"Hands and Feet" of Jesus: Meet David Eubank

David Eubank's daily trust in the guidance and protection of God, while performing heroic and awe-inspiring work in devastating war torn countries will blow you away. His transition story from special forces soldier to humanitarian soldier for Jesus will have you smiling at all of the good works that he and his army of volunteers are accomplishing in desolate war torn countries on the other side of the world.

David is the founder and driving force behind the "Free Burma Rangers" . His continuing 28 year mission started in Burma but now has spread to Sudan, Iraq and Syria. He and a few thousand trained missionaries are the "Hands and feet" of Jesus spreading love to those who most need it. You'll hear him tell some first hand amazing stories of challenges, tragedy and successes.

The "Free Burma Rangers" documentary is something you should definitely notch out some time to watch and is available at https://fbrmovie.com/ or you can find it on YouTube at https://youtu.be/OkLQnFCEhec.

The Free Burma Rangers website is

And David's Book "Do This For Love" is available on Amazon.

I encourage you to jump in and take a listen to this week's episode with the remarkable David Eubank.

DAVID EUBANK AT A GLANCE

Former U.S. Special Forces captain, missionary kid and founder of Free Burma Rangers

Topics

Free Burma Rangers · Burma/Myanmar · humanitarian relief · war zones · Special Forces · missions · faith · prayer · family · miracles · suffering · love

His Faith Journey

Missionary kid in Thailand → U.S. Army Special Forces → calling to missions → Burma → Free Burma Rangers → humanitarian work in Iraq, Syria, Sudan and beyond → continuing to follow Jesus through danger, loss and service.

This Episode Explores

• David Eubank's childhood as a missionary kid in Thailand

• His 10 years in the U.S. Army and Special Forces

• The calling that led him from military service to missions

• How Free Burma Rangers provides relief in war zones

• Why the organization emphasizes love, service and helping people

• Bringing humanitarian aid, medicine and reporting to civilians

• Raising his family inside dangerous conflict zones

• Miraculous circumstances surrounding missions in Iraq

• The rescue of a young girl trapped beneath her dead mother

• Losing friends in war and wrestling with unanswered prayer

• How David understands sorrow, shame, faith and God's purpose

Questions Answered

• Who is David Eubank?

• What are the Free Burma Rangers?

• Why did David Eubank leave the military?

• How did David's Christian faith shape his mission?

• What does Free Burma Rangers do in war zones?

• How does David Eubank respond when prayers aren't answered?

• How did Free Burma Rangers rescue a girl in Mosul?

• What happened to David's friend Shaheen?

• What happened to Zal in Syria?

• Why did David take his wife and children into Burma?

• How does David understand God's role in suffering?

• Where can people learn more about Free Burma Rangers?

Core Story

David Eubank grew up as the son of missionaries in Thailand, became a U.S. Army Special Forces officer, and eventually felt called to leave the military and serve people caught in war. That calling led to the creation of Free Burma Rangers, a humanitarian organization providing medical care, food, evacuation, reporting and spiritual encouragement in conflict zones. David's story includes extraordinary rescues and what he describes as miraculous answers to prayer, but also the painful deaths of close friends and the realization that faith does not mean every prayer is answered the way we hope. Through it all, he returns to one central idea: do this for love.

David Eubank: Do This for Love — Faith, War & Miracles with the Free Burma Rangers

Amazing Greats with Ric Hansen

A Life of Faith, War and Service

Ric Hansen:I've never met someone who trusts so much in God's guidance that he chose to bring his wife and raise his three kids in the heart of some of the most unsettled, war-torn countries of the world.

Meet David Eubank.

He founded an organization called Free Burma Rangers 28 years ago, and his mission is to provide relief to hungry and hurting civilians who have been ravaged by civil war.

His story is filled with hope and love and genuine kindness as he continually points to Jesus as his source for strength.

In this episode, you'll hear the heart-wrenching story of how David lost two of his closest friends and how he rescued a small girl in the heart of a battle while she lay covered by the body of her dead mom.

But most importantly, he shares how Jesus shows up continuously and in amazing ways, with miracle after miracle.

David Eubank's story is compelling in every way.

So, let's jump in and find out more.

David Eubank:Well, you have one life, and you might as well go for it, because what are you going to hold on to?

I grew up as a missionary kid in Thailand. I remember thinking, "I think I'm more of a soldier."

I felt God had something else for me to do.

I turned to Karen and I said, "I'm going to Burma. Will you come with me? Will you marry me?"

I felt in my heart, "Say no and let it go, or you say yes and you get in."

I have no other plan. Just go. Go to the sound of the guns, go to the sound of need, and trust God to show you how you can be used.

David Eubank, a former Special Forces captain, has gone on to found a relief group called the Free Burma Rangers, helping those fleeing the front lines of war.

His wife and three children go with him into the conflict area.

As we did these relief missions, more and more ethnic people began to join us.

"I want to go ahead and help my people as I can."

We're here on the border of Iraq, and these are all refugees that are fleeing.

