not afraid

I promised to tell you how you can be praying for Ezechiel, and here we are a month later with blog-followers reminding me you still haven’t heard!

The truth is I much prefer to write the happy truths and the positive perspectives over the harsh realities and the hand-tied problems.  I’ve got no positive spin on Ezechiel’s current situation, except that I believe no ugliness is able to rob glory from God when it is due, and it ALWAYS is.

So, my burden, shared.

I’ve told you before of all the ways Christ-in-Ezechiel amazes and inspires me.  There are a lot of people in Haiti (and the world) when investigated more thoroughly, or when joined long-term, you realize their hearts and motives weren’t what you had originally thought.

But after six years of watching, working with and praying with Ezechiel, I continue to be able to say it: his heart is after God’s.  He doesn’t care about the things the world cares about.  

He started a church in a place NO one would ever want to, and a school that no one can ever pay for, with people that no one cares about for reasons no one understands but Christ.  Each time he senses there is more to be done for His glory, he goes at it, even spear-heading a completely miraculous road-building project that has not only revolutionized the entire community, but also presented a whole new kind of Christ-following to a huge population of people who had never heard of Him.

Except for the general struggles of making ends meet, paying teachers, being overworked and never having enough time to be so many places at once, the work has always been long, hard and good.

But because Ezechiel’s heart for the Lord has had him reaching out to involve so many, a lot of people have come to respect and admire him, and a lot of people have come to follow after the Lord because of him.  And being highly influential and well-known—at least in Haiti—is not usually a good thing.

While Ezechiel’s work has always had him in the almost-impossible-to-access mountain-top village of Baron, the bigger city of Baron below is led by a local majistra, or magistrate, something like a judge or mayor. 

While I’m sure it’s not always the case, generally politics in Haiti = corruption.  Positions of power are highly esteemed, and especially in places like Baron where there IS no other authority, they hold a lot of weight.  Being in power means an ability to generate (or access) more income than most would ever be able to, and so corruption, bribing, jealously, violence, stealing and fraudulent activity, alongside of very little accountability (if any), and usually mixed with traditions of voodoo (fear-based, deceptive and prone to violence) can be a dangerous mix.

Because of all this, Matt and I, and pretty much everyone we know and work with, stay as far away from politics as we can.

Including Ezechiel.

The day before graduation, he came to Emmaus for the Alumni Day, but had to cut out early to pick up his daughter from school (his wife is now 7 months pregnant and not doing well). 

Before he left, he popped in my office and for the first time, when I asked how things were going in Baron, said, “Ah, well.  They are going ok, I guess.  I haven’t been there in a few days.”

He has NEVER not been there for a few days, not since his parents long-prayed for conversion, and house church plant a week later. 

Complicated issues are generally approached very indirectly in Haiti, so instead of jumping on my concern for this, I asked about his wife and family, hoping he’d come back to his weird response. 

Finally, he did.  “I’ve got to descend in Baron for a bit,” he said, quietly, looking at his hands.  “You understand?”

“What?” I asked, confused and not getting the cultural “understand?” that a Haitian friend would have. 

“I have to do less, not be there as much, get people to stop liking me so much.”

“What?  Are you tired?  Are you sick?  Is your wife upset that you’re not home often?”

He had obviously hoped not to have to explain everything to his blonde friend, but…

“Stace, they are saying they’re going to kill me.”

WHAT?

“Everyone up there knows me now, and because of the school—the only school on the mountain--and the road project, which involved 160-180 men every Saturday, and the church, which is always reaching out to help people, a lot of people are saying good things about me.”

Ezechiel with his wife, daughters, and parents

Trying not to interrupt with a hundred questions, I continued to listen.

“The majistra down the mountain is a pretty powerful man with a reputation of being ruthless, and he keeps hearing of me and all the things that the church is doing in the community.  He’s worried.  He’s worried I’m trying to gain popularity and am then going to try to run for office or something and take his job,” Ezechiel continued.

“But Ezechiel!” I interject.  “That’s crazy!  You’ve just got to tell him you don’t care about that, and would never run for office!”

