There were to be weddings. There were to be bouquets of dazzling sunflowers. More golden flowers were to be woven into the hair of brides.
Now, tanks have trampled the fields and planted enemy soldiers in unending rows. Rockets roar, explosions shake the ground, civilians are targets. A burned-out building casts a dead gray shadow over the Pinocchio Kindergarten playground that had been scorched by missiles. There is neither life nor mercy in metal.
The psalmist’s lament, which is a sentiment even older than the ancient script, rings desperately true: “How long, O Lord, how long?”
The Russian military caravan is 40 miles long. The capital of Kyiv is encircled like a noose. Anemic babies cry out from bunkers underneath the hospitals. Far away, a man who Madeleine Albright once called “reptilian” is unmoved by international economic pressure and pleas for mercy. If he is a genius, Putin is a diabolical one.
More ancient prayers of lament for our time and place: “Out of the depths, we have cried out to you, O Lord. Hear our voices.”
Over one million refugees have fled into the teeth of monstrous traffic jams. A volunteer named Daniel took his place in a short line to receive instruction to fire an AK-47. He was a coffee roaster last week. He is just 21 years old.
This is an ancient land. Slavic peoples once worshiped the sun. Christians have prayed in the Monastery of the Caves for 1,000 years. The Orthodox Church popularized the sunflower by allowing the use of its oil during the fast of Lent. Eventually, Ukraine led the entire world in sunflower production, exporting oil, seeds and flowers far and wide. Ukrainians are a remarkable, resilient people.
Many people of good faith thought a new era of peace had taken root and would flourish. The blood of victims from previous wars cried out from the ground. Never again, we said. We believed in the promises of progress.
“My soul is in deep anguish. How long, O Lord, how long?”
A Ukrainian woman offered a Russian soldier a packet of sunflower seeds. “Put them in your pockets,” she said. But he was cruel-eyed and foul-mouthed. He must be scared. He and his battalion are a long, long way from home. They are just barely old enough to shave, yet they hold life and death in their hands.
“Forgive them, for they know not what they do.”
We are all capable of wielding terror and justifying brutality in the name of the Holy.
We are also created in magnificent grace and able to perform extraordinary acts of resistance that make the evil things quail. The Ukrainians removed road signs along the major highways in order to complicate navigation for the invading forces. They tied strips of cloth into camouflage netting. They have passed out plastic foam plates full of sliced bread and have also filled sandbags. They continue to pray in ancient holy sites of their homeland and in hastily erected tent villages in refugee camps. May we join them in heart and mind.
O Lord, our help in ages past, may we continue to give packets of seeds. May there again be weddings. May there again be fields of gold. “For though weeping may linger for the night, joy comes in the morning.”
Andrew Taylor-Troutman is the pastor of Chapel in the Pines Presbyterian Church. His newly-published book is a collection of his columns for the Chatham News + Record titled “Hope Matters: Churchless Sermons.”