Rebels macheted off arms, and this man stayed behind in the mayhem

Desmond Bell prayed that his daughter would make no noise, so that the violent rebels outside wouldn't be drawn to his house.

It was 1999, and Wilberforce was overrun by mercenaries who sought to control the country's diamond mines. They ruthlessly cut off limbs of random people as part of the terror-spreading campaign.

Bell peaked out from his window as he prayed. The rebels had just entered his neighbor's house. But they seemed to move away from his. Most of the neighborhood was hidden in his house, not because he had better security, but because he was a pastor, and people thought he would have favor with God for a miraculous deliverance. Even the local iman was there.

Bell, 43, who told his story at the Lighthouse Church Wednesday night, narrowly escaped that night.

Within days, Bell was on the phone with his brother in England. They were applying for him to get a refugee visa. Since Bell once resided in England, they figured it would be a slam dunk. All he would have to do is escape to nearby The Gambia, a former British colony, to from there travel to England.

Bell thought happily about all the prosperity he and his young family could have in England.

But he also wondered about the dozens of people attending his fledgling church. He felt a great responsibility towards them as spiritual overseer. To immigrate or not became a dilemma.

In the end, Bell opted to stay in the war-ravaged Sierra Leone, thinking that was what God wanted for him.

“I could have died,” he said. “But it was the will of God. If I would have gone to England, I think I would abandoned God altogether. Sometimes it seems like God's will is very difficult. It's hard to swallow. Every logic was to go to England. But God told me to stay in Sierra Leone.”

Eventually, the West African nation – known as the second poorest country in the world at that time, despite its diamonds – signed peace. After Wilberforce, Bell planted a church in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2002, and then another in Nigeria in 2009.

Today he's pastoring in Marseille, France.

You may not appreciate the irony. He's a Third World man pastoring in a First World country and he's made inroads into the white French population. The previous missionary, a white American, only got Africans in on congregation and couldn't hardly make headway among the white French.

“Just stay where God wants you,” he said. “I stayed where God wanted me, and He blessed my ministry. God gave me unprecedented revival.”

The Lighthouse Church has invested about $1 million in the church in Marseille, said Senior Pastor Rob Scribner to the congregation on Wednesday. Under Bell, the Marseille church has 40-60 congregants.

Lighthouse Christian Academy students hear testimonies like this regularly at the Lighthouse Church.

When he turned down his brother's offer to get the refugee visa, the aghast England resident was disgusted with Bell for risking his life and turning down his generous help, Bell said. Communication pretty much dropped.

But recently when he visited Bell in France, he saw that God was, in fact, behind the decision to stay.

“The decision you made was the best for your life,” he told Bell.