Greetings Pax Pres! As the news regarding Russia and the Ukraine continue to unfold in significant ways this week, I honestly do not feel that more words from someone like me are needed in this age of every pundit under the sun offering their analysis of the global matters at hand.
Instead, it is a time such as this when the timelessness of
God‘s Word is what is needed.
Acts 17:26-27 says, “From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands. God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us.”
Psalm 46 says:
"God is our refuge and strength,
an ever-present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
and the mountains fall into the heart of
the sea,
though its waters roar and foam
and the mountains quake with their
surging.
There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
the holy place where the Most High
dwells.
God is within her, she will not fall;
God will help her at break of day.
Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;
he lifts his voice, the earth melts.
The Lord Almighty is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress.
Come and see what the Lord has done,
the desolations he has brought on the
earth.
He makes wars cease
to the ends of the earth.
He breaks the bow and shatters the spear;
he burns the shields with fire.
He says, “Be still, and know that I am God;
I will be exalted among the nations,
I will be exalted in the earth.”
The Lord Almighty is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress.
Romans 8 declares: “I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God. …In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God. And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.”
Whether you are looking for hope in your own personal anxieties
and uncertainties, or hope regarding the affairs in the Ukraine and its impact
on civilians, military, missionaries for the Gospel, and the least of these -
if that is the hope you are seeking in these tenuous days, then I point you
back to Scriptures such as those above to guide your prayer and to fill you
with God’s strength and hope. Not to remove us from caring about the affairs of
the nations, but rather to deepen our perspective and the way we pray.
I also point you to a song that has meant a lot to me in various seasons of uncertainty in the last few years: “Ancient of Days” by Shane & Shane.
“Though the nations rage
Kingdoms rise and fall
There is still one King
Reigning over all…”
May the word of Christ and the peace of Christ dwell richly in
you as you look for ways to pray for global affairs and all those in need, and
to do your part in showing the love of Christ to our neighbors.
