Within a Yard of Hell

"My message is: Anything that comes your way as a human being, your condition should not lead you to feel you are not important. As long as you are alive, God has a plan for you.”

~John Sahr, attacked by rebels in the war-torn country of Sierra Leone in 1991. He was beaten and tortured by 6 teenage boys, who left him to die after plunging his head into boiling water.

Sahr's story was published by the St. Petersburg Times, along with the testimonies of other people who became victims of the civil wars of Sierra Leone and Liberia. Find more about it here. Photographer John Kaplan captured the brutality of the torture methods used, and captured the poignantly beautiful spirit of survival.

If John Sahr, whose head was put into boiling water, recognizes he still has a purpose on this earth, who am I, who has led an infinitely more cushy life than he, to not acknowledge that I have a purpose here, too?

What is God's plan for my life? Where am I being called to? I do not know exactly. I only know my command is to GO. Lord, give me focus and passion to take your Word into the far corners of the Earth, wherever that may be.

"Some wish to live within the sound of church or chapel bell. I want to run a rescue shop within a yard of hell." ~ C.T. Studd