Who would bomb missionaries? And why?

I wrote the following in Chapter 3 of Please, God, Don’t Make Me Go: A Foot-Dragger’s Memoir:

In those days, all flights to Colombia left from Miami so, on July 19, 1976, our little family set out driving from Seattle, stopping in Dallas for pre-field orientation. 

Between Dallas and Miami, the Wycliffe office contacted us: The Bogotá guest house had been bombed. 

Bombed? Who would blow up missionaries? And why? 

A lot of people depended on the Bogotá guest house. While most Wycliffe personnel in Colombia lived in Lomalinda, the remote center of operations, sometimes people spent a few days in the capital city for doctor appointments, vacations, shopping, as well as paperwork for those arriving in or leaving Colombia. 

The three-story building had a few small apartments our colleagues used for those visits, and that’s where our family planned to stay—assuming it was repaired by the time we arrived—and do paperwork before traveling to Lomalinda. 

And so, on Monday, August 16, 1976, at five in the morning, the Aerocondor lifted off the Miami tarmac. . . .

After landing in Bogotá and going through customs and immigration, we loaded our baggage into and on top of a dilapidated microbus and set out toward the guest house. I continued in Chapter 3:

In traffic—erratic, aggressive, even dare-devilish—we soon learned to hang on, swaying as the van darted around cars and came to quick stops to avoid collisions. 

After countless dizzying turns, our driver pulled to a stop on a city block lined with adjoining brick or block buildings, two or three stories tall, with bars on every window and door. A uniformed guard stood in a booth in front of the guest house. I’d never seen such safety precautions in Seattle. 

Guest house on left; Jonathan Smoak photo

 The front door burst open and grinning strangers poured out in a line, their greetings so warm that I thought they’d mistaken us for someone they already knew. But I was wrong—they knew our names, and they were expecting us. When I realized their sincerity, I fought tears. 

Motioning us toward the entrance, someone said, “Excuse the porch and the mess on the first floor. You heard about the bomb, didn’t you?” 

Twelve days before our family arrived, Bill Nyman and his daughter, Melodie, had met Will and Lee Kindberg and three of their kids at the airport and set out for the guest house, part of the family riding with Bill and the others with Melodie in the family’s orange Volkswagen Beetle. 

She arrived before her father and, in what had to be divine intervention, she suggested they wait in the car for the others. 

Minutes later, around midnight, Bill pulled up next to Melodie. He, Will, and Will’s son Doug climbed out. 

While Bill searched for the key, Will noticed a package next to the door. Assuming it was for someone inside, he picked it up and said, only joking, “What’s this? A bomb?” 

At that moment, Will saw an electrical device on the package. And it flickered. It was a bomb! “Everyone take cover!” (from Please, God, Don’t Make Me Go: A Foot-Dragger’s Memoir,  Chapter 3)

Before we left the States, when we’d first heard about the bombing, I was troubled, puzzled over why someone would bomb missionaries. As I processed it, I remembered our nation’s turbulent 1960s and ‘70s when many people demonstrated against U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War. It was a time of widespread violence, including bombing—a kid I’d known in college was one of those bombers and spent time in prison.

So, I wondered if perhaps Colombia was going through a similar time of unrest and that young idealists had randomly targeted our guest house.

But what I didn’t know at the time, 

and would soon learn, was this:

The bombing of our guest house

was a deliberate act of terrorism

aimed at our mission organization.


God knew about the bomb,
He knew the names and faces and hearts
of those who bombed—
and would continue to bomb—

yet He sent our family there anyway.

For months and months, I’d given God lots of opportunities to impress upon me that moving to Colombia was not a good idea, but instead He gave our family only open doors and green lights.

How true it is that 

“God’s ways are as mysterious as 

the pathway of the wind.” 
(Ecclesiastes 11:5, TLB)