Missionary family believes prayer
saved them during home robbery
___By Stella Anderson Prather
___Arkansas Baptist Newsmagazine
___LA ROMANA, Dominican Republic (BP)--Recently awakened early one Sunday morning, a Georgia man sensed an urgency to pray for missionary friends living in the Dominican Republic. Later that same day, a church member in Tennessee who had visited the Caribbean nation stood before his congregation and asked the church to pray for missionaries he felt were in great danger.
___The timing of these prayers may seem like coincidence to some, but Roger and Diana Gaunt are convinced these petitions to God were no fluke. The missionary couple has no doubt that these prayers were divine intervention that ultimately protected them during a recent home invasion.
___"God used folks in the States ... to pray for us. We know that it was the prayers that went up to the Lord ... that preserved our lives," said Roger Gaunt, who has served as a Southern Baptist International Mission Board missionary in the Dominican Republic for 18 years. "We are sure the Lord prompted and used prayer."
___Prayer power is precisely what the Gaunt family needed Sunday, Nov. 5.
___Returning to their home in La Romana after morning church services, the Gaunts and three of their teenage children walked in on at least three armed robbers who were burglarizing their residence. At once, Gaunt said, the intruders took the family hostage at gunpoint and held them against their will for the next five dreadful hours.
___During the harrowing ordeal, the Gaunts were gagged, blindfolded and bound at their hands and feet. At one point, a gunman threatened a family member and struck and slapped others.
___"There were times I thought some of us were not going to make it," Gaunt said. "We had to depend on God ... and believe God was in control."
___Throughout the abduction, Gaunt said he and his family prayed for God's protection and silently recited comforting Scripture passages. They would later discover, through e-mails, that a close friend and even complete strangers also had been praying for them.
___"I'm going to frame those letters in gold," Gaunt said.
___After robbing the Gaunts of many personal belongings, the intruders eventually left their home. Within a while, one family member managed to escape the bonds and helped untie the others.
___Local police are investigating the crime, Gaunt said. But no arrests have been made.
___Fortunately, the Gaunts were not seriously hurt during the incident. However, within a few days of the robbery, the family left the Caribbean island to recoup from their experiences. They currently are residing in Little Rock, Ark., so they can be near another daughter who attends Ouachita Baptist University in Arkadelphia and relatives who live in Bella Vista.
___Despite the episode, Gaunt said he sensed that God was in control and was guarding them from harm.
___"I've never felt the presence of God's angels in my life like I did that afternoon" Gaunt said. "We were not alone in that room.
___"Beyond a shadow of doubt, we are convinced that on the day of judgment God will replay that scene again ... and God will lift the veil from our eyes and we will see all that were in that room," he said. "There are just so many confirmations, like these faxes and letters from people who were praying for us, that we know ... God's army was there.
___"We don't understand all the implications, but just that God used folks whose prayers ... helped us," he added.
___Gaunt said he also is certain God "somehow worked in the life of one of the intruders." The man, whom Gaunt believed persuaded the others not to harm them, at one point loosened the ropes on Mrs. Gaunt's hands when he saw her weeping. He later asked family members to forgive him.
The Baptist Standard
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