I've already talked about the contentious geopolitical climate of Honduras at the time of my mission in another post (see The Military Roundups of San Miguel...), so I won't belabor this subject too greatly here. But I do want to elaborate a bit more on the time I spent in Choluteca which is a Honduran city which lies just a few miles north of the Nicaraguan border.
Nicaragua was plunged into civil war in 1979 when the Sandinistas took power. The Sandinistas maintained power throughout the 1980's and during this entire time were opposed by a terrorist group called the Contras which was short for contrarevolucionarios or counter-revolutionaries.
The Contras based their operations in Honduras just north of the Nicaraguan border and this afforded them the strategic advantage of being able to covertly penetrate the border to carry out their terrorist activities against the Sandinista government and its forces while offering a place of retreat and safe haven from those forces whenever things went badly for them. The Contras also had similar bases and operations in Costa Rica to the south of Nicaragua.
This infuriated the Nicaraguan government but Honduras allowed the Contra terrorists to operate on their soil without intervention and may even have supported their operations at the request of the United States government who covertly supported them through a CIA initiative.
This was all carried out without the knowledge of the US congress and in violation of US law because congress had passed legislation in 1983 (in the Borland Amendment) prohibiting any US funding of the Contras. This all came to light later in what came to be known as the Iran-Contra scandal through a US congressional inquiry into the matter.
During that inquiry it became evident that the US government had been selling arms to Iran and other countries and funneling the proceeds of these sales to the Contras to support their cause. Again all of this was done illegally and it created a situation which allowed the Contras to continue to operate out of Honduras.
The situation I am describing is pure insanity. The US government was selling weapons to a terrorist state who only a couple of years before that time had committed an act of war against our nation by violating our sovereignty when they seized control of our embassy and took and held American citizens hostage for over a year. Why would we ever sell weapons of any kind to such a nation?
Then the money from the sale of these weapons was funneled to the Contras who waged a brutal war against the Sandinista government which caused them to respond in kind leaving the civilians paying the costs of this war with their lives either lost outright or shattered by the inevitable effects and the aftermath all wars inflict on the innocent. Tens of thousands of civilians lost their lives in Nicaragua during this civil war and many, many more than that were shattered by its outcomes.
All wars are rooted firmly in the cold and indifferent soil of insanity, but this one, perhaps particularly so.
Because Choluteca is situated so close to the Nicaraguan border I was an eye witness to some of what was going on at this time. While I was there, hundreds of Honduran troops were stationed in and about Choluteca. Every morning we were awakened by them as they marched past our house at 6:00 am chanting to keep the pace of their steps as they went by. Most mornings the drill sergeant would bark out a command as they reached our home and the recruits would drop to the ground and start counting off pushups before resuming their march and proceeding to who knows where.
Many times while walking into the countryside on the outskirts of town we would run into one of their training exercises. They would wave to us and wish us well and then immediately return their attention to their maps and to the details of whatever they were doing that day. The army was always very friendly to us.
One of the coolest things I witnessed while I was there were some tank exercises. I saw several tanks barreling across an open field at what must have been something between fifty and sixty miles an hour. It was really impressive to see something so massive move that fast. The tracks articulated gracefully across the uneven terrain of the open field. But what was most impressive was when the turret would lock onto a target and track it as the tank moved across the rough uneven ground. I had never seen anything like that before. I was blown away by the technology (no pun intended).
It was during the time I spent in Choluteca that the Nicaraguan government threatened war against Honduras if they didn't intervene on their behalf against the Contras. It was because of this threat that the Honduran troops had amassed in such numbers in and around Choluteca. There was a real sense that war was inevitable.
Because the threat of war had become almost tangible, many of the members of our church began to worry about the safety of me and my companion. They were convinced that we should stop going out as missionaries and remain in our house until things cooled down. They were afraid that we would be kidnapped or worse if we were not more careful about our activities.
This kind of talk spooked me and my companion enough that we called the mission president in Tegucigalpa to ask him what we should do. He told us that he was aware of us and what was happening in our area and that he had prayed about what he should do. He simply told us to do the work the Lord had called us to do and we would be protected. So we did.
The members of our church still worried and would shadow us in an attempt to try and protect us if we ever were attacked, but we were never bothered by anyone who meant us any harm. We were protected just as our mission president had promised. The Lord was never far from me while I was on my mission and I count this as an evidence that He both exists and that He loves me.
By this time I had seen the Lord's protecting hand so many times on my mission that it was easy to believe we would be protected and so I obeyed the mission president when he requested me to continue my labors as a missionary.
Some reading this blog might consider me naive and foolish. My simple reply to any such is that you haven't experienced what I've experienced and therefore don't know what I know about the Lord and what He is willing to do for me. There's no doubt in my mind that God exists. He is really there so when He makes me a promise through one of His duly ordained servants, I consider it to be a binding contract.
While faith may seem like a feeble and foolish crutch to someone unacquainted with the Lord, it becomes a mighty source of comfort and power to those who know Him. Because He breathes His power into the faith of those who serve Him and try to follow His teachings there is nothing weak or foolish about it. I've simply seen too much of the Lord and His ways and felt His spirit working within me too many times to doubt Him now.
No comments:
Post a Comment