Hope amid the Rwandan horror
Carl Wilkens had been country director for the Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) in Rwanda for about four years in April 1994, when he found himself in the midst of an unfolding genocide. During the next 100 days, more than 800,000 Rwandans were murdered in a frenzy of ethnically motivated killing. The rest of the world virtually ignored it.
ADRA, Seventh-day Adventist Church and United States government representatives urged Carl and his family to escape, but Carl knew his departure would leave members of his staff in danger. So, while his wife, children and parents evacuated to Kenya, Carl stayed and did what he could to help and protect others caught in the madness.
I’m Not Leaving is the remarkable story of Carl’s experience. It’s not a history of the Rwandan horror—“the stories in this book are completely inadequate to represent the horror and loss that happened during the genocide. It was so much worse than I could ever write.” It’s more personal. Carl tells stories of working to save lives and reflects on how these experiences changed his relationships.
As such, I’m Not Leaving is a story of hope rather than horror—although the horror is only just out of sight. Carl’s task is to personalise the people who endured these tragedies, undoing the work of the murderers whose method objectified their victims. His is a story of courage and faith, demonstrating these matter even in the most brutal of circumstances.
Not greatly developed as a book and drawn significantly from tape recordings Carl made during the genocide, I’m Not Leaving reads as the raw notes and stories from the frontline, where life is heartbreakingly tenuous and stubbornly resilient.
Without labouring its point, Carl’s story is a call to live courageously, faithfully and compassionately, whatever the cost, and to trust God with our lives and our service to Him and others.
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