Day 12 Story 11- Protection on the Site

We were building a new metal structure for a small body of believers some 2 hours south of Bujumbura.  At the time the entire nation had a 6 PM road curfew. 

 Basically, this meant that if you were on the roads after 6PM you wouldn't be able to get into major urban population.  The military would drag barbed wire and steel drums across the road to make sure that this law was enforced.  The rationale behind it? The rebels who were still very much at large in the hills in and around Bujumbura would often travel at night.  Just about every weekend we would have a fire fight in the hills in and around the city.  Sometimes it would last 5 minutes, other times it would go all night long with bursts of machine gun fire and mortar shells exploding.   The government's best solution was to barricade all the cities after 6 PM.  

We had a team of builders in country.  We had shipped the pre-fabricated steel frames to the construction site the week before.  We loaded up the back of my pick up truck with power tools and a gen set early that  morning and rolled out as soon as they opened the roads, usually around 6.30 AM.  I would then drive like a crazy man to get to the work site in order to maximize the amount of time we would have available.   It usually took between 4 and 6 hours to completely assemble the 35 by 50 foot structure.  Everyone had their specific job function perfected. And we worked in harmony.  

 Some erected the support beams, others handled the braces.  We bolted, welded, attached foam, hoisted roof sheeting, pounded nails and rivets, mounted perlins, moved ladders, tightened cables, fueled the gen set, kept spectators away, barked orders, and watched the clock like a hawk.  I usually handled the translation and organization for members of the church that volunteered to help to keep things moving. The end result was a beautiful new steel frame church building with no sides that could be used for church services immediately.  

Then we would load up the tools as quickly as possible and fly like the wind down the pot-hole laden roads to get back into town before the barrier closed off return access.  Only once while I was in Burundi did we not make it.  They shut the roads down a half hour early due to some rumors of rebels and we had to use some pretty slick negotiating skills to avoid sleeping in the country side with the rebels.  

This particular day we were having some trouble getting the perlins hoisted onto the supports.  This was slowing us down.  To make matters worse it was hot.  I mean really hot.  Everyone was baking in the tropical Burundian sun.  I had a hat on to keep the perspiration from washing out my eyes as I assisted the team to get the 50 lb steel perlins mounted about 8 feet in the air.  I would hold one end up while another  team member stood on a ladder fastening the other end of the perlin with a rivet gun.    Once the team member assured me that the  perlin was securely mounted  I would hand off my end to a different team member on a ladder on the other side.  I, then bolted the braces into place to hold the frame square.  

Probably doesn't make a whole lot of sense unless you actually have helped assemble a pre-fabricated steel structure in the tropics of Africa.  

For some reason, I sensed that this job wasn't going to be easy.  Normally, we did one a day for 5 to 6 days and then the team would fly back to America.  The end result would be 5-6 new church buildings.  This usually doubled, tripled, or even quadrupled the number of believers in a local congregation.  Crowds of people would gather around us to watch the assembly process take place. Invariably, we would get the chance to share the Gospel message and many would receive Christ on the spot.  And, of course, this would cause the  church to grow.  We had already assembled 4 buildings that week and had encountered some sticky situations: a local government official tried to shut down our construction, military on the road almost arrested me, etc...

 I prayed under my breath as I knelt in the dirt to tighten the bolts holding the brace in place.  

Suddenly, I hear a cry above me.  I tried to look up as a 50 pound  perlin  falls through the air hitting the bill of my hat an inch from my forehead.  The impact was so strong that it threw me backwards into the bushes on the edge of the construction site.  The perlin slammed into the ground with a loud thud. Everyone gathered around me sure that I must be unconscious.   My neck and head were a little sore, and my hat slashed, but otherwise I suffered no major injury. Several months later I dropped one of these bad boys on my finger from about 6 inches and passed out in the parking lot. (You can read that story on my blog from 2009).  

An inch isn't very big.  In this case, though, it was the difference between life and death for me.  Had I not straightened up as soon as I heard the cry there probably would have been a mourning service instead of a celebration service. The perlin would have cracked my skull open. Unfortunately, Burundi has no good medical facilities.  God spared my life, I know prayer made the difference that day.  To all who have prayed for me over the years.  THANK YOU!