The Noose He Couldn’t Tighten

“And bring us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.” — Matthew 6:13 (ASV)

The day after the raid, the captives were brought to the raiders’ chief “as trophies at his feet.” Within twenty-four hours Ajayi was the property of three different people. He was traded for a horse, sent back when the horse turned out to be no good, and for three months was allowed to visit his mother, who was a captive in the same town. Then one evening he was sent on an errand and found himself chained up for market. At first light the traders marched out. Another boy in the chain begged to see his mother and was beaten into silence. Ajayi thought they walked past the very house where his own mother was. He did not dare say a word.

He was sold to a woman who took him south towards the coast. She talked cheerfully about going to the Popo country to buy tobacco. Ajayi knew what that meant: it was where the Portuguese bought slaves. He stopped eating. He got sick.

Then he decided to die. He wrote about it later with an honesty that still stops people:

“I determined with myself that I would not go to the Popo country; but would make an end of myself, one way or another. In several nights I attempted strangling myself with my band; but had not courage enough to close the noose tight, so as to effect my purpose. May the Lord forgive me this sin!”

He planned to jump out of the canoe at the next river. Before he could, his owner sold him on. At the next town he tried again, several times, and failed. He was traded for tobacco and rum, kept chained alone, and finally brought to a great lagoon. He had never seen so much water, and it terrified him. He was taken across it at night to Lagos, the slave port.

Here is the sentence he wrote about those months, sixteen years later: “Thus the Lord, while I knew Him not, led me not into temptation, and delivered me from evil.” He was quoting the Lord’s Prayer, a prayer he had never heard at the time. Looking back, he could see that it had been answered for him before he ever prayed it.

This is a heavy chapter, so let’s be direct. If you have ever felt the way that boy felt, that the only way out of the pain was to end your life, you are not the first, and you are not beyond God’s reach. Ajayi felt that way at thirteen. He went on to live about seventy more years, find his mother again, and help thousands of people find God. The despair was real. It was not the end of his story, and it does not have to be the end of yours.

And notice what he did with it. He didn’t hide it. He wrote it down, asked forgiveness, and told it so that others would know where God had found him. Darkness that gets named and brought into the light loses some of its power.

One thing to do this week: if you are carrying thoughts of hurting yourself, tell one safe person this week: a parent, a pastor, a teacher, a doctor, or a crisis line where you live. That is not weakness; it is exactly the kind of help God sends. If you’re not there, pray the line “deliver us from evil” slowly every day this week, for yourself and for someone you know who is struggling.