Another situation that needs prayer!

This situation that arose today is completely different from the one we posted on Facebook earlier today. We and our church members need prayer all around! I am writing this post to remind everybody how important your prayers for our safety are. 

One of the 13 year old teens in our church recently was befriended by a group of older boys. Very quickly they started asking him to go and buy alcohol with fake bills and pick up their drugs for them. He didn't want to, but they told him they would kill him if he didn't. Then, they started extorting money from him. He had to bring them a regular amount of money. Several times recently he has come by my house asking for money (which we didn't give him) only to find out now that he was sent by this gang to get money from us. 

Last Sunday night this gang stole a gas cylinder from Nick and Norma's house. They came back a couple days later to sell it back to them in an attempt to lure them outside where several guys were waiting to jump them. Thankfully Nick refused to open the door.

They now have plans to break into Nick's and Juan's houses (it's a duplex) this Sunday night, knowing when they will be at church and nobody will be home. They also asked this teen about our house, and whether or not they could get inside. The teen let them know that Jimmy's house is armed and dangerous, so they changed their minds. 

We have spoken with our neighbors who will be keeping an eye on things during service times. Also, the police will be doing regular rounds during that same time. We have lots of safeguards in place to reduce as much risk as possible, but they made sure this teen knew they were armed too. 

It is probably just a bunch of dorky teens talking big to make themselves feel bigger, but it could be more than that too. 

Honestly, we have always known that we are targets everywhere we go and again, we do everything we can to reduce risk. We walk by faith and use the brains God gave us. We are double checking everything and staying more alert, but people wanting to steal from us or rob us are everywhere. If this place wasn't so dark we wouldn't need to be here.

This is why just supporting us financially isn't enough. We need your prayers for our safety, both when we are home and when we leave. Also pray for Nick and Norma and Juan. Please pray especially for this boy who has actually been very close to our family and in our home regularly until this last month. Pray that we can help him out of this situation and even better that we would be able to reach these gang members with Jesus before their behavior gets them killed.

Psalm 91 is the latest passage that our family has been memorizing together. Perfect for this occasion!