And yet we knew we had to respond.

I felt God's voice get underneath it, right? I look like a Christian nutcase, man.

Everything is just right there on the edge.

"What happens if it's wrong?"

We're going to help you.

Even if we die trying, we're not going to lose it.

"Did you count? Jesus, help me."

From Special Forces to a Calling

Ric Hansen:All right. I have the pleasure and the opportunity today to talk with a man that I'm just totally enamored with — what you've done and what you do. I just had to have you on the podcast.

The gentleman that we both know, Jonathan Webb, was the guy who said, "You've got to figure this guy out. You've got to talk to him."

I said, absolutely.

The next thing I did was go and see your documentary and was just blown away.

So, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the podcast, David Eubank, all the way from Thailand. It's a beautiful morning there, right?

David Eubank:Yes, it is, Rick. Thank you.

Ric Hansen:We've got sunshine. We're about, I think, 13 hours apart. You've got sunshine and a beautiful day starting, and our day the day before is winding down and it's in the evening.

But good to have you here.

Let me do a brief introduction, but for the most part, I want you to tell your story.

Let's start with the fact that you were in the United States Army Special Forces for 10 years, and then at some point along the way you had a calling.

You're a U.S. Special Forces guy, and all of a sudden you decide there's something else in your future.

Tell us about how all that happened.

David Eubank:Well, first of all, Rick, thanks. And thanks for having the great taste to be living in Fox Island.

I love Washington State. On a nice day, this is the most beautiful place in the world.

We try to come every year. I was telling you earlier about rodeo, our kids' rodeo.

I don't know if you know, my son Pete is the youngest guy to climb Rainier. He was six when he went up there with me, and the girls are right behind.

They would have the record, except he's younger than them.

Anyways, we love Washington State, and thank God for it.

I remember once when I was in the Rangers, we were doing a training jump right over Fox Island and Ketron Island, right there in the south part of the Sound.

It was spring, and the water was blue and emerald color. As we're flying in the aircraft, the ramp opens, and I'm looking out at the snow-capped Olympics to the west and the Cascades to the east, and right below me is the Sound.

We went running and jumped out and parachuted right to the Sound.

I thought, "This is too cool."

Another time, one guy's running out. We're a HALO team. I was a team leader in Special Forces high-altitude free fall, and I heard him yell — even with my headset on, I could hear him yell, "I love America!"

He's diving out of the plane.

It's so cool.

Anyways, we love Washington, and about this time of year I would be cross-country skiing. And if Crystal was open, I'd be downhill skiing.

I'm horrible at all that, but I love it.

Growing Up as a Missionary Kid

Ric Hansen:So you're calling Thailand home now, right?

David Eubank:I'm home in Thailand.

We're in this home maybe one or two months a year, and that's it. Most of the time, this is our base.

Most of the time, I'm in Burma or Iraq or Syria, or some of the places we were in — Tajikistan on the Afghanistan border, trying to help the Afghans this summer as well.

So this is just a base that I'm rarely at, but I love it. I thank God who's given it to us.

We've got seven horses right out here. We're all riders, although my girls now just kill me. They play polo for university.

Anyways, I grew up in Texas, and my parents took me to Thailand as a nine-month-old.

So I grew up here in Thailand.

Like Washington State has changed, Thailand's changed.

As I grew up, as a little boy, I had a .22 rifle over my shoulder, galloping my horse down the main street of a city which now is full of traffic.

I'd shoot squirrels or monkeys or whatever, and that's hard to do now.

I grew up in Thailand.

My mom and dad are still here. My dad's 91, my mom's 89. They're 61-year missionaries here.

They're amazing followers of Jesus. I just thank God I was raised by them.

All mistakes were my own.

I was telling my dad the other night, because I have three sisters and myself, and I said, "Dad, you know, when us kids make mistakes, don't put it on yourself. You're awesome parents."

Jesus had 12 disciples, and one of them was a traitor. Was He a bad leader?

No. You get freedom.

So all parents out there, just keep pointing your kids to Jesus. Say you're sorry when you're wrong. Keep telling them you love them.

That's all that you can do, because we're all given freedom.

And I also believe the Word of God doesn't return empty.

As you pray for your kids, as you pray for other people, there's power in that.

And I thank God for heaven for whatever doesn't work out on this earth.

I grew up as a missionary kid in Thailand.

I remember when I was five years old, I was behind my house and looked up in the sky, and I thought, "One day I'll be a soldier and then I'll be a missionary."

I don't know why I thought that.

I remember the sky was really blue.

Why did I think that?

Well, my dad was a soldier, fought in the Korean War, became a missionary.

My dad's my hero.

I got an Army ROTC scholarship when I graduated from high school in Thailand, went to Texas A&M University, was in the Corps of Cadets, was commissioned as an infantry officer, went to Panama as an infantryman, and then into the 2nd Ranger Battalion, which is at Fort Lewis, and then in 1st Special Forces Group, also at Fort Lewis.

But through all of that, I never forgot about being a missionary.

