You just never know

Last night my wife and mom and I landed in San Antonio a few days before I would speak at the homeschool conference.  We arrived around midnight and we all needed water and some throat lozenges.  So after dropping them off at the hotel I proceeded to find a twenty four hour pharmacy.  I walked into the Walgreen Pharmacy and at the time was the only customer to approach the store. I noticed a young person walking toward the store with a ski mask and sun glasses but when seeing me he/she walked away from the store. I proceeded to enter the store and told the clerk that there was a suspicious and unsavory character outside the store. He said he would check it out.  As I proceeded to look for the lozenges, I thought I would take a moment to see if the person behind the ski mask had entered the store.  As I looked down the aisle where the register was located, there he/she was pointing a gun at the clerk; he was holding up the cash draw emptying it.  As I stood in the aisle trying to gain my bearings that a robbery was indeed unfolding, the gunman turned and looked at me.  My initial thought was to try to keep a safe distance in the aisles but there were too long to elude a gunman.  You see these things on movies but when you’re in the midst of a crime you don’t have a lot of time to plan. As I walked to the back of the store I saw the pharmacist and told him that a robbery was unfolding. He phoned the store manager and when the manager didn’t respond, he walked to the edge of the aisle and when seeing what I saw, ran to the phone behind the counter at the pharmacy, calling 911. Following him I asked him where I could hide and he pointed to a storage room. As I entered the storage room with a glass window on the door, the gunman (in this case a gunwoman) walked back to the pharmacy with the gun in the side of the store manager demanding the rest of the money.  With calmness the gunwoman said, “this is what happens to kids when they take drugs. Make sure your kids don’t take drugs because this is what happens to them.”  The whole thing was rather surreal but I am giving you a second by second report.

 

There was really no place to hide in this store room and knew that if the gunman entered the room it would be difficult to defend myself. At that moment I heard shouting which I assumed was the police, demanding for him to drop the gun. I say “him” because I didn’t know or think it was a girl.  After about three demands to put down the gun the policeman took one shot hitting her in the head, thus protecting the manager.  All of this taking place about eight feet away from where I was standing, I could hear the gunwoman say, “why did you shoot me in the head, you knew it wasn’t a real gun.”  Well, there was no way that anyone could tell that this wasn’t a real gun.

 

I have placed a link below and later tonight there will be an interview where I am asked what took place…I was pretty nervous giving the report but I hope the Lord will use my feeble attempt to turn the hearts of parents to their children and the hearts of children to their parents, because obviously this earth, and particularly our land is being smitten with a curse (Malachi 4:6).  The irony is that I am here to speak to parents on the effects of the media and character development.

 

http://www.woai.com/mediacenter/local.aspx?videoid=542632@video.woai.com