Initially there was a lot of gunfire to be heard, including 5-6 shots fired in the air down the street from our office on the afternoon of March 21st. The first night there was heavier artillery across the river and nearer the centers of power. For the next two days, there was a lot of shooting into the air by soldiers (not fighting, just celebratory or for show) and you could hear this all over town but none immediately near where I live. (Thankfully there was very little bloodshed).
We were under 24-hour curfew for 2 days and then 12-hour curfew for a few more, so there was not much going out. Like us, most Malians were staying near to home. There were kids out playing soccer and even a wedding on our street on day 5, but very little traffic even in the neighborhoods.
It's not long in this setting when you find yourself jumping when a car drives down your street: Where's he going? Or when a car backfires or someone slams a metal gate. If you hear sirens in the distance, you wonder what they might mean. You become, for want of a better word, "flighty". My cat Tigger is like this and it always makes me laugh if I should accidentally drop something in the kitchen, how he can fly out of there so fast you can almost see the blurred lines racing behind him like in a cartoon.
On Easter morning (day 19), the remnant was gathered on our office lawn for our Easter service and a small group of birds flew by in a flurry and swung up by the 2nd floor balcony before flying over to the trees. I realized that they were entirely without care and oblivious to the uncertainty that hung as heavy in the air as the humidity that was suffocating us in the early stages of hot season. Sure, the birds, cats, dogs, goats and sheep in Bamako were certainly as frightened by the gunfire as we were, but their reaction returns to normal within a short time. They do not have the long-term post-trauma anxiety that we do.
Later in the day, we went to a restaurant on the Niger river that had a pool for a very non-traditional Easter dinner. It was 109 F (43C) and the power was out, like it had been for the past 8 days, so there was no point going home to cook and we were all cleaning out our fridges to leave anyway.
So we swam in the pool and had pizzas or steak au poivre vert.
And there they were again - birds, carefree and oblivious. There were 2 goats tied up in the lawn and cranes kept landing and walking around among these goats and then flying up to the wall.
And the words of Jesus came to me "Consider the birds of the air".
Matthew 6: 25-27 "That is why I tell you not to worry about everyday life . . . . Look at the birds. They don't plan or harvest or store food in barns, for your heavenly Father feeds them. And aren't you far more valuable to him than they are? Can all your worries add a single moment to your life?"Admittedly, the context here is about not having enough to eat or drink and what we might wear, but I think certainly this could be extended to worries about personal security.
I always ask my cat when he goes racing out of the room when I drop something whether I have EVER done anything to intentionally hurt him? Why can he not trust me after years of living in my apartment?
Lord, help me to rest in your arms and trust YOU without flightiness at uncertainties.
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