In the Presence of My Enemies (5 page)

There was one luxury about these circumstances, I noticed: No mosquitoes! They had nowhere to breed here in the midst of salt water. We could lie out here and stare at the stars above without being bitten. There was a gentle breeze, and the sound of the water lapping against the boat sounded peaceful.

Francis and Tess, as it turned out, were fans of the old Beatles music, and in fact, they sang quite well together. As we stretched out under the open sky, they began to sing the mellow songs: “Yesterday,” “Ticket to Ride,” “Let It Be,” “The Long and Winding Road.” The rest of us joined in when we could. Even the Abu Sayyaf sang a little, though such music was technically forbidden by their faith.

Then we came to the song “Imagine,” John Lennon’s ballad about a different world. When we got to the line “Imagine all the people, living life in peace” I finally lost it. For the first time since we’d been kidnapped, tears began to stream down my face. It was so poignant—all these hostages singing about a world so near and yet so unbelievably beyond our grasp. As we lay there in that moment, a bond began to form, connecting us with one another, even our captors. Looking up at the sky, I found myself drifting into ragged sleep.

2

Bright Beginnings

(1959–81)

Learning to get along in crowded conditions was a skill I had acquired early, as the fifth child of six in the Norvin and Betty Jo Jones household. In fact, I was born just as my parents were recovering from the tragic loss of my oldest sister, Terry Lynn. Only nine years old, she had been cut down by a reckless motorist who had, on June 10, 1958, ignored a bus’s flashing lights and arm signal and pulled around it anyway.

I was in the womb at the time. My mother told me later that being pregnant forced her to keep going from day to day, to eat properly, and not to sink into abject despair. I arrived at St. Mary’s Hospital in Cairo, Illinois, on January 17, 1959.

They named me Gracia (pronounced
“gray
-sha”). We moved a year later so my father could pastor a church in Ripley, Tennessee. Then in 1962, he was asked to help start a Bible college in Woodstock, Ontario, which is where my memories begin. My baby sister, Mary, was born there. I went to school in Woodstock, and of course I learned to ice-skate there. In my little pink-and-gray leggings outfit, I would fall time and time again, but no matter how many times I hit the ice, I always got up again.

It was a wonderful childhood in so many ways. In addition to Mary, I had two other sisters, Becky and Nancy, and one brother, Paul. We always seemed to get along well, thanks to our parents’ wise guidance. They put the Lord and his Word at the center of our lives. I could sing hymns from memory even before I could read, although not always with full comprehension. I puzzled for quite a while over the song “Bringing in the ‘Cheese’ ” (instead of “Sheaves”), until someone finally enlightened me.

Our family was in church every time the doors were open: Sunday school, morning services, evening services, midweek prayer services, plus the assorted dinners and special events that always seemed to come up.

When I was seven or eight, I had a wonderful Sunday school teacher who explained to me the importance of committing my life to Christ. Not long after that, I remember begging for the opportunity to be baptized.

When I was a little older, the Bible college moved northwest to Sault Ste. Marie, where it was really cold. All four of us girls had to share one bedroom, using two sets of bunk beds. Somehow we stayed warm through the long, dark winter that year. A year later, my father accepted a pastorate in southeastern Illinois, at Congregational Christian Church in Olney. I started fifth grade in Olney and built many friendships that I’ve maintained to this day.

Somewhere around the house I picked up a book about Amy Carmichael, the young Irish woman who went to India around the turn of the twentieth century to work with children. She found out that little girls were being forced into prostitution in the Hindu temples, and she set up a refuge to shelter them. Her writings over the next fifty years of her life were profound and inspiring.

Even more vivid in my imagination was the Scottish missionary Mary Slessor, who was the subject of another book I must have read half a dozen times. Mary worked in Africa—specifically, Nigeria—a little before the time of Amy Carmichael. There she battled witchcraft, cannibalism, alcoholism, and the particularly gruesome practice of killing newborn twins because they were supposedly a bad omen. What I liked about Mary Slessor was that she was gutsy; she’d stand up to tribal chiefs and tell them exactly what she thought! They didn’t quite know what to do with her.

