William O. Levi - The Bible or the Axe: One Mans Dramatic Escape From Persecution in the Sudan

Preface

AND THEY SAID unto me, The remnant that are left of the captivity there in the province are in great affliction and reproach: the wall of Jerusalem also is broken down, and the gates thereof are burned with fire. Nehemiah 1:3

It was hot and so very dry. The little girl kept on walking, then crawling, knowing only that she must escape the horror that lay behind. Foot by agonizing foot she traveled, ever aware of the scorching heat of dry air entering her tiny lungs with each breath. No tears flowed from her large, dark eyesthere was not enough moisture for such a luxury. The tears flowed inside of her mind and caught at her throat like the talons of a great bird.

Mama, she whispered, but that was all. There was no strength left to speak to the rocks and dirt and twisted brush. There were no words left to cry out to the God her family had once depended on. She wondered vaguely if God had died too, along with her mama and papa and older brothers and sisters.

If only the pictures in her memory would stop playing over and over again.

The day had begun like any other, with Mama singing softly and preparing the familys meager breakfast over a small fire. Papa had gone out hunting with Big Brother, and Big Sister was playing with the baby. Life was not easy, but Mama and Papa believed that God would provide food for His children, and they were thankful for what they had.

Mama had looked at her that morning and smiled. Are you awake, little sleepy girl?

She had scooted over to the fire to give her mama a hug. Mama gave her a bite of breakfast, a special taste just for her. Mama would probably eat one less bite of breakfast to make up for it. She remembered that taste of porridge, and her stomach burned with hunger. She never got a chance to eat the rest of her breakfast.

Mama stopped singing, and the wooden spoon dropped into the pot. She could picture that spoon falling into the porridge. It was like slow motion. Then she heard the shouts. Papa and the other men were running back to the village, yelling for their families to run. Run and hidebut where?

Mama grabbed the baby and ran outside in time to see Papas face just before he was cleft in two by the swords of the jihad soldiers. He fell slowly, like the wooden spoon, as his own blood wet the dry earth. She heard her mama scream, Yeshua, save us!

As her mother sank to her knees, the baby clutched to her breast, she was surrounded by a swarm of soldiers.

The little girl ran. She ran without stopping. She ran without feeling the thorny sharpness of the dry underbrush. She ran until her body could no longer go on, and then she collapsed into a stand of tall savannah grass. Through the musky scent of the sun-scorched grass, she smelled something else. Her village was burning.

She hid in the grass until the noise of the jihad soldiers stopped. Then it was quiet.

For a moment, she wondered if she were the only person from her village left alive. Then she remembered Papas voice yelling, Run!

She got back up and started running. She ran southeast, toward the mountains. Across the mountains somewhere was Kenya. If she kept running, she would get there.

The little girl was tiny, and it was difficult to tell how old she was. Perhaps she was six or seven, perhaps eight or nine. She kept on walking, then crawling. The bite of porridge she had eaten had long since been used up in her struggle to survive. How could she go on?

She could hardly feel anything. She dreamed that she was walking through Kenya. Are Mama and Papa in Kenya? She was supposed to run there. Perhaps she was already there. Perhaps she could rest now.

As she sank to the ground, she did not escape the watchful eyes of the circling birds. They sharpened their talons with hungry beaks and began slowly drifting toward the ground.