“Stace,” he says, and for the first time I realized how exhausted his eyes look. “This has been going on for a while now.  I HAVE.  I’ve gone to him three times, telling him just that, promising I’m not interested in politics, explaining to him WHY I’m doing all the work.”

“SOOOOOOoo,” I said, “We’re good?”

“No, Stace.  He doesn’t believe me.  Because I want people to come to know Jesus makes NO sense to him.  It sounds like craziness.  So he still thinks I’m lying, and that I’m trying to sneakily take his position from him.  I’ve tried and tried, and he doesn’t believe me.”

“A few weeks ago, he had some of his thugs destroy part of the school, to show me he is serious.  Last week, he burned down part of a home where I sometimes stay, a home of some elders in the church.  He says he will kill me if I don’t disappear, and he’s showing us that he means it.”

“So, I can’t stay in anyone’s home anymore, especially my parents home, because it has become too dangerous for them.  I’m sleeping in the church, on a bench, every night, so that if he hurts anyone, it will only be me.  I’ve had to stop leading the road project, and I’m trying not to spend many days in a row in Baron.”

“And I’ve prayed about it, but I just can’t leave the church.  I’m not only the pastor.  I’m the only one in the church who can read well enough to read the Bible, much less teach it.  There are so many new Christians making up that church, with my parents being the oldest Christians and even them, only following Christ for about 2 years now.”

“I can stop a lot of what I’m doing, and I keep telling people to stop talking about me and stop coming to see me, but I can’t stop taking the Gospel there.  I can’t teach all the things It gives me to teach, and then quit when it’s hard.  I can’t tell them to persevere in their faith as they have abandoned all their voodoo traditions and been persecuted by friends and family and the community, and then abandon them when I’m being persecuted.”

He stops and looks at his hands, again.  Uncomfortable.

I know it’s my turn to talk.  And I want to make him feel better. 

But for once I don’t have anything to say. 

“I…But…Couldn’t you…?  I don’t….”

“Stace,” he interjects, trying to help me.  “I’m not afraid.  It is ok.  I know God is leading me onward, and Stace,” he grows quiet, “I’m not afraid to die.”

My eyes suddenly overflow, because we were talking just talking about how great the alumni event was and his daughter and suddenly we’re talking about MURDER and I’m getting on a plane the next day for America and I’ve got NOTHING to pass across the desk to help him and no way to lighten his burden and no thought or power to help the situation.  

When the rubber hits the road, I’ve got nothing more than he does.  I’ve got nothing to help him that he doesn’t already have.  I’ve got nothing that can touch the situation but Him (once I admit to myself that rounding up my own thugs to punch the mayor in the face would not be a Godly response). 

Looking at Ezechiel’s slumped shoulders and knit brows and his tight lips, prone so commonly to break out in a big easy smile, I am helpless.

When-Roselore-took-the-sparrow-home-to-feed-her-children helpless.  When I-stood-in-the-middle-of-a-thousand-tents-in-Port-au-Prince-days-after-the-earthquake helpless.  When-I-begged-Augustin’s-niece-on-her-excruciating-death-bed-to-think-upon-Jesus-to-no-avail helpless. 

Helpless is a horrible-feeling place to be.  Especially for Miss Fix-It. 

Hands up and empty feels pretty terribly vulnerable and small.  Especially in a situation that needs STRONG and MIGHTY.

And THAT, friends, as you already know and as I often need to be reminded, is NOT me. 

Everything that Ezechiel, that Baron, that the majistra needs is In Him.  Powerful.  Authoritative.  Omnipresent.  In the heart and mind.  Protector.  Warrior.  Creator.  Active Friend.

Helpless, no matter how uncomfortable, is a good place to be.  Helpless in the hands of Our Help. 

And Ezechiel, lifting his eyes, lifting his voice to pray with me, then grinning at me and wishing me a good summer as he heads out the door, already has Him.

Not in the, “yeah, I’m a Christian,” way.

In the, “He says he’s going to kill me and he sent thugs to destroy part of the school and to burn down the house I was staying in and I will continue to preach the Gospel and I AM NOT AFRAID” way. 

That was May 16^th, and I stared beg-prayers, heart-break and awe at his back as he got on his bike and headed out the gate.

I haven’t heard from him since.