The Robbery

This is an email I sent on December 12, 2006--I'll include it here to give the context for the last post ("Will We Be Robbered Again?")

The Lord will fight for you...especially during armed robberies!

Hello to all!

A special scripture for us today...from Psalm 91, in the Message translation...
You who sit down in the High God's presence,
spend the night in Shaddai's shadow,
Say this: "God, you're my refuge. I trust in you and I'm safe!"
That's right—he rescues you from hidden traps,
shields you from deadly hazards.
His huge outstretched arms protect you—under them you're perfectly safe;
his arms fend off all harm.
Yes, because God's your refuge, the High God your very own home,
Evil can't get close to you, harm can't get through the door.
He ordered his angels to guard you wherever you go.

In the early hours of this morning, we were the victims of an armed robbery. But thanks to God's amazing power and grace, we are safe and unharmed!

If you live in our area, you may have seen on the local news a story about a string of armed robberies that occurred in the western part of Rockingham County early today. From the information we have, the robbers (two men) stopped at several dairy farms before coming to our neighbor's machine shop, which is directly behind our small pasture which is behind our house. The robbers held our neighbor at gunpoint and knife point and demanded money. He told them that he didn't have any money there so one man held a gun to him and brought him down the hill to our house (thinking that it was the neighbor's own house). Our neighbor said when he saw Jeff's Jeep at home, he knew that he should bring the robber here because Jeff could help him! It was about 6:20 am, and Jeff had come upstairs after showering to get dressed for work. I was still in bed, as were Josiah and David (thankfully, they slept through the whole thing). We heard the doorbell start ringing frantically, so Jeff went down and looked out the window in the door. (Meanwhile, the robber was telling our neighbor, "This doesn't make sense! You don't ring the doorbell at YOUR OWN HOUSE!!!") Jeff saw our neighbor and a masked man holding a gun, so Jeff opened the door and discovered that the man wanted money--in the literal words of the robber, "Can you help a brother out?". The guy and our neighbor came in our house, Jeff ran downstairs, grabbed a stack of small bills, and shoved it into the guys' hands who then ran out the door, yelling "5 minutes!" The robber then went next door to the neighbor's house where his wife and three children were. By God's grace, the robber did not hurt anyone there, and he ran out of their house pretty soon; the other robber was waiting in the car for him, and they drove away.

As I write this, one of the suspects has been arrested, and one is still on the loose. We pray he will be caught soon!

Whew, nothing in our lives had prepared us for this. It happened so fast, with only time to do what instincts told us to do. Jeff said a million thoughts flew through his head as he tried to figure out the best thing to do. As soon as the robber ran out the door, Jeff called up to me, "Call 911! We've been robbed!" And so for the first time in my life, I got to call 911! We thought the sheriffs would quickly come to our house, but as we watched them driving by on the road in front of our house, we eventually realized they were probably looking for the guys and had some leads to go on. At that point, we didn't realize that ours was not an isolated event, but part of a string of crime.

Today has been a day of crazy thoughts, much conversation as we try to process it all and figure out what happened, fast heartbeats (about 2 hours after the crime, my pulse was 104), adrenaline rushes, and most of all, immense gratitude to God for his protection. The really disturbing part about these crimes is that they targeted Mennonites, who traditionally are pacifist. But one of the most affirming parts of all of this is how God worked it out, in a thousand different ways, so that no one was hurt.

During lunch today, Josiah brought up the story of Moses and the Exodus from Egypt. He asked me a question that I wasn't sure about (was Pharaoh himself killed when the waters of the sea came together, or just his army?) so I got out the Bible to look it up. Josiah wanted me to read the whole passage to him, so I did, stopping often to explain things more fully to him. I was so impacted when I got to these verses in Exodus 14:13-14 which say, "Moses answered the people, 'Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again. The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still'." I felt like these Scriptures were fulfilled again here today, and I am so grateful for that! We can smile about it now, but Jeff grabbed a baseball bat to take with him to the door, but when he saw the gun, he realized the bat wouldn't do much good! However, God sure could do some good!

I don't mean to imply by this that bad things never happen to God's people; we all know they do. But we also know that our God is mighty, and His hand is powerful. For us personally, it strikes us as ironic that this crime was committed against us here, in peaceful, rural, Rockingham County. We've lived in "dangerous" places before--southern California, Israel--but here in a "safe" place, we've seen evil face to face like we never had before. It's been a good reminder that God is everywhere, He is always in control, and no place is entirely dangerous or entirely safe!

One more passage from the Bible to leave you with...the story of Elisha and his servant when they were trapped in a city surrounded by hostile soldiers...2 Kings 6:8-23...especially verses 16-17..."Don't be afraid," the prophet answered. "Those who are with us are more than those who are with them." And Elisha prayed, "O Lord, open his eyes so he may see." Then the Lord opened the servant's eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.

May we all "see" with our spiritual eyes how great and powerful and good our God is!

With a grateful heart,
Davene Fisher