Dr. Ngoumape has served as dean of the Biblical Brethren Seminary and Bible Institute in the Central African Republic (CAR) since 2004. In November of 2004 he was at home in Bata preparing for guests who would arrive following the Sunday service. Needing sugar and tea, he boarded his motorcycle for the six-mile trip to the village of Bozoum to get the necessary supplies. But less than a mile outside of Bata, he met bandits coming into the village.
They stopped me him and took what valuables he had, forced him off the bike, and onto the ground. One of the bandits kicked him on the chest. The man began to kick a second time, but Ngoumape remembers the attack was obstructed. “It seemed like an invisible hand blocked him.”
As he lay on the ground, Ngoumape remembers praying, “God, if there is anything left that you want me to do, let your glory be shown.”
Finally, the robbers forced Ngoumape back into the village. As the group approached, people began running away, thinking the bandits were coming to raid the town. Then someone realized that Ngoumape, their beloved pastor, teacher, and friend, was being held hostage, so they did the unexpected—they ran toward the eight captors and their prisoner.
A circle began forming around the group—first 20, then 50, then 100 people.
In Bata, the bandits continued to attack. “They started shooting in the air [with their machine guns] to intimidate the people and scatter them,” Ngoumape remembers. “While the bandits were shooting, the people would lie down. When they stopped shooting, the people would get up and keep coming.”
Unnerved, six of the bandits began to walk away. But two continued to hold Ngoumape at gunpoint. Again, they forced him to the ground. Ngoumape recalls thinking, “This is my last day. I’m going to die.”
One drew a sword from his side and raised it over Ngoumape’s head. As he swung it down, the African pastor realized the bandit’s hand was being pushed aside by an invisible force and the blade struck the motorcycle beside him.
“I heard him hitting the motorcycle with the sword and he hit it the second time and the third time,” says Ngoumape.
Bewildered, the man drew his gun, took five or six steps back, and aimed. “I thought, ‘Okay, he missed me with the sword, now he’s going to kill me with the gun.’” The rounds from the machine gun struck the motorcycle. Again, on three separate attempts, an invisible force moved the weapon away from Ngoumape.
Stunned, the bandit turned to walk away.
The crowd began to wail because they thought Ngoumape had been killed. “I felt I had to stand up to let the people know that I was alive,” the professor remembers. Thinking the bandit was gone, Ngoumape rose to his feet.
“I started to look to my left.” He felt something turning his head to the right. “I see he [the bandit] has a gun pointed toward me. At the same time, I was pushed down, and while I’m falling, he shoots. He shoots a second time, and finally runs away. This is how God intervened in a miraculous way to protect my life,” he concludes. “I’m thankful for it and as I had prayed, He has something for me to do.”
As the man ran into the jungle, the crowd swarmed around Ngoumape, certain he had been injured. “I had to convince them I was not wounded,” he remembers. Then, the group moved into the seminary chapel, where they gave thanks to God for all He had done in protecting Ngoumape during the two-and-one-half hour attack.
Now that’s an amazing story to be sure, but what I can’t get past, what I’ve been thinking about for the last week was this man’s prayer.
Lord, if there’s anything left for me to do, let your glory be shown.
Not, Oh God please protect me
Not, Oh God Strike them down
Not, God if it’s your will save me
This prayer is an amazing prayer of faith. This is not the prayer of a man holding to his life, or his safety. He holds on to God and His will. God, if there’s anything left for me to do… This prayer showed that paramount is God’s will. He’s submitted to it, and not just at this moment, because you don’t pray a prayer like this on the spur of the moment. A payer like this gets prayed at a moment like this because it was prayed MANY times before. In times when there was not trouble and danger. This prayer is the prayer of a man sold out to God. This is a prayer of a man who no longer fears what man can do to the body because his life is already forfeited to God.
Let Your glory be shown
Not, crush my enemies
This is the prayer of a man whose natural inclination immediately moves to those who might be saved by witnessing God moving. This is the prayer of a man more interested in God’s fame than his own.
So…bewildered by this stunning act of faith I am left wondering…would I have prayed that prayer?
Would you?
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