At the 10-year point, I just felt God call me.

I remember looking at my own mistakes in my life, my own weaknesses, my own sins, and thinking I could never be a missionary.

I put God first and tried to follow Him.

I opened the Bible randomly and said, "Lord, show me."

I put my finger on Isaiah 6:8.

That's where Isaiah says, "Here I am. Send me."

But he also says, "I'm a man of unclean lips amongst the people of unclean lips."

Like, "I'm not worthy."

I really felt that.

But in that Scripture, an angel comes and purifies Isaiah.

Go.

And I was just reading this morning, Rick, as my devotions, about Cornelius, the Roman centurion.

God tells Cornelius to go reach out to Peter.

At the same time, Peter is asleep on the roof or has a vision on the roof where he's staying in Joppa.

God shows him all these unclean animals and says, "Kill and eat."

And he's like, "I can't do that."

And God says, "Don't call unclean what I call clean."

I was just reading that this morning.

I think in our lives, if we have a good conscience and it's working, or if we're open to the Holy Spirit, He'll convict us of our sin.

But that doesn't mean you're condemned. It means you're convicted.

You can say, "I'm sorry," get rid of it, and God's going to use you.

God cleans you and uses you.

So anybody who watches this or listens: if you feel bad about what you've done that's wrong, good. We should feel bad.

But then get rid of it.

God, Jesus forgives you. That's what He died for.

Go again. Start again.

So, anyways, I got out after 10 years and met my wife, Karen, who did not want to marry me.

Actually, she wouldn't even date.

I was still in Washington.

So I took her on a climb of Mount Shuksan. Anyone who's in Washington, Mount Shuksan is one of the most photographed mountains in the world.

It's beautiful, especially the Lake Ann perspective. It's up near the Canadian border, near Mount Baker.

That was our first date.

It's not a really easy climb. I summited and I thought, "God, let me marry this woman."

So that's kind of how it started.

A Honeymoon in Burma

Ric Hansen:And then, as you told in the documentary, you went on your honeymoon in Burma for the most part.

David Eubank:Yeah.

Right before she agreed to marry me, I was invited to go to Burma to help a tribe called the Wa in northern Burma.

Burma is now 72 years of civil war — the longest-running civil war in the world.

A series of dictators just attacking their people has not stopped.

In fact, this year is probably the worst in about 70 years.

I'm getting ready to go back into Burma in about 10 days.

There are over 200,000 people newly displaced.

I was invited back in 1993 to come and help.

I had already asked Karen to marry me.

I was visiting her in Seattle. I was now at Fuller Seminary. I got out of the Army, went to Fuller Seminary in California, came up to visit her.

She was living on Queen Anne in a little apartment.

I asked her to marry me.

She said no.

I got a phone call from my dad. He tracked me down to her place.

He said, "Dave, I got the leader of the Wa tribe in Burma at my house in Thailand saying, 'Come and help us.'"

I prayed with him on the phone. I felt I should go.

I turned to Karen and said, "I'm going to Burma. I know you don't want to marry me. I guess it's over, but I've got to go."

Within a week, we were engaged.

That's a whole miracle.

Then we got married, and our honeymoon was in Burma, 1993.

Ric Hansen:Wow.

David Eubank:Twenty-eight years ago.

And without my wife Karen, I would definitely do many, many more bad things, and I would not do very many good things.

I always liked to do stuff alone, just running amok.

I like that saying, "He who travels fastest travels alone."

"I don't need anybody."

Year by year, I realized what a fool I am and how wonderful a gift Karen, my wife, is to me, and how little I could do without her.

Maybe some guys could do very well single.

God bless you. I couldn't.

The Mission of Free Burma Rangers

Ric Hansen:So you teamed up then in Burma.

Tell us about what it is you did then and continue to do.

It's relief for people who are in a war-torn country, basically, right?

David Eubank:Right.

You have Burma, which is now 72 years of war.

We are working on foot mostly, sometimes on horses, very rarely on vehicles, because the Burma Army controls most of the roads.

We're up in the big mountains. The mountains are where the ethnic people live on the periphery.

If you look at Burma, it's kind of a long-shaped country, and the border areas are very mountainous.

They all have the ethnic minorities, and that's where the fighting is.

The Burma Army comes in, launches mortars at a village, machine-guns it, tries to drive people away, and then they come in, loot the village, burn it and lay landmines so people won't want to come back.

When we hear about that, we walk.

It may take you a week to get there.

The people are gone from the village. They're hiding maybe two mountains over in a ravine where there's water, and they're scared and have no more food left.

Or they've got wounded people or sick people.

Our teams will come in, and the first thing we do is pray.

Whether they're Buddhist or Christian or animist or whatever their religion, we just say, "We come in Jesus' name. Can we pray?"

Everybody always says yes.

When you're in trouble, you want help.

And when you're in trouble, someone risks their life to get to you. That's credibility right there.

That means we're in this together.

As Free Burma Rangers, we are not a religious organization.

