I hadn’t come on a mission trip to Tanzania to experience this.

My friends Kato and Treth and I were walking home from an afternoon at the beach near the coastal city of Dar es Salaam when two native men walked out of the bushes and approached us. We gave them fist bumps, a customary greeting between men in Tanzanian culture, and they began talking to Kato and Treth.

Then, one of the natives pulled a machete out of his pants and held it up to my neck. "Give me your phone, or I kill you.”

I decided not to comply and stepped back, hoping that maybe I could escape. But the second man pulled out his own machete, and both men started chasing me. They wanted my phone! With the hot African sun blazing down, I fled. When I realized they were no longer coming after me, I stopped and turned to see them standing on either side of Kato, their weapons to his neck. As I watched, they took his phone. And then they decided to go back to chasing me.

I looked behind me as I ran. With no other line of defense, Kato and Treth picked up rocks and began throwing them at my two pursuers. I managed to stop, snatch up several small rocks, and join my two friends in our counterattack. The two natives finally realized they’d been bested and bolted away.

What Am I Going to Do?

I’d arrived in Tanzania only a few weeks earlier, in August of 2023, and planned on staying for six months. But the robbery left me shaken and discouraged. I came all this way, ready to help the people of Tanzania and this is how they repaid me? Why should I serve them when they behave like this? I began to wonder if I should stay the full six months.

I’d been on short-term mission trips before, once to Thailand with my mom to work with ZOE, an anti sex-trafficking and orphan rescue ministry. I’d also gone with my youth group from Petra, my home church, to Mexico, YWAM (Youth With A Mission) in Virginia, and to New York and Florida.

But during my senior year in high school, I started getting concerned about my future. I considered going into sports medicine. So, I started taking online college courses and interned at Garden Spot PT. But it didn’t feel right, and I had no confirmation from God that this was his plan for me. I finally realized I wasn’t supposed to go to college at all.

Then I got a call from Joel Wildasin, chaplain at a HOPAC (Haven of Peace Academy), a primary through grade 12 Christian school near Dar es Salaam, a commercial port on Tanzania’s Indian Ocean coast. My family became friends with Joel and his wife Lauren and their four kids when we lived as neighbors in Bowmansville, PA, my hometown, until I was 15. Joel had worked with the natives in agricultural assistance for eleven years before taking the chaplaincy position about two years before my arrival.

“If you want to come, you’ll be helping out at HOPAC with tutoring, mentoring, or any other areas where you might be needed,” Joel told me. 

I prayed about the opportunity, and this time, I felt God calling me to go. I put together a prayer team through my Petra small group and organized a going away party. God provided much of my financial support through the friends and co-workers I invited.

I flew to Africa and was soon busy tutoring first graders in English and seniors in math. I also helped Joel with Bible classes at the school and played guitar on the worship team during morning chapel.

Give Up or Go On?

And then the robbery happened. I struggled with fear for several days afterward, especially at night; animal noises in Tanzania sound scarier after dark, and mob riots break out over traffic accidents and other such “disagreements.” And I also had a hard time forgiving our attackers.

I had to decide if I was going to give up or go on.

I talked with Joel in order to process the experience. He helped me to better understand the culture and why these sorts of things happen. And the Lord seemed to say that the men who’d attacked us were hurting and poor and that sometimes, resorting to crime was the only way they knew how to survive. This insight changed my perspective, and even though I was robbed a number of times while in Tanzania, I was able to respond with calmness and even pray for the thieves.

My work was not limited to HOPAC. I visited villages, sometimes alone and sometimes many hours away by bus. I helped in construction projects, my workdays beginning as early as 6 a.m. and lasting until 4 p.m. In the evenings, I spent time socializing with the villagers and building relationships. At other times, my partners and I walked around the village, sharing about Jesus with anyone who would listen. I would stay in one village for as long as two weeks at a time.

I so depended on God looking out for me during these travels. On one occasion, I had just finished ministering in a location ten hours away by bus from Dar es Salaam. I had to get up at 3 a.m. and walk alone for twenty minutes through dangerous, dark alleys in order to reach the bus stop. In Tanzania, desperate people see white skin, and they automatically think, “money.” I was terrified and prayed the whole time. I’d alerted my support team back home to this situation beforehand, so I had plenty of prayer coverage.

Things could have gone very badly, but God protected me, and I arrived safely at the bus stop.

But perhaps the thing that grew my faith the most was my bout with malaria about two months into my assignment. Apparently, the medicine had stopped working, and I came down with a really high fever. For several days, I lay in bed, every part of my body burning hot. Then I’d feel cold and shake violently, or I’d wake up at night sweating. Will I even make it through to morning, or will I die in my sleep? I wondered. All I could do was pray and read my Bible. Those days of sickness made me realize just how dependent I was on God and how much my life really was in his hands.

But the people God touched through me made it all worth it.

I mentored a group of 7th-grade boys at HOPAC. They hadn’t committed their lives to Jesus, and they didn’t seem interested either. All they wanted to do was just mess around. At times, I even had to bribe them. “If you guys just sit still and listen to the devotional, we can go outside and play some basketball afterwards.” This usually seemed to work, and I got the Word of God into them. By the time I left for home in February of 2024, I’d seen their hearts drawn a little closer to the Lord.

My Muslim Friend

Then there was a 15-year-old Muslim Arab kid. He came from a broken family; his parents had married for money rather than love. His dad, a Catholic who worked in the UK, was always gone. His mom, fiercely Muslim and a secretary for the president of Tanzania, was also rarely home. Joel and I visited this boy in his home a couple of times.

“That house is really dark spiritually. I can just sense it,” I said to Joel afterward.

 “Yeah,” he agreed. “There’s definitely something demonic there.”

I worked hard to reach the boy, to show him Jesus was the way out of that darkness. I prayed for him and talked with him about the gospel. But I didn’t see breakthrough. Then he got kicked out of HOPAC and needed to move to a different part of Tanzania to a boarding school his parents had picked out for him. In the interim, Joel invited him to live with them, and so the boy became my roommate. I had my personal devotions every evening and invited him to read the Bible with me and join in my prayers. At first, he declined. But my persistence wore him down, and he eventually joined in. He began asking questions about the Christian faith. I answered as best I could, and Joel and his family and I just loved on him. By the time I left, he had become much more open to the Lord. The love of Christ we’d shared with him and how he’d seen God care for us and provide for us had softened his heart.

Even though I faced danger and sickness while in Tanzania, my faith in God grew like never before. The Lord changed my life during those six months and used my experiences to call me to missions. I now want to do a DTS (Discipleship Training School, Youth With A Mission’s entry-level school) either in Switzerland or South Africa. So, despite the challenges and difficulties, I want to continue to make a difference on or off the mission field.

Tags: jesus, missions, missionary, fear, africa, protection, school, attack, tanzania, life purpose, hometown, robbed, testimony, transformation