All morning my heart is praying.
A missionary to Ukraine, Scott, let us know that today, Tuesday, was asked to be a day of fasting and prayer for Ukraine.
How human God's people are feeling!
Certainly not divine, or all-knowing, or omniscient, or immortal.
Our mortality confronts us at every turn.
Like a helpless rabbit we are in the face of coyotes and foxes and bears.
I can hardly miss a meal without recognizing my human needs.
I am as fragile as the hens I fed yesterday--constantly depending on their owners for grain and water.
Gathering eggs is a comfort to me, a common ordinary task that yields something good to eat.
Not to brag, or to be seen by men, but to simply let God know that, just like the helpless Ukrainians,
I am depending on Him.
"Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength," I read when my Bible opened by my bedroom window this morning.
But, "Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, and whose hope is the Lord."
Truly, Lord, our hope is in You. Not in the leadership of Ukraine, not in their army or their ragtag bands of swiftly-trained young people. Not in sandbags or weapons or molotov cocktails.
But in You!
"O Lord, my strength and my fortress, my refuge in the day of affliction, the Gentiles shall come to You."
And here is the promise I am holding before the Lord today as I join my brothers and sisters in Ukraine in prayer, fasting, and depending on the Lord,
"Therefore, behold, I will this once cause them to know, I will cause them to know My hand and My might; and they shall know that My name is the Lord." (Jer. 16:21)
Them.
The Russians.
The Ukrainians.
The fathers, the mothers, the sons, the daughters, the grandfathers and babushkas.
The babies and elderly.
The soldiers and civilians.
The presidents and leaders and generals.
Lord, we are asking and trusting that You will cause them to know Your hand and Your might,
that they may know that Your name is the Lord."
Thanks for your thoughts and of the notice of a day of prayer and fasting.
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