C-mail: The Attack

The Attack

Maybe it started when they denied the renewal of my visa.  Or maybe it was when our bus got held up.  I'm not sure, nor do I believe it's important when it started.  But I might as well start with the two events I just mentioned. 

First at the end of June I went to the corresponding government ministry to renew my tourist visa. I had been told that I could do this three times, but apparently the woman that attended my case had not been so informed. Left with three days to get out of dodge, my wife and I decided that it would be best for me to return to the states for a couple of weeks. I had just enough miles to make the trip for almost free which was a huge blessing. I sadly had to say goodbye to my pregnant wife and leave her in the capable hands of her family. It had been a year since I had seen my parents and took advantage of the time with them not knowing when next we´ll be able to see each other. God was especially good as I was able to connect with my mom's church a bit more, give a few talks and a CPM (Church Planting Movement) training seminar. The women from my mother's class pulled together a huge donation of baby clothes for our in route baby girl and any other infants that might be in need. I was able to re-enter Caracas without incident.

About a week later, my wife and I were returning from a shopping run on a bus. We were seated in the last row of seats and the bus was full. About half way through the trip, the man standing in front of me looked out that back window. I figured he had seen something so I looked out the back as well. I found nothing interesting to see.  Turning around I saw that he had become very well armed. A woman had handed both him and another man at the front of the bus large pistol each and they all began to shout and demand that everyone give them their bags, cells phones, etc. A young girl in the middle of the bus began to put up a struggle with the woman as she tried to take her purse away. Everyone one the bus begged the girl to give up her purse as the man up front set her in the sights of his pistol. The woman slapped her hard in the face twice and the bag came free. The trio got off the bus at the next stop but not before taking all the cash from the driver. The miraculous part is that the man with the gun at the back didn't touch us nor take anything from anyone sitting in that row. I had pulled my wallet out to give it to him, but he didn't seem to notice nor want it. The row in front of us and all the rest were robbed, but not us thankfully. I will mention in a side note that this was my first time being held up. The rest of that day I was high on adrenaline and thought the experience was almost fun. Since then, I've noticed that every time I get on any bus, I go hyper alert  My pulse races, and it takes awhile to calm down. Reacting like that is part of the trauma, but it has helped to remember God's protection on that day. I say helps because it doesn't just disappear. Now I count myself with the rest of the population that resides here and has been robbed at least once. Their own stories range from the mundane to terrorizing.

Soon after, the dreams started. First it was my mother-in-law. Every night for a week she dreamt that Zulay was dressed in a wedding dress. She took the dream as a omen of death. Then she started dreaming about someone shredding a chicken and other bizarre food items over Zulay.  My mother-in-law, seemed to think that someone was trying to get at Zulay, and more specifically at our baby through food. I honestly don't pay a lot of attention to dreams, but I have found them to be good indicators when something is off in the spiritual realm and as such, I take them as a call to prayer.  Even so, we didn't think much of it.  If God needed to tell us something, He very well could tells us directly.  

It wasn't long after that when Zulay had two significant dreams. I won't go into detail, but there was one element in common between the two dreams and that was of a young woman that she had never seen before. From how Zulay described her, I don't believe that I had seen her. Given that the dreams weren't positive in nature, we prayed and asked Jesus what to do. The response was to pray. As long as Zulay held on to His hand everything would be ok. Yes the attacks would come, but as they came, they bounced off. Plus, every time Zulay was praying, Jesus showed her a wall that was shaken by the prayers.

During this whole time, Zulay was having a rough go with the pregnancy. Lots of pain, nausea, vomiting, etc. Our doctor told us that the baby was positioned unusually low in her abdomen. It was possible that later on she could develop a placenta previa. She ordered lots of rest for Zulay which is not her cup of tea. None the less, we forged ahead in ministry, kept up the bible studies, and started a small business.

We decided to sell brownies in front of our house on Friday nights. One, because Friday nights can be a bit of a dark time out here and we wanted to have a strong presence in the street in the midst of that darkness. Second, we want to find more people of peace and having a little stand on the street automatically increases the volume of people we can interact with in a very culturally appropriate way. And finally with the baby coming, we could use a bit more income.

That first evening, I was sitting outside at the table while Zulay was looking for something inside. In that moment while I was talking with a friend, a woman dropped a small container of yogurt on the table and said that it was for Zulay. Before I could turn around to see her face she had already turned around and was hurriedly walking away up the hill. Oddly enough, from what I could see of her, she matched the description of the woman in Zulay's dream. By the time Zulay had come out, she was already out of sight so I couldn't confirm it.

We had a small dilemma. Do we take the yogurt? I don't believe that any sort of witchcraft would harm us if indeed there was a spell over it and if indeed we had eaten it judging by Paul's advice in Corinthians. However, my main concern was rather if someone had put rat poison or an abortive agent in the mix. Given the situation with my mother-in-law's dreams and taking the timely advice of my parents to never take candy from strangers, we decided to simply toss it.

