The sun comes up over the dusty streets of Azua. Dark skinned, smiling faces begin to emerge from patchwork houses. “Buenos Dias,” they say to each other. Toddlers bumble around in just their underwear, hanging onto pant legs of an older brother or sister, trying to keep up as they play with a coke bottle racecar. A small man with a loud voice walks the streets shouting one word, “Aguacates! AAAAAguacates!” avocadoes for breakfast. A raggedy white truck drives past weighed down with speakers that match its size and probably cost just as much too. They declare, “sabado, Sabado, SABADO!” with enough clarity to be heard from the mountaintops that hover over this city.
The city is abuzz with life. But nuzzled in a yellow house on the corner of a busy street sleep team Dunamisses, six white American women, all packed tightly into one room with two sets of triple decker bunk beds, sweating our junk off. Elephants could be stampeding through the streets and we would not be bothered. Forty-eight hours without sleep and seven hours sitting in a hot airport, followed by a three hour arctic bus ride had sealed our fate to sleep through church the next morning. Our eye lids began to flutter open around 10 am and with a deep breath we thought, “I am in the Dominican Republic and it is officially the first day of the World Race!”
The next few hours were filled with joy, glee, and random bursts of excitement followed by brief dance parties. “Bring on the adventure Jesus!” Our pastor and host Raul asks us to share a song with the congregation that night at church. We decide on Amazing Grace (can’t go wrong there right?) practice a few times and then get purdied up, washing off the last bits of American dust from our hands and faces. By the time all six of us load up in the back of Raul’s pick-up truck to head off to church, we are pumped.
Liz decides we should practice our song one more time on the way to church, paint the streets with praise. We all agree and Monica starts to strum her sweet traveling guitar. I take up the harmony as we begin,
“Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me…”
Suddenly the sweet sound changes as our brains attempt to register what is going on. Loud banging, squeals, pain and laughter… The truck keeps moving and the banging eventually stops. We all scramble for understanding. The joy and glee from earlier has evaporated. “Are you ok? Is everyone alright?” We begin to ask each other. We look behind us as the truck touches the ground on the other side of a bridge and what we see shocks us. A group of people in colorful cloaks each wielding a large 2.5 liter bottle, and dancing in victory with high pitch yells. Literally, they looked like a group from the KKK that escaped from the circus. Long cloaks with pointed hats, all ranging various colors of the rainbow. The last image I saw as we drove away left me unsettled; a masked face with a pointed hat, nothing but a slit for eyes.
We have just met Los Diablos; a gang that barrels through the streets and congregates in busy intersections to beat women with empty coke bottles or milk jugs. Why? For fun. Can’t wrap my mind around that one. Raul explained that it is just how they have been taught and is all they know. I am left confused.
Monica starts praying and blessing them as the truck rumbles on (thank you Lord for this woman’s Holy Spirit reflexes), my back is on fire and I am pissed, Laura is trying to hold back tears of pain and shock. And everybody else is either praying or comforting. We get our footing, pray for them, bless them, ask the Lord to reveal Himself to them and sing one last earth shaking verse of Amazing Grace just to spit in satan’s eye. Nobody messes with our Holy Spirited jam sessions. This city is getting painted like it or not.
Later that night we meet for our evening feedback and we unravel our first day in the DR. These Diablos are the hot topic. We assess the damage. A few bruises. Pray against any lingering fear on each other and begin to talk about the spiritual implications of what happened. We found it crazy that we had just started one line of a song and satan tried to shut us up. With physical pain no less. It was clear that the enemy was intimidated by our presence here. And as a Christ-follower, persecution is a promise. We just couldn’t get their faces out of our minds, or their laughter.
To be fair, imagine if your hobby was beating women of all ages with water bottles, and this hobby brought you an incredible amount of joy and identity. You gear up with your other Diablo brothers, don your colorful hoods and stand on guard at a bridge like a troll daring any female to cross. Then, your ears perk up as you hear joyful feminine voices drawing near. And as the voices get closer you see six pony tails flipping in the breeze. What luck! Then the bomb is dropped… they are all white! We got six Americanas! Boys, the piñata is coming to us tonight! Can you picture the free for all?
That was almost two weeks ago, and today, team Dunamisses plus one equally dunamis woman, our squad leader Erin, was walking the streets of Azua after a delightful afternoon of prayer, breakthrough, and yogen fruz (frozen yogurt on crack). We turned a corner and something was off… Two girls were scrambling across the street in front of us. The normally boisterous street we live on had grown silent and there, a block in front of us, as a group of colorful hooded figures. Los Diablos. We meet again.
I felt the fear smack me like a tangible road block. We stopped for a second each of us contemplating “fight or flight???” NO, the Spirit of the living God told me. “No fear, in Jesus name,” the words tumbled from my lips. Our feet launched forward. This was gonna be an old fashioned western showdown. Insert the image here of tumble weeds sweeping across the gap between us and that old saloon tune whistling on the breeze, “waa naa waa naa waaa, wow wow wow”. Bystanders that watched along the road had all grown silent. I could feel the confidence of my team growing behind me. No matter what was about to happen, Jesus was with us. Urging us forward like a ship being blown into turbulent seas.
The yards passed as the gap closed. “Hold your ground,” I silently urged. We stared them down, shaking our heads no and daring them to come at us. Then, all the sudden we were on our front porch and as the screen door to our living room slammed shut, we made eye contact with each other and burst into laughter. All tension evaporated and we could not stop laughing. Diablo (which if you didn’t already know, means devil in Spanish) had come across the Dunamis power of God and there had been no competition.
As the laughter and relief passed, Ashlee’s voice hit the air and we were struck. “I think I just stared down a ten year old.” Yeah, those weren’t grown men, those were kids. And they were scared of us. The big bad Diablos I had been hoping to avoid the rest of our time here in Azua, were just a pack of hoodlum boys looking for something to do on a Saturday afternoon. It hit me how tiny our opposition truly was. What a cool way for God to show us how tiny the enemy was compared to Him and exactly how powerful we were as His daughters. The battle was over before it had ever been fought. The white flag was drawn at one word, “Jesus”. That is all it took. One shot to kill an army. But we need to know who we are fighting.
“For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.” Ephesians 6:12
Our battle has never been against each other, folks. We all have the same enemy. No matter where we live or what we believe, we all have one thing in common; we were made by God, in His image. Therein lies all the qualifications needed to be eternally despised by Satan. He is a snake whose native tongue is lies and soul purpose is to steal, kill and destroy anything created in God’s image. That means you and me. But NO FEAR IN JESUS NAME! With Jesus inside of you, you have the power to stomp on that snake’s head and send him squealing for the hills!
Let’s skip to the end of this story called life and all of creation… (Spoiler Alert)… Jesus wins! Hands down. That leaves satan with a big pointer finger and thumb plastered to his forehead. Boom shakalaka.
But as God’s hands and feet here, we need to know who we are. We need to stop being so afraid at what satan could throw at us and start telling Him what God will throw at him! Let’s move off the defensive line and start playing some offense! Got a mountain in your way? Tell it to move! Tired of being picked on or blocked by the enemy? Tell him to get behind you! Ask God to reveal Himself and He will do it, but He will also show you who you are and it will change your life forever.
We are praying for another run in with Los Diablos before we leave town so we can tell those boys about the love of the Father. So we can take off their masks, look into their eyes and tell them who they really are. The Lord is calling forth a generation of men that use their weapons (even if they are only water bottles) to fight in the army of light, brothers that fight for their sisters and not against them. The King is on the move and raising up an army.
But for today, Diablo met Dunamis and Diablo peed his pants.