You can be any religion or no religion.

The leadership, myself and others, follow Jesus, and that's the way we go.

But you don't have to be a Christian to join us.

You have to do this for love.

We only have three rules.

You do this for love because we don't pay the teams.

You have to be able to read and write in some language because we do medicine and reporting, which requires literacy.

And the last one is: you can't run if people can't run.

We're not a militia. We're not there to fight anybody.

But if people are under attack as you're helping them, you cannot leave them until you get them all out.

At that moment, it's between you and God.

Let's say the Burma Army's right on you, shooting at you.

You can't run away until people can run away.

At that moment, you can fight back if you want. That's between you and God.

We're not pacifists, or you can stand there and take it, whichever one you want.

But you can't leave the people.

"Help People and Get the News Out"

Ric Hansen:That's a solid rule.

We're hearing about the incredible life's work of David Eubank as founder of Free Burma Rangers.

David Eubank:Yeah, that's a scary rule.

And the only way you can keep it is love.

Any of us who are parents, you would never leave your kid if they were under attack.

So it's the same thing.

When you don't have love someone, when you don't even know who they are, I've thought this many times:

"I'm going to die for that person. I don't even know who they are. They could be the town drunk and criminal, and I'm going to die and leave my wife a widow and my kids without a dad for that guy."

That's natural, right?

So then I have to pray, "Jesus, what do You want me to do? I'm not the Savior. You're the Savior. I'm Your servant. What do You want me to do?"

And I felt Him say, "Go help them. Go help him. You're My ambassador. Go help him."

"Okay, then Lord, give me love, because without love, I don't have the courage to go."

Love gives you the ability to do things you wouldn't normally do.

It happens to me all the time.

Our mission is to go in there, pray with people, encourage them, give them medical and food supplies, which we carry on horses or on other volunteers' backs.

We run a little clinic right there in the jungle — dentistry, surgery, minor surgery, medicine for malaria or typhoid, helping deliver babies.

Then we'll interview people because we want to get the news out.

If we boiled our mission down, it's this:

Help people and get the news out.

We want them to tell their stories — what happened to you?

We want them to tell their stories for their own sake, for their own honor, to know that this is not going to be a secret.

It's wrong, and people are going to know.

We want them to tell the story so the world knows what's happening.

We want them to tell their story so that the enemy who did it goes, "This is what you're doing. This is not secret. This is what you're doing."

We'll go with some of the men of the village.

They'll say, "Go show us your village."

"Well, it's three days away and the Burma Army's in between us."

"Okay, we have to sneak there."

We'll go around the Burma Army patrols and go back and document the burned villages, the destruction.

Then we can write that up and say, "This is what happened."

That's our main job:

Help people and get the news out.

For me and for the leadership of the Free Burma Rangers, we want to be ambassadors for Jesus, and we want people to know His love and to follow Him.

Whether they do or not, it's up to them.

And we help everybody.

Expanding the Mission to Sudan, Iraq and Syria

Ric Hansen:This has been going on for years, but now you've broadened, right?

There are other war-torn countries that the Free Burma Rangers have extended their life-giving services to, one of which is Iraq.

Is that the next country that you went to help?

David Eubank:Right before Iraq, we were invited to help in Sudan.

Sudan was the biggest country in Africa. They had a long civil war, and it got split in half — Sudan in the north and South Sudan, a separate country, in the south.

Some of the people who were in South Sudan were still in the north because when they drew the line, they were drawn into the north part, which they didn't want to be.

They were attacked constantly in what's called the Nuba Mountains of Sudan.

So we went to South Sudan and then infiltrated up with the Sudanese People's Liberation Army.

We went with them into the Nuba Mountains and trained relief teams in Africa.

We were bombed every single day.

Every day, Sudanese Air Force bombers would bomb us.

Now there's a ceasefire in that area.

That was 2014.

Then at the end of 2014, we were invited to help in Iraq because ISIS had hit and was growing in Syria and Iraq.

We were asked, "Come and help the Kurds up in northern Iraq."

We prayed about it, and it was a series for us of miracles that we could actually get there.

We ended up in northern Iraq and Kurdistan.

I remember being in the Nineveh Plains, where Mosul is.

I was on the front line with the Kurds. It was like World War I — these trenches — and you could see ISIS just about 500 or 600 yards away with their black flag flying.

I read the whole Book of Jonah in that trench and thought, "This is the same place."

The people repented and came to the Lord, but now we're in a different era and a different trouble.

I said, "God, what would we do in the Middle East?"

In Burma, we walk. We're fit. We know what we're doing.

We're like the first string in Burma, but we're really not that good.

If you took us out and put us somewhere else, we're like third string.

It's just that in the jungles of Burma, there's nothing to compare us with.

Here we are in the Middle East. They've got roads, hospitals, oil wells, infrastructure, tanks and airplanes, and Americans are behind them with airplanes.

"What would we do here?"

And I felt God tell me, "Give up your own way. Give up the Free Burma Ranger way and just come help these people."

