Local sources and residents describe the attackers as Fulani militiamen. Others in the same communities call them bandits. Either way, the victims were families of the church, taken from their homes by men with guns.
The raid is one of a string of attacks on Christian communities in Kaduna State this month. On October 1, assailants killed a man at about one o'clock in the morning in the Babban Saura area of Chikun County, near Kaduna city, and took others away. The same day, attackers hit Ungwan Waziri village near Karji, killing one Christian and kidnapping several more.
On October 6, men broke into homes at Rahusa Estate in Chikun and seized five Christians and a six-month-old baby. Their captors demanded 350 million naira, about $263,000. In late September, raiders were said to have taken 22 people from three Christian villages in Kajuru, among them two infants of four months.
The state government says its security strategy is working. Governor Uba Sani's "Kaduna Peace Model" has been credited with freeing more than 500 captives and reopening markets, schools and farmland. Residents of the stricken villages say the abductions go on regardless. The casualty and ransom figures come from residents and local sources, not from police counts.
A baby, a pastor, and a price
Set the numbers aside a moment, my friend, and think of a house. A mother is asleep. Before dawn the door is kicked in. A pastor who has buried the dead and prayed over the sick is marched out into the dark. A six-month-old is carried off like a sack of grain, and a price is set on her head. That is not a statistic. That is a family, and every one of them was made in the image of God.
When a child can be traded for 350 million naira, something is deeply wrong, and no peace model can fix it until the guns are stopped and the guilty are brought to justice. Nigeria's leaders hold their office from God, and they are charged to protect the innocent. The sword is given them for that purpose. Honest men can see when the shepherd is not reaching the sheep, and honest men can say so, and they can pray that those in authority will act.
But the Christian is not left to despair. The people in those villages are not forgotten, and their Lord knows the name of every one taken. He did not stand far off from suffering. He was arrested by armed men Himself, bound, and led away in the night.
"The LORD is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit." (Psalm 34:18)
Nigh. Not far off, not busy elsewhere. He is near to the mother who has not slept since the raid and near to the believer sitting in a bush camp waiting to learn whether the ransom will come. Those captives may be hungry, and they may be afraid, but they are not alone.
That nearness reaches us in comfortable places too. Scripture gives a plain command:
"Remember them that are in bonds, as bound with them; and them which suffer adversity, as being yourselves also in the body." (Hebrews 13:3)
As being yourselves also in the body. The church in Kaduna is not a distant cousin. It is the same body, and when one member is carried off in the night, every other member ought to feel the wound. Here in America we have our pews, our freedom and our quiet Sundays, and it is easy to forget that those things are a gift and not a guarantee.
So remember them. Speak of them. Give to those who carry relief into such places. Ask that governments at home and abroad count the safety of Christian villagers as a matter worth their attention. The world may measure these people in naira. Heaven measures them in the blood of Christ, and by that measure each one is beyond price.