we found a big pile of all of the important contents of Matt’s backpack! His passport, credit cards, Bible, and other things dumped by a tree, along with the knife that one of the men threatened Grant to stay in his tent with. We have given up the hunt, but every time we go to town, we scour the street market for second hand electronics, hoping that we can recover the stolen goods, even though the likelihood is slim.
Nothing is unseen by God or out of His control. He is sovereign.
As our team spent a day at a hostel resting and debriefing, we thought we were in the clear. It was a blessing to rest, feel safe away from the house, and spend time with our host’s daughters and with each other. Matt was encouraged to go to Johannesburg and get a scan for his skull and brain because the technology in Livingstone is less than reliable. After he made it there, they found two skull fractures and internal bleeding and he was rushed into emergency surgery to add a metal plate. When we heard this, we knew that Zach needed to be checked out, too, just to be safe. It was easy to think of the worst possible scenario and be anxious, but we just prayed and kept believing that God is trustworthy. Yesterday he was flown to Johannesburg and his CT scan came back negative with no internal bleeding, Praise the Lord!
Nothing is unseen by God or out of His control. He is sovereign.
After replaying all of the events and trying to convince myself that this was actually real and did happen, I see God’s hand in everything. In so many aspects of that night, we were protected from anything worse. I am constantly reminded of verses that reassure me of God’s plan and His protection. No matter what I face, even if it is a life threatening situation,
HE IS MY PEACE; HE IS MY PLAN.
Psalm 139:1-12
“O Lord, You have searched me and known me! You know when I sit down and when I rise up; You discern my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways. Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, You know it altogether. You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high; I cannot attain it. where shall I go rom Your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, You are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, You are there! If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me. If I say, ‘Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me be night,’ even the darkness is not dark to You; the night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light to You.”
