In a world with many sorrows, I don't necessarily look away. A year ago, when I was so sick growing Max, I had to look away, especially from the Ukraine. But normally I seek out news of the world. In fact, it moves me most, events in the world across cultures.
This past week has had its sorrows, from the news and closer to home. I don't know anyone who wasn't deeply affected by the death of the Jordanian pilot at the hands of the Islamic State. I didn't seek extra information besides what I read or heard on the radio. It was enough to break my heart from the other side of the world. I thought Omid Safi's article about Moaz was particularly humanizing.
Six days ago, friends from our little community in Colorado lost their baby in the third trimester. They are the fourth people in the past year who've lost a baby. I've been sad every day.
In 1998, I saw an insert in my church bulletin that Trans World Radio was starting a program called "Project Hannah: Women of Hope." It was meant to encourage isolated women around the world, and train them practically in nutrition, health, parenting, work, and life in Christ. As a teenager, I sent away for their information and used their daily prayer calendar through college. The prayer calendar is specific, usually topical for a month, and they mailed it to me. They now broadcast in 70 languages.
But then I became itinerant. I stopped following their work, donating occasionally, but not praying daily as I had for those years. The calendar still comes to one of my three addresses, but my life is still pretty irregular.
This fall, I found out they had an app. I spend a lot of time on my smartphone, more than I can be proud of, but so it is. I downloaded their app, and now have access to their daily prayer needs once again.
I mention this because I've found it's an antidote to being overwhelmed by information, even though in some cases the prayer requests alert me to suffering of which I hadn't been aware. The prayer needs are tough, here is today's,
This past week has had its sorrows, from the news and closer to home. I don't know anyone who wasn't deeply affected by the death of the Jordanian pilot at the hands of the Islamic State. I didn't seek extra information besides what I read or heard on the radio. It was enough to break my heart from the other side of the world. I thought Omid Safi's article about Moaz was particularly humanizing.
Six days ago, friends from our little community in Colorado lost their baby in the third trimester. They are the fourth people in the past year who've lost a baby. I've been sad every day.
In 1998, I saw an insert in my church bulletin that Trans World Radio was starting a program called "Project Hannah: Women of Hope." It was meant to encourage isolated women around the world, and train them practically in nutrition, health, parenting, work, and life in Christ. As a teenager, I sent away for their information and used their daily prayer calendar through college. The prayer calendar is specific, usually topical for a month, and they mailed it to me. They now broadcast in 70 languages.
But then I became itinerant. I stopped following their work, donating occasionally, but not praying daily as I had for those years. The calendar still comes to one of my three addresses, but my life is still pretty irregular.
This fall, I found out they had an app. I spend a lot of time on my smartphone, more than I can be proud of, but so it is. I downloaded their app, and now have access to their daily prayer needs once again.
I mention this because I've found it's an antidote to being overwhelmed by information, even though in some cases the prayer requests alert me to suffering of which I hadn't been aware. The prayer needs are tough, here is today's,
Please pray for young girls and women who are violently and emotionally traumatized. Ask that they will come to know God's restoration and healing through Jesus Christ. Many are in despair and consider suicide as an escape from the torment of being locked away, beaten, starved, and raped when they resist their pimps.
Despite the sorrows, this prayer calendar offers me the one thing I can do about any of this [besides working in these environments, giving money, and contacting my senator]. To pray. I am encouraged to be a part of Project Hannah again because I join my prayers with others around the world.
I had a hard fall, and it wasn't particularly because I was a new mom. Reconnecting with these lives of women who suffer put my own suffering in perspective, but not in a way that belittled my experience. Rather I thought, if Christ is there for the worst of what these women go through, he is here now. That was the other gift of returning to Project Hannah.
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