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CBN.com – The village of Wa in northern Ghana is considered the largest village in Africa, around 30,000 people, and it’s one of the most forgotten.
Why go somewhere so remote?
Debbie Jaggers replies, "If you would have told me years ago that we would be going and doing what we’re doing, I would have smiled at you--very sweetly, but I would have smiled--and said, 'I don’t think so.' To go to Ghana in the first place was God’s call. He gave us a love for the people. He gave us a desire in our hearts to go."
Debbie and Keith spent six years as missionaries in southern Ghana before moving to Wa in August 2001. Many in this predominately Muslim community practiced black magic. The Jaggers saw Wa’s small Christian community in need of training, so they tried to settle in quietly.
Keith Jaggers says, "I was spat upon on the main street of town. I was a Christian, but I was an American. After September 11, the people, instead of just watching as we go by, they would stop and stare. We could feel their anger toward us."
The tensions increased, and two watchmen were hired to guard the Jagger’s home. Then on October 4, two strange things happened. As Keith was fixing a screen door in their home, a nail flew out of the door and grazed his face, nearly hitting his eye. Later that day, Debbie was working in the kitchen when a heavy shelf, firmly secured to the wall, gave way.
Debbie recalls, "It came flying off the wall and hit me on the head. It spun me around and I hit the floor. When I got up, my head hurt so badly that I put my hand on my head and there was blood. I had to have stitches."
The local doctor treated Debbie and asked her if the injury was an accident. She thought he was implying that Keith struck her, but he knew something that the Jaggers didn’t: A group of Muslim men had been in Wa for several days putting voodoo curses on the Jaggers home. When Keith and Debbie went to bed that night, they had no idea that five men were coming to kill them.
"At a quarter to two, we heard this banging on the window and screaming. He screamed, 'Armed robbers are coming! Armed robbers are coming!' I could see two men running across our yard with hoods on," Debbie says.
Keith adds, "They had come over in a military style attack. They weren’t sneaking around."
Keith and Debbie heard the hooded men beating one of their watchmen.
"So I went back into the bedroom to call the police, but it was dead," Shannon says.
Keith recalls, "It was a little bit like watching a movie, like, there’s a sense of disbelief. This couldn’t be happening."
Was it the end of the road?
"We both knew that we were going to die just in the way they were coming," Debbie says. "They were coming through the door with a battering ram. Everything was so intense. We knew that there was a purpose for them coming, and we really believed that we would die."
"We immediately just started to pray, to pray God’s protection on ourselves, on our property, just pray," Keith says.
Once inside, the intruders went from room to room, yelling and ransacking the house. Debbie and Keith hid in the bathroom’s shower stall. They were so overcome by fear that they could hear each other’s heart beat.
Debbie continues, "Then they got to us in the bathroom. He pushed the handle down and opened it very slowly, and then he started to shut it. I thought they’re not going to find us. Then he stopped and reached around and looked behind the door. He said, 'They’re here' -- in English. Just before that we had been praying. I was praying and I just knew that that was it. The Lord said to me, 'Debbie, Psalm 91.' He said, 'You have been with Me in that secret place. Now you just stand in My shadow.'"
The man ordered Keith and Debbie into the hallway.
Keith says, "When we stepped out of that bathroom and into that hall, we stepped into the presence of the Spirit of God."
"The power and the glory of God fell so strong that you could feel the walls rattling. I couldn’t stand up. Keith had to literally hold me up at one point. It was not from fear because fear was gone," Debbie says. "I liked it one time when Keith said, 'It wasn’t the courage we had; it was the absence of fear.' And in the presence of God there was no fear."
The men demanded money. Keith had a one-hundred-dollar bill. He handed it over and said, "In the name of Jesus…"
"I noticed instantly at that moment that he said 'in Jesus' name' that both their heads -- I mean it was in sync, it was simultaneous -- the power of God was so strong there that they backed up from us, and they were the ones who had guns."
The five men went into the living room as Keith and Debbie stayed in the bedroom. The Jaggers waited an hour expecting the terror to continue, but nothing happened. Keith and Debbie heard the men leave the house and drive off in their car. They never returned.
"Psalm 91 became a part of our personality," Keith says. "It is just part of who we are. [Reading from Psalm 91] 'Because he loves me,' says the Lord, 'I will rescue him. I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name. He will call upon me and I will answer him. I will be with him in trouble. I will deliver him and honor him. With long life I will satisfy him and show him my salvation.' That’s what keeps us going."
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