At this point I had no conscious thought of ever becoming a missionary myself. But I found these biographies inspiring.

Our family moved once more when I was fifteen and Dad became a professor of Bible and theology at Calvary Bible College in Kansas City. My sister Mary and I attended a private academy called Tri-City Christian School, from which I graduated in 1977. This gave me the chance to expand not only my love of music but also my first and best talent: socializing. I really liked planning and organizing parties and events, both at church and at school. I loved being around people and always wanted to make sure everyone was having a good time. My friend Diane Jaeger and I would often arrive at class to comments of “We heard you coming!”

When I wasn’t doing homework, I managed to sing, play basketball and soccer, help with fund-raisers, meet yearbook deadlines, and be a cheerleader—such wonderful days.

I applied to and was accepted by several colleges, but the thing that hooked me on Calvary Bible College was its music program. Peter Friesen, the greatest choir director I’d ever met, gave me voice lessons even before I enrolled as a freshman. I fell in love with his instruction, and soon I was enveloped in the busy swirl of college life.

My first roommate was Marcia Miller. We were both poor, and the cafeteria didn’t operate on weekends. So we’d scrape our money together and walk to Wendy’s to order a single Frosty. At the condiment rack where you pick up your spoon, we’d also pick up some crackers that were supposed to go with chili . . . only we would sit and dip them in our Frosty in order to make a meal. (That’s probably not what the Wendy’s corporation had in mind.)

I learned a lot from watching Marcia’s spiritual walk with God. She inspired me to live a simple, genuine faith. She taught me to look for God’s hand in even the smallest daily events.

Believe it or not, I did love to study. But even more than that, I loved the social life. I got involved in about everything there was: singing alto in choir as well as a small ensemble that traveled on weekends, teaching fourth-grade Sunday school at Tri-City Baptist Church, visiting a detention center once a week to counsel kids who had gotten in trouble with the law. Eventually I became the yearbook editor, student council secretary, a resident assistant on the freshman girls’ floor—and in between, I worked in the snack shop to pay my school bill. It was crazy, but I loved every minute of it.

Even when my parents moved away to northeast Arkansas to take a pastorate and be near my grandmother, I knew I wanted to stay at Calvary. At that time, Calvary was located in a former nunnery with a beautiful chapel. My friend Margie and I would go in there at odd moments and sit where the acoustics were just right, then sing every song we knew.

Another friend, Kathy Stech, had a car, which gave the rest of us some mobility. By my senior year, I had yet another close friend, Elizabeth Redden, who was dating a really cute guy named Doug Burnham. I didn’t know much about him, except that he was sort of quiet and an “MK” (missionary kid) from the Philippines. Even though Doug was quiet, everyone on campus seemed to know who he was. Soon after returning from Christmas break my senior year, Elizabeth said to me, “Hey, did you know that Doug’s older brother is transferring here for the second semester? His name is Martin, and I guess he’s already had some pilot training, because they’re going to let him teach in the flight program as well as go to classes himself. He’ll be a junior. Do you want to meet him?”

Sure, why not?
I thought.
If he’s as cute as Doug, this could be a worthwhile conversation.
She guided me over to a lunch table where the two brothers were eating. Martin was a handsome guy with hair a little darker than Doug’s, more reddish than blond. “Hi, guys!” said Elizabeth. “How’s the spaghetti today?”

She introduced me and we made some small talk. Our conversation didn’t last long. As we walked away to head for our afternoon schedules, I remember thinking that Martin seemed just as nice as his brother.

As the semester rolled along, I was busy, of course, getting ready to graduate. Even though we didn’t know each other well, Martin and I always seemed to be in the same place. He seemed really nice, and he ran with a crowd of guys I enjoyed—fun-loving, casual guys in their jeans and flannel shirts, not out to impress anybody. Martin even wore cowboy boots. Whereas a lot of the other male students seemed fascinated with designer clothes and ties, wanting to look like they were headed somewhere important in the world, Martin and his friends would rather be wearing “kick-back clothes.” Some of them were pilots in training, some were farm boys, and all were down-to-earth. I liked that.