It would be like if you're building a house with your dad and you're in the middle of it, and your dad said, "Son, stop. Go across the street to that old lady widow there. Everything she tells you to do for the next month, do it."

"But Dad, I'm helping you build the house."

"No, no, no. Go over there for one month and serve her."

That's exactly what it was.

Trust in the Middle East

Ric Hansen:Uh-huh.

David Eubank:It was, in a way, very liberating, but also very like I felt like an idiot.

What do you mean? We don't even know anybody.

We don't speak Arabic or Kurdish.

When I first met with the Kurdish general and offered our services, small as they are, as frontline relief workers, at the end I said, "Can I pray?"

He goes, "Yeah, pray."

My translator was there, and I'm going to pray in English.

I felt God say, "Get on your knees."

I was like, "Get on my knees? These guys will think I'm a nutcase."

And I felt God ask, "Are you afraid of Me, God? Are you afraid of them? Who do you want to look good to?"

I said, "Oh yeah, God. You win."

So I got on my knees and I prayed.

When I got up, the general, through my translator, said, "I have no idea what you said because you prayed in English, but I could see you respect God like we do. Thus, I trust you. You can go anywhere you want in my country."

I thought, "Wow."

Ric Hansen:Is that your son?

David Eubank:Yeah, that's my son.

"You brought your most precious thing. I give you my most precious thing — my nation. You can go anywhere."

So that was God opening the door for trust.

We had a very small relief team.

Many of our team leaders from Burma came.

These are Asian, brown-skinned guys with flip-flops, bags of betel nut, never seeing the desert, but amazing medics and amazing video people.

We had a combination of my family, some of our foreign volunteers, and our Burma medics and videographers working together with the Kurds up on Sinjar Mountain with the Yazidis.

Later on, with the Iraqi Army in the Battle of Mosul, later on in Syria, where we were still involved.

I just came out of Syria two weeks ago.

When Afghanistan fell apart, we were asked to go help.

By the time we moved to Tajikistan, which is north of Afghanistan, the bordering country, we started to cross over to the Panjshir Valley, and that fell.

So our main areas are Burma, Iraq and Syria, with relationships now in Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Sudan.

How Many People Are Involved?

Ric Hansen:This is not just you and your team. You've developed multiple teams, right?

There are Free Burma Ranger teams in all those countries doing this work ongoing.

Somewhere I think I read 4,500 teams. Is that right?

David Eubank:About 5,000 people we've trained.

We've trained hundreds of teams, but we have about 100 teams active in Burma right now.

We have a couple of teams in Sudan, but again, it's a ceasefire, so they're not doing that much.

In Iraq, we've got a team.

In Syria, we've got a team.

In Tajikistan, we don't have our own team. We have a couple of people who say they're on our team, and they're more like partners from the local church, the Tajik Church.

In Afghanistan, we have full-time teams in Syria and Iraq, and we have 100 full-time teams in Burma.

We're pretty small.

We've probably got about 700 total people around the world doing things.

Raising a Family in War Zones

Ric Hansen:You've touched on it briefly, but I wanted to dig in deeper about your family commitment to this project.

This is not just David off doing this.

You've already talked about Karen joining you, but you have three kids.

Tell us how all that works.

David Eubank:What a blessing.

Before we had kids, we were already going into Burma in the early '90s.

Right when Karen was pregnant with our first, Sahale, who was born in 2000, we talked about what's going to happen when we have kids.

Are we going to go into Burma with the kids?

They could die — not just from gunshots or being killed or captured. They could get malaria, typhoid, typhus.

All these things kill children.

It's a dangerous environment.

Karen said, "You know, we shouldn't be led by all the bad things that could happen in life. We should be led by the opportunities God gives us."

I think that's true no matter where you live.

Of course, bad things could happen. Those are all real.

You're not crazy to be afraid of them. They're all real.

But do you want to be led by those things that are not of God, or do you want to be led by the opportunities God gives?

We want to be led with the opportunity.

So when our kids were born, we took them into Burma.

Pete was three weeks old when he was carried in, nursing.

Karen's holding my backpack, no lights to avoid the Burma Army.

We did that because, one, we love our kids and want to be with them. That's where our mission is.

And two, I can think of no better life for them to grow up.

It's like growing up like Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone and Molly Pitcher — just running amok, riding horses when you're two years old, and there's almost no rules except be good.

Where we are with the ethnic people in Burma in the mountains, there are no locks on the doors because there are no doors.

That's the society.

You just go in and out of anybody's house anytime you want.

People generally do not steal, and there's not a lot to steal anyway.

They're like frontier people.

Our kids grew up like that.

My kids also grew up with hundreds of aunts and uncles who were not white. They're brown, they're Asian. That's their aunt and uncle.

They grow up looking at people for how they are, not by the color of their skin.

That's just a huge gift, I think.

They've developed into resilient, tough kids.

Pete's right over there doing homeschool on the porch.

My two girls now, Susanna and Sahale, are in university in their sophomore year at Texas A&M.

They both play polo.