That next weekend Marna, the Shorack's family middle daughter, was celebrating her birthday. She wanted to go to the beach and since none of us on the team had taken a rest for a while, we decided to make an outing of it. We went to a small village on the coast having a great day on the beach. That evening, Zulay began to feel a strong headache. We decided to call it a night and laid down to rest. However the moment Zulay laid down, she felt an excruciating pain in her head bringing her to the point of tears. I was worried that her blood pressure had gone up. Late Sunday evening in a small fishing village hours away from any sort of doctor, city, pharmacy, we had only God as our hope. I prayed, but the pain continued. I figured maybe I should try asking God for direction in how to pray. As I listened, I saw an image of Zulay's head in the grasp of a something like a giant crab's claw clamping down on the back side of her head. However, the claw couldn't get a very solid grip on her head and slipped off since her head was slick with grease or oil. Not sure what else to do, I began to pray against the claw, rebuke it, and pray for Jesus' protection against the claw. The pain continued and I could "see" that the claw had Zulay's head in it's grip. However, in this image, I noticed that Zulay's head was dry and the claw had a firm grip on her.  It struck that the claw slipped off in the first image because of the oil on her head.  I needed to anoint her with oil.  

When I first moved to Caracas, I began to carry a small frask of oil just in case of some such situation. It seemed like a cool thing to do in the moment. I never really took it seriously nor had I ever before used it. Now, five years later, the situation had presented itself. As I began to put oil on Zulay's head, she felt immediate relief. I kept applying, praying, applying, praying and after a few marinades I asked her how she felt. She said that every time I placed oil on her, she felt the pain go down in scale. We were able to sleep that night and get back to Caracas the next day. 

Just to clarify, I don't believe that oil heals; it is God that does all the healing. Yet the Bible is full of examples of healings that were carried out by faith, through a physical element such as: bathing in a river, oil, spit, mud made with spit, laying on of hands, shadows, hems of garments, sweaty rags, walking to a certain place, looking at a bronze snake, etc.

Two weeks went by before the next incident. That Sunday morning in route to the church, Zulay felt a different pain, but we didn't pay it much attention as she's had all sorts of pains associated with the pregnancy. As we were arriving at church, a woman called my name. She informed us that Pablo had been attacked the previous night and had his arm broken in three places. Only a few yards outside of the church, I decided to find my friend Pablo to see what was going on while Zulay would continue onto church. The report about Pablo was only a little exaggerated. I found him seated as usual, but covered in dried blood and with a huge cast over his entire left arm. In conversing with him, he told he had been attacked as he tried to defend an older man, and was hit a number of times with a pipe. He showed me an x-ray of his arm: his humerous was broken clean through and almost made a 90 angle with itself. The radius was also broken with a small bone fragment floating half an inch away from the main fracture. They had put ten stitches in his scalp from another blow and we would later find out that he had three broken ribs.

I've known Pablo for a while and this was by the far the worst I had seen him. He's homeless, has no clean clothes, nor anywhere to bath himself.  I knew that no one would attend to him in a hospital in this condition. I found a taxi and brought him up to my house to get a sling on him, bath him and change his clothes. It dawned on me how tired I was while I attended him as I realized I had no idea how to make a sling. Obviously I needed to rip up a shirt, but I wasn't quite sure what to do afterwards. My thoughts weren't clear, but finally had enough sense to take the shirt over to my neighbor who is a seamstress. She quickly returned and soon Pablo was clean, dressed well and had a sling for his arm. My teammate Noretys came along as we tried to find a doctor/hospital that would attend to him.

Sadly, for reasons too detailed and insignificant for this letter and ultimately for Pablo, no one would take him in. He needed a serious operation with screws, plates and pins but the only place in town didn't want to take him since he wasn't taken there first. Of course we wouldn't find that out until 8 o'clock that evening. It was at three that my wife sent me a message saying she was having contractions.

Towards the end of the church service, the pain she had felt at first only worsened, intensified, and settled into a regular rhythm of every twenty minutes. Our baby Sophia moved like she had never moved before. The ushers in church began to scurry, not to mention my mother-in-law. They found her a Buscopan Plus, yet the pain didn't diminish. She decided to come home. Only problem was that I wasn't home. I was a good samaritan looking for an inn, but none were willing to accept my neighbor.

When Zulay got up the hill, she went to the house of our neighbor, the very same woman who sewed the sling for Pablo. She immediately took her in and helped her to lie down. The woman's mother was there and is getting on in years is starting to suffer from Alzheimers.  She looked at Zulay and said, "This baby is ready come. What month are you in?"  Zulay told her that she was in her fourth month to which the grandmother responded, "Ah no, that's way to early!"  She then started to message Zulay's stomach to keep Sophia from coming out.

When I received the message, I knew I had to get back to Zulay. I called in another teammate to tag them in and help Noretys with Pablo. At that point I left running and caught the first bus back to our part of town.