Graduation day, when I received my bachelor’s degree with a major in Christian education, was special, of course. My older sister Nancy surprised me by coming along with my parents. After the ceremony, my sister-in-law, Beth, hosted a lovely luncheon for the whole family.

The college had already offered me a job as secretary to the student-services group—the dean of students, the dean of men, the dean of women, and the chaplain. I was glad for this chance, not only because it would pay the bills but also because I’d get to stay at Calvary, a place I loved. Kathy Stech and I rented a small, roach-infested apartment nearby, and we enjoyed being on our own; even the bugs didn’t daunt us. By August I was settled into my desk at one end of the administration building, juggling the needs of four busy people as they organized their programs for the fall semester.

As the semester began, it became apparent that one of the men’s dorms housed a number of especially rowdy guys. Its resident assistant, whose job was to keep a lid on things, was Martin. Time and again he would show up at my desk with one of his charges in tow, summoned to face the dean and explain the latest antics. This gave Martin and me chances to sit and talk while waiting for the ominous door to open.

He talked about his classes and about his folks far away in the Philippines, serving a tribe called the Ibaloi. He told me he was the oldest of five children; besides Doug, there were Cheryl and Brian, who were both in high school in Manila. And then there was his little sister, Felicia, still a preschooler. He said one day, “Did you know I had to help my mom sew up my leg one day after I cut it with a machete?” (All boys in the Philippine rain forest carry a machete.) That’s when I learned that his mother was a nurse.

Understandably, he was very involved with the Missionary Prayer Fellowship (MPF), a student organization that focused on world outreach. He and his friend Clay Bowlin planned weekly meetings to focus on various populations overseas and their spiritual needs. They prayed for missionaries—many of them Calvary alumni—serving all around the globe.

When it came time for the annual MPF chapel service, Martin and Clay put together a drama highlighting various mission pioneers through the centuries.

Martin played William Carey of England, the first modern-era missionary. Dressed in full Georgian costume, complete with knickers, he began in his rich, baritone voice:

As a young child I learned the importance of putting my best effort into all that I did, and completing each task that I started—a discipline that was to pay off in my later years on the mission field. . . .

From the beginning God gave me the desire to know exactly what his Word said. . . . As I continued my study and meditation on his Word, I could not help but be impressed with the fact that we, as believers, were simply not doing all that God had commanded.

When his Word says, “Go ye,” he means Go ye! And when he says, “into all the world,” he means into all the world. To “preach the gospel to every creature” means exactly that. God means exactly what he says.

He has commanded us to “go and make disciples of all nations.” The promise that follows is “lo, I am with you always.” Do any of us have the right to play leapfrog with the command and [only] hug to the promise?

I didn’t know it at the time, but Martin could have been describing his own upbringing, his study of the Scriptures, and his personal passion as well as William Carey’s. The bigger perspective had already taken root in his soul.

On another occasion, MPF staged
Through Gates of Splendor,
the tragic story of the five missionaries massacred in 1956 by warriors of an indigenous tribe in Ecuador. We all knew the story, of course, since it had gotten so much press. But even so, we sat there riveted as the five men waited on the sandbar of the river beside their little mission plane, expecting the Aucas to return for another friendly conversation like the day before.

One of the actors jumped up and pointed toward the imaginary jungle. “Oh, good!” he cried. “Here they come again!”

And then his face froze. “But look—they’ve got their blowguns with them. . . .”

The play ended abruptly. The actors didn’t need to show what happened next; we all knew.

I stood up to leave the chapel that day, unable to say a word.
Will the Lord ever require me to do what those men did? to go through what they went through?
I was stunned. I slowly headed out the door, tears streaming down my face.

3

The Nicest Guy