Growing up as a missionary kid in Guatemala, it was normal to see soldiers with machine guns everywhere. One time when my mother was standing in line at the bank, I looked over at the soldier standing in the corner. His finger was on the trigger of his machine gun. I thought oddly to myself, if I went behind him and said, “Boo!” lots of people would be killed. I thought it was foolish for the soldier to have his finger on the trigger! What was he thinking?
Our house was located near the university, and there were riots going on at the university all the time. We would hear gunshots or machine gun fire every once in awhile, and we just carried on because everything was normal. Firecrackers were popular to set off, and they sounded very similar to gunshots, so if you paused any time you heard a popping sound, you would never get anything done. For example, people popped firecrackers whenever it was someone’s birthday, Christmas, New Years, and any other excuse for a celebration. Charred newspaper remains were often seen blowing along on neighborhood streets, because few people ever bothered to pick that up.
Well, one day, a stray bullet flew through the window, just inches from where my baby sister was standing. The window hadn’t stopped the bullet, the curtain hadn’t stopped the bullet, but the couch did. It was an ugly green couch, and maybe that bullet was the turning point that caused my parents to buy a new couch after so many years. Nevertheless, my sister was okay. She wasn’t dead. She wasn’t even injured. God is in control of even the stray bullets, but it sure was a scare. The odd thing was that we continued to live in that house, and it didn’t really affect our lives very much, except for the fact that we were grateful that my sister was still alive!
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