Mystery 'Angel' Helps Haiti Missionaries Evacuate During Country's Violent Riots

Tré Goins-Phillips : Jul 19, 2018
Faithwire.com

In the end, Hajdari's "miraculous adventure" reminded her of Isaiah 43:2, which reads, "When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze."

(Haiti)—[Faithwire.com] What for many began like any other mission trip quickly took a nightmarish turn when a government-sanctioned spike in fuel prices spurred violent protests and riots across Haiti. (Image credit: Lizzy Hajdari/via Faithwire)

One mission group from a church in New York City was doing medical work in Delmas 75 in the country's capital, Port-au-Prince, when they decided on Friday, July 6, to travel to Moulin Sur Mer, a resort almost two hours away, to put a relaxing cap on what had been a busy week.

Then the protests started, stranding mission groups from all across the U.S. in the third-world country.

Now safely back in the United States, one New York City missionary, Lizzy Hajdari, told Faithwire in a recent phone interview about her and her fellow travelers' harrowing journey to safety—and the inexplicable aid that came their way.

The group, made up of about 20 people, some from New York and others who lived in Haiti, planned to leave the Montrouis resort Saturday morning, but the U.S. embassy in Haiti posted a warning, urging American travelers and residents to "shelter in place" amid violent demonstrations in and around Port-au-Prince. So Hajdari's group found a nearby hotel and hunkered down for another day.

"We just started to pray," Hajdari said, "trusting God was going to make a way somehow."

Finally, on Sunday morning, the group ventured out. But about one mile into their trek, Hajdari said, the missionaries were met with a group of gang members who had set up a roadblock, stopping every vehicle and demanding money.

Hajdari said they turned the van around, ultimately parking along the side of the road to strategize their next move. Not long after they parked, three local young men in the group volunteered to go speak with the gangsters.

"Maybe about 30 minutes later, they're riding back on motorcycles, and they're riding back with gang members," Hajdari recalled, going on to say that a man whose face was masked by a yellow handkerchief motioned for them to get into a blue pickup truck and follow them.

From that point forward, the man, whom Hajdari believes was a member of a gang, negotiated with the supposed gangsters at each roadblock, ushering the truck full of mission workers through each checkpoint. They repeated that process "every few hundred feet," Hajdari explained.

"This one guy, I don't know what he was telling [those at the roadblocks], I don't know who he was," Hajdari said. "But when we thought it was hopeless, the road just opened up for us."

That mysterious man, though, only took them to a certain point. The New York group was closer to Delmas 75, but not yet where they needed to be. Hajdari said they needed "another angel" to get them to safety...

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