Caracas isn't like the states where you can just call an ambulance and they come and get you if there is a problem. As you can see from what happened with my friend Pablo, things are complicated and if you don't do things right from the start, you can end up in a big mess. The doctor doing our control with the pregnancy had told us that she would be gone for three weeks for a conference in Australia. None the less, she left a number to call just in case. The doctor was somewhat concerned, but advised as long as there was no blood or other fluid flowing, that she was ok. In any case, should anything else happen, he was ready and could meet and attend to her in a nearby clinic.

When I got there, I found Zulay in bed, a bit shaken up, but feeling better.  The neighbor had made Zulay lie down in her bed, given her a bit of food and was taking excellent care of her. She even told me to pray and we prayed for Zulay.  Thankfully, the contractions didn't return and the doctor via text prescribed her a week of absolute bed rest.  

The week after the rest was the week of the vacation bible school or "plan vacacional" as they call it here.  Thankfully everything went great with the kids and Zulay felt full of energy.  Yet that Tuesday night, I got a message from my neighbor.  She asked if we  had anything to treat a gassy stomach.  I needed to return a pot to her house and went over with some medicine.  She led me to where her son was laying on the bed; his whole stomach was taught to the point that it felt like a drum. He was laying in the same place Zulay had laid just ten days before when our neighbors attended to her.  I forgot to mention that this family is the same family with the boys that have the severe form of muscular dystrophy. The oldest had passed away at the age of 18 three and a half years ago. Now the second oldest was 21 years old and laid out sick on the bed.  The night the oldest had passed away he also had been suffering from a bloated stomach. The boy's mother ran to administer the medicine while I left to ask another neighbor for an herbal treatment (dried orange peel).  I returned and began to pray for the boy.  His heart was racing and his face was pale.  As I prayed for him, I felt tension in my neck and decided to try massaging his neck.  Immediately he began to belch and continuing like that for over the course of an hour, his bloating went down to the point of normal and he soon fell asleep.  During that time, his mom told him not to worry, that he wasn't going to die.  Every since his brother had died, he always worried the same would happen to him. I kneeled down to assure him that as he believed in Christ he need not fear death since Jesus had already gone through the same.  God had raised him from the dead and we have the same assurance through Jesus.  After falling asleep, I left the family to return home and rest as it was late and I was exhausted from the VBS.  About half an hour later, I heard some noise in the street and twenty minutes after that a frantic call from the mother telling us that her son had stopped breathing and she had taken him to the hospital, but they didn't give him much hope.  Neither my wife nor I slept well that night as we prayed and awaited any news. In the morning, I sent a message asking for an update and got a positive report that he was doing better.  Not half an hour passed before another message informed us that he had died. 

The next night was the wake and everybody who never visited him life were kind enough to show up just a day to late.  I honestly was just too tired to process it all. The burial and the mourning period were a bit of a blur.  There are only two of the brothers now left and it's hard.  The youngest one told his aunt that he doesn't believe in God while the other accepts that his brother is with God and can see him later.  We continue to visit the family. 

While our beloved neighbor was one death, at the end of the VBS, a wave of deaths hit the area.  A young girl of fifteen from our distant neighborhood was raped and stabbed to death. We later found out the person behind the murder was a girl of 12 who enticed ten boys to do the act. My brother in law's fiancee narrowly escaped the cross fire when her next door neighbor was shot and killed in on the street.  A man from the neighborhood we've known for many years finally succumbed to a long term illness.  Yet in the midst of attack God has been faithful.  One man from a house we're doing a bible study in was hijacked in his taxi, forced to drive two hours at gunpoint to a remote town, robbed, and miraculously let free.  They didn't physically harm him which is not typical for those types of incidents.  He's shaken up and his future employment is uncertain

In middle of it all, you have to look for the good things, even if they come wrapped in evil.  I was encouraged by a story from a book by Ed Silvoso.  The author painted the picture from the movie Rocky where Rocky and Apollo are both down on the mat. Both are exhausted and beat, but the first one to get up wins.  The author went on to say that during his ministry, although there were significant attacks and losses, he was encouraged to think about how bad off the other guy was.  I honestly can't back that up theologically, but it's an encouraging thought none the less.  

For the moment it seems things are calmer.  There are still attacks.  Disturbing dreams have continued to bother Zulay.  During the youth camp, one of the youth organized the group to pray for Zulay, Sophia and myself.  During the prayer, one youth heard odd whispers in his ears.  Another saw an imposing dark figure stand in front of him and tell him to stop praying.  Others felt a very heavy presence over the whole camp. Yet they kept praying, even praying again later that night on their own for us and Sophia.  Zulay and I are reading a scripture and praying together every night which has been helpful.  We see how following Jesus' advice of clinging to his hand has proven effective.  We just need everyone else to do the same. 

Please pray for us to keep up the good fight.  Pray for Zulay's pregnancy to go well and for health for Sophia.  Pray for my visa issues as I have a trip in November and that last thing I want to happen to get separated from Zulay.  God is good, and the victory is already won!  Pray hard!