Terrorists or Missionaries?

My roomates, the members of our Bible study group had a harrowing run in the post war Balkans.

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My Croatia team, 1995

Story Tags

Espionage, terror, jail, Balkans, Missions

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• Turning point
• Living to the Fullest
• The Author of Your Story

Just after the height of the Balkan conflict, I moved to Zagreb, Croatia. I was enjoying my life as an American in the Balkans, until one day I found a horrible surprise in my flat.

My apartment was filled with heavily armed Croatia militia and police men. They were turning our flat inside out, searching every drawer, thumbing through every book and confiscating a variety of things including photos, journals, and an auto tag my roommate had picked up on the street.

The chief policemen assured us that this was all routine. After they were finished searching our apartment they took me and my roommate Carey into the police station where we were booked and interrogated for hours. Other officers stayed at our apartment to pick up our third roomate. He arrived with 7 Croatia guys that were coming over for a Bible study group. The policemen called for a paddy wagon and brought all of them for interogation.

The questions they asked indicated they suspected we were terrorists. We were a little scared that we might be falsely indicted and punished for a horrible crime that we had nothing to with.

Through the experience, I learned that God will stay with Christians to give peace and courage through the most difficult and crazy ordeals.