Several months ago, due to new national land-reform
legislation, our school was declared property of the state. Our appeals to the
local and provincial INRA officials were decisively rejected, and our last
resort was to petition at the national level and await divine intervention.
God
provided just the right lawyer to defend our case in the capital: an expert in
real-estate law and former employee of INRA, the government land agency. He
quickly found enough problems with the actions of the agency to build a
compelling case. The judge ruled in our favor, and ordered INRA to desist. The
national INRA officials reprimanded departmental INRA in order to save the
agency from complete embarrassment.
As David Gates put it, “They don’t
care if their people steal land, as long as they can do it without getting
called out and embarrassing the agency.”
Unfortunately, the big-shot lawyer who
took our case was of a similar spirit of his INRA brethren, and charged $10,000
for his services. But before that discouraging news even reached us, a sister
from LaPaz payed the fee in full! I don’t even know who she is or how she found
out about the case, but I know God put it in her heart to help. Our God is a
mighty defender. We have nothing to fear as long as we are in his keeping. Thank
you all who have kept this situation before the Lord in prayer.