Man, they are brutal polo players. They'll run you over on horses.

They just finished their finals, and they're flying here.

So, Rick, if you get to the end of the program, please pray they can get through all the COVID restrictions and link up with us, and we're going to go to Burma together.

When Prayers Aren't Answered the Way We Want

Ric Hansen:I'm sure there are dozens, maybe hundreds, of stories where God showed up.

And there may be some stories where He didn't show up — where things didn't go the way you'd hoped.

Give me one of each of those stories.

One of the stories that was absolutely God being with us. I'm sure there are a lot of them, but I want your best.

David Eubank:Oh, I don't know.

Ric Hansen:Pressure's on now.

David Eubank:So many stories of God showing up.

Some stories of disappointment and prayer.

I planted bamboo from the jungle — these are huge bamboos right there — and prayed for it, and it died.

I've got a baobab tree from Sudan. You know baobab trees? Look it up on the internet.

It's huge. It's growing.

What gives?

How come we prayed and planted a baobab from South Africa and it's growing?

The bamboo from Burma right next door is not growing. It died.

Those aren't the biggest things, are they?

I'm sure you've lost friends, maybe family.

I've lost friends and family, and I prayed and prayed and prayed, and they died.

Shaheen: A Brother in Iraq

Ric Hansen:Shaheen was one of those, right?

Shaheen was your interpreter and almost like a brother to you.

Tell us about him.

David Eubank:He was our translator.

He was Yazidi, which is a subgroup of the Kurds up in northern Iraq and Kurdistan.

They were targeted especially by ISIS for slaughter.

I met him in Sinjar, a place surrounded by ISIS.

My family was up with the displaced people in their tents helping. I was down at the front line.

I was with Shaheen.

When I first met him, he said, "You shouldn't."

He spoke perfectly English. Very funny guy.

He said, "I can be your interpreter, but I'm not going to go anywhere near the battle."

I said, "Well, then you're useless to me, man, because I work at the battle."

He would complain about America, about everybody who abandoned his people, and everybody was a coward and everybody let ISIS destroy his Yazidi people.

I got ready to go to the front line.

He said, "I'm not going."

I said, "Dude, you spent the whole time I've been with you, three days, complaining about the cowardice of Americans and the cowardice of the Iraqis and the Kurds, and you won't even go help your own people. I need you to help me talk. That's your role."

He goes, "Well, no. I'm proud to be a coward."

I said, "That's a horrible thing to be proud of."

He said, "I don't care."

I said, "Well, what is God telling you?"

He said, "God?"

I said, "You believe in God, right?"

"Yes, of course I do."

He was Yazidi.

I asked him, "What's the difference between Yazidi and Christians?"

He said, "One hair."

"One hair?"

"What's the difference between a Yazidi and a Muslim?"

"One mountain."

Big difference.

Yazidiism is kind of this mix of Zoroastrianism, some Christianity. It's kind of a mixed religion.

I said, "You won't go."

And I said, "If God tells you, would you go?"

"How would He tell me?"

"If you ask Him."

I grabbed his hand and prayed and said, "Lord Jesus, show Shaheen what to do."

When he was done, I said something I've never said to someone when I prayed ever.

It's not really me to know, but I just felt convicted to do it.

I said, "I don't know what God told you, but God told me you need to go."

Those are dangerous words, right?

I've never said that to anyone before, but I said it to him.

And he goes, "You're right. God told me I have to go."

I said, "Well then, stop being a coward. Let's go."

He transformed.

That was two years before he was killed.

In the Battle of Mosul, during a brutal firefight, we were rescuing a family who'd been shot up, all wounded.

Right before that, he hated the Kurds. He hated the Arabs.

Right before that, on May 4, 2017, as we went into battle, he turned to me and said:

"Dave, something happened to me. God changed my heart. I actually love the Arabs. Can you believe that?"

He's telling me that as we're going into battle.

He died.

We were shot that day.

He died nine days later of infection.

A great, great brother. Great friend. Very funny guy.

That was a huge loss.

I prayed and prayed, and it didn't come true.

The Miracle of Getting to Iraq

But I wanted to tell you three quick stories.

One is how we got to Iraq.

I'm in Burma in 2014 and 2015.

It's early February 2015.

I'm in Burma walking for two months in a very dangerous area.

To get to this one place in particular, I had to walk 19 days of those two months, about 20 or 30 miles a day.

When I got there, I was checking my satellite email on our backpacks — a little laptop with a satellite modem.

You don't surf the net, but you can send messages back and forth.

I sent a message.

I get a message from a guy named Victor Marx, who runs a ministry called All Things Possible.

He says, "Dave, I got invited to go do counseling for these Yazidi women who are tortured by ISIS and escaped. Dave, you come with us so you can do relief work in the combat zone because there's nobody up there. There's nobody there. Be there in seven days. I'll pay for it."

Seven days?

It took me 19 days — two months walking, 19 of which were getting to this place.

I'm on the wrong side of the Burma Army.

I asked my staff, my team.

