Our sports and entertainment industries depend on us as their spectators. However, we never planned to attend a war unfolding in real time.
We are stuck in a bizarre and horrifying spectacle as the free world, immobilized by the very treaties meant to prevent war, watches while Ukraine keeps getting brutalized before our eyes. We pray, we donate to charities aiding the new refugees, we internalize our distress.
We also cry out to God at the senselessness of such suffering. Why does God allow evil like this to occur – and keep repeating itself throughout history? The answer parallels our being made in the image of God (Genesis 1:27).
Our actions have real consequences. When we thrive in a relationship with the living God through faith in Jesus and demonstrate his life and character, our deeds bless others. But when people set themselves up in place of God and impose their will, the result is selfish, ugly, brutal, catastrophic. So, we cry out to God… and he responds. His timetable may not correspond to ours, but he does answer.
Psalm 10 records the cry of those suffering brutal oppression. “Lord, why do you stand so far away? Why do you hide in times of trouble? In arrogance the wicked relentlessly pursue the afflicted; let them be caught in the schemes they have devised… In all his scheming, the wicked arrogantly thinks: ‘There is no accountability, since God does not exist.’” (Psalm 10:1-2, 4)
Ultimate justice may provide little comfort to those who endure present suffering.
“He (the wicked one) waits in ambush near the villages; he kills the innocent in secret places. His eyes are on the lookout for the helpless.” (v8)
It’s excruciating to observe the plight of Ukrainian families grow worse daily. But God has not forgotten those living in the midst of such chaos, with no other hope. “Rise up, Lord God! Lift up your hand. Do not forget the afflicted. Why has the wicked person despised God? He says to himself, ‘You will not demand an account.’ But you yourself have seen trouble and grief, observing it in order to take the matter into your hands. The helpless entrusts himself to you; you are a helper of the fatherless.” (vv 12-14)
God frequently works through us in answer to prayer. Governments, for instance, have a responsibility to reward good and punish evil (1 Peter 2:14): that’s why we should urge our leaders to take even stronger action.
Simultaneously, let’s pray for God’s intervention to end this barbarism in a way no one expects. Let’s help the Ukrainian people get through this disaster and back on their feet. And let’s trust our lives to Jesus: he will guide us out of our own darkness and shine his light and life through us in our fallen world.
“Lord, you have heard the desire of the humble; you will strengthen their hearts. You will listen carefully, doing justice for the fatherless and the oppressed so that men of the earth may terrify them no more.” (vv 17-18)
Don Baumann is outreach pastor (retired) at Hilltop Community Church.
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