Matt W Ruff

I got in the car at the airport and the seat was laid flat so that I was not visible. The driver changed into the uniform of a police officer hoping we’d be waved through military checkpoints. Then we hit the open roads to drive some 6- hours north — on African roads. The open country is where the real danger lurks. Fulani herdsmen or Boko Haram, both Muslim terrorist groups, are known to throw obstacles out into your path — burning tires, spike strips, anything. When you brake hard and hit reverse, another group, armed with AK47s, comes out of hiding and throws obstacles behind you. If you don’t stop, they will simply riddle the car with bullets. Unless you are very lucky, you are trapped. The goal is hostages, especially Christians and Westerners. They kidnap you and send your body parts bit by bloody bit to your family demanding payment for your release. The government and the UN are both corrupt and look the other way. We stop for gas. I’m noticed by children. Word spreads rapidly that a white man, seldom seen in the north, is in that car. Soon the car is mobbed by people pressing theirs noses to the windows to peer in. Some are shouting and knocking on the glass. Most of it is just curiosity and not malevolence. I get out and walk around. They press against me, and I push them off. Hard. You get used to it, but you must make them respect your space. (Muslims will do the same in Hyde Park. You’ll never see a knife coming if you allow that.) In those parts of the world that are dangerous for Americans, you must be wary of the children. Watch them. In South America, for instance, many are in the employ of the cartels. It’s no different in Africa or the Middle East. They are given cell phones, some money or candy or some other incentive, and told to report anything unusual. If you see one looking at you and reach for a cell phone, it should trigger alarms in your head. It’s time to move. Fast. We drive on past burning villages, through desert country, and finally to a compound where I am locked in from the outside. The windows are heavily barred. If there’s a fire, I cannot escape. Welcome to West Africa. The Christians who house me often do so at considerable risk. As an American, I’m deemed to be valuable if kidnapped. They would likely be killed. They are courageous, extraordinary people. They tell me stories of family members murdered: boys and men shot or killed with machetes; women raped and mutilated, and girls taken into sex slavery. This is daily life for them and has been since ~2000, and intensifying in 2012 and after. Yet many are joyful, warm, good humored, and hopeful. They want to know how many are with me and if America is going to send them help. It pains me to say that I am alone and probably not. They look downcast, but quickly cheer up and move to other topics. I speak in their churches on apologetics, but the apologetics they need is of the physical type. I preach in the cathedral on hope. Muslims gather round the church and stare through the windows to intimidate. The cathedral had once been bombed. We press on and sing in defiance. When I am finished many are emotional, thankful, as if I had preached the most wonderful sermon. I had not. It was hot, stuff, the sound was poor, and the distractions many. But that was beside the point for them. My simply being there, risking something on their behalf, that’s what mattered more than any words. Pray for these people who suffer under the sword of Islam.