We prayed.

"Yeah, of course."

That was easy.

"If God gets us out of here in seven days with a helicopter or something, we'll go to Iraq."

It was one of those easy, impossible-without-God prayers.

The next morning, the resistance leaders with us said:

"Hey, you're not going to believe this. The Burma Army that's blocking your way — they've left their positions from in front of you. They've gone behind you to follow you, which has opened the short way back."

Instead of walking 19 days back to the border, we could walk back in three days.

We walked about 30 miles a day.

No way.

We get to the border.

The border is usually guarded.

The guards were all asleep.

We crossed the border.

Our driver fell asleep on the other side in this other country, flipped our car, wrecked it completely.

We were unhurt.

We got out, got to the airport.

Now the other country's airport officials were looking for us because they're in cahoots with the Burma Army.

All the computers shut down.

They just said, "Get on a plane."

I land in Thailand.

Next thing I know, I'm on a plane to Iraq.

Seven days later, I was in Iraq.

How could that happen?

Those were all a bunch of miracles.

We were like Mr. Bean.

It wasn't like we were James Bond.

All we had to do was pray and try.

And so there we were in the Middle East.

Rescuing the Girl in Mosul

Ric Hansen:One of the scenes in the documentary, you see us running behind that tank and grabbing that girl.

David Eubank:She'd been hiding under her dead mom for three days.

That whole street had about 150 people shot up.

To me, it was a miracle that we could first of all get that tank because you couldn't just run down the street.

ISIS had not just machine guns and rifles and rockets that would kill you.

Even if you had a vehicle, they had anti-tank systems to blow your vehicles up.

They had destroyed tanks and everything.

You couldn't just run out and grab this kid.

What I wanted was a tank in front, an armored bulldozer behind to clear the way, and then Humvees behind.

We would push up to the corner where the girl was hiding under her dead mom, grab her, and the wounded guys, throw them in the Humvees and pull back with all that armor and support.

That's the Iraqi Army.

Ric Hansen:It's a compelling scene in the documentary.

It's a miracle that you got it videotaped so that it could be a part of all of that.

David Eubank:Yeah, we film everything.

We couldn't get there.

I asked the Iraqi Army, "Give me a bulldozer and a tank, and I'll follow on and do this rescue."

They said, "I'm really sorry for that kid. That's many kids dying. If we send a tank or bulldozer out, it'll get destroyed. We only have four tanks left out of the 30 we started with."

They had 112 armored cars in the beginning of this battle. They had 12 left.

The Iraqi Army was decimated.

He said, "We just can't lose our armored crew and our armor for that kid. Many more kids will die if we do that. I'm sorry. You can't do it."

Finally, I called the Americans, and they started dropping smoke, obscuring the enemy.

I get the Iraqi guy and he goes, "No."

I said, "Look, there's smoke."

He goes, "Doesn't matter."

I said, "If God told you, if Allah told you to give me these armored vehicles, would you?"

"Well, yes, if Allah told me."

I grabbed his hand and said, "Dear Allah, please tell this commander what to do. I don't know what to do. Please tell him what to do in Jesus' name, in Yeshua's name, in Isa's name. It's all words for Jesus."

I got done praying.

He opened his eyes.

I opened my eyes.

I said, "What did God tell you?"

He said, "One tank. Take it or leave it."

So that's why we're running.

That wasn't my plan.

My plan was the tank goes first, the armored bulldozer clears the way, and the Humvees go.

That would be the sensible way.

But there was no way for sensibility at that moment.

One tank. Take it or leave it.

So he said, "The Lord's chair" — and we ran.

I grabbed the girl.

I didn't get shot at. Bullets everywhere.

One of my guys got shot through the calf, but he lived.

Another guy was filming it.

We got two of the guys out.

One of the guys was killed.

So we actually only rescued the little girl and one other person out of that whole mess.

But to me, as I carried the girl back running with the tank behind me, now shooting and covering us, I just thought:

"God, thank You. I could be part of life. You did this. We just did our little part."

That was an answered prayer.

That girl is now reunited with her grandmother.

And that's a whole God story there.

Losing Zal in Syria

Then, later on in Syria, in 2019, one of the people who was on that mission was actually filming it from across the street — Zal Sang from Burma.

We were in Syria.

We got hit by a Turkish drone strike.

The Turks were supporting the Free Syrian Army, which were a bunch of jihadis, including ISIS people, who were attacking the Kurds.

We were in the middle of that.

People were dying and wounded every day.

We were evacuating people and taking care of wounded.

Finally, we got hit ourselves.

I was out of the vehicle the whole day, evacuating wounded.

Zal was making a video because we make videos constantly of situation reports.

He was sitting inside the armored vehicle.

He got out and said, "I finished the video."

It was kind of quiet that moment.

There had been shelling all day long, all around us, bullets everywhere.

But there were about 10 minutes of quiet.

He got out and took a seat to rest behind the vehicle.

I got in to look at his video — a three-minute video on a rescue we did the day before.

All of a sudden, the strike came in.

Boom.

It wounded two of my guys.

I was inside the vehicle, so I wasn't wounded.

It blew up our vehicle, but it was armored.

I got out and saw Zal on his back.

He had a hole through his head, in his temple and out behind his ear.

He had a hole the size of my two thumbs through his neck.

He was obviously dead.

But I didn't want him to die.

He's like my brother. He raised my kids.

I ran up to him and looked at him and thought, "He's dead."

But I'm just praying I could do something.

My eyes were drawn up involuntarily, like there was something that drew my eyes up.

This has never happened to me.

There was still shelling going on, fighting and shooting.

But I looked up and I saw Zal's face in heaven, huge smile.

He gives me this big smile.

Then he turns his head and laughs, like he always did, and he disappears.

I thought, "Wow. Heaven happens fast."

Oh my God, he's already there, and he's happy.

When I thought later about what his eyes were saying to me, it wasn't like, "Oh, that's so terrible that guy died."

It wasn't, "Oh, what a mess. My one-year-old daughter who turned one this day is going to be without a dad. My widowed wife. Oh, poor Dave."

It wasn't that.

He was smiling and laughing.

And I felt his eyes say to me:

"Keep building God's kingdom on that earth. You're doing the best thing. Keep going, bud. It's not that bad. Don't worry. I've got to get up here, and you'll come here later."

Living With Sorrow, Without Shame

I've never seen someone in heaven like I saw.

That's great.

It turned my eyes back to him, to the dead body, because I love him.

We started working on him.

We took him to a hospital. It was only four kilometers, two miles away.

The hospital was on the front line. The invasion had come that far south.

We carried his body into the hospital.

They worked on him for over an hour.

He was long dead, but they're working on him.

Electric shocks, adrenaline, oxygen, CPR.

After over an hour of that, the Kurdish doctor put his hand on my arm and said:

"Is it enough?"

I said, "He's dead, isn't he?"

And he said, "Zal was dead before you brought him to the hospital. He died instantly."

But we'd been working on him because we loved him, and we loved David.

We all started crying.

But I knew he was already in heaven.

In this world, we're trying to do our best to hold on to life.

Ric Hansen:Yeah.

David Eubank:That's true.

Those are examples of prayers that were not answered the way I wanted.

I wanted him to live.

I wanted him to come back.

But it's not that way.

So I only know this, Rick.

I believe — and I know that it works for me in experience — that God works good from all things to those who believe in Him and are called according to His purpose.

He brings good from all evil.

It doesn't mean things aren't evil or good. There are evil things.

But He's bigger than evil.

He's bigger, and He brings good from it.

And also, we can live with sorrow in this world.

We can't live with shame.

Jesus comes. He doesn't take away our sorrow because sorrow is about love.

He wept Himself.

So it means we can live well with sorrow, but shame we can't live with.

He comes to take away our shame, take away our sin, so we can be part of His kingdom on this earth.

Love as much as we can until we get to heaven.

Supporting Free Burma Rangers

Ric Hansen:Man, with that, we've got to cut.

I could listen to these amazing stories and hear all of the wonderful things that you're doing all night long, quite frankly.

We've come to the end of our time here.

Maybe when you come back from Syria or somewhere along the line, we can get an update.

At this point, just tell me how we can support you.

The documentary is online somewhere, right?

How could we find that?

David Eubank:The documentary is called Free Burma Rangers. It's on Amazon.

You can also get a DVD from LifeWave Films.

And you can contact us.

You can look at our website: freeburmarangers.org.

You can find out anything you want about the movie, about the documentary, how to get it.

You can get it free streaming now from the people that helped make it, Daadocs, another group, but I can connect you to those through our website.

And I wrote a book called Do This for Love: Free Burma Rangers from the Battle of Mosul.

You can buy that book on Amazon too, hardcover or e-book.

I think the biggest thing we need is prayer.

Right now, pray that my daughters can make it here from Texas A&M through all the COVID restrictions, and that we can get into Burma and make a difference.

Ric Hansen:Thank you, David.

That was an amazing time to spend, and we've got to get back together again.

God bless you.

Continue the great work that you're doing, and we'll keep in touch.

Thanks for taking the time with us today.

David Eubank:Thanks, Rick.

And I pray that I can come see that awesome place of yours in Fox Island.

When we come to the States next year, I'll be in touch with you.

I love it.

Let's do that.

All right, thank you, man.

In Jesus' name.

All right, bye.

Bye-bye.

Closing

Ric Hansen:Wow.

Unbelievable, for sure, what David Eubank and thousands of volunteers are doing every day in Burma, Iraq, Sudan and Syria.

I can't think of a better way to launch Season Two here than this great story on Amazing Greats.

Thanks to Jonathan Webb for connecting us with David, and thank you for listening, sharing and praying as we grow our audience week after week.

Check out our website for more amazing content at AmazingGreats.net.

The Amazing Greats podcast is produced and edited by Clem Daniels.

Until next time, God bless.