(Here are my remarks to August 25 prayer rally hosted by Concerned Women for America in Lafayette Park in Washington DC on behalf of Afghanistan.)
Some of you may recall the old hymn:
Once to every man and nation
Comes the moment to decide,
In the strife of truth with falsehood,
For the good or evil side;
Some great cause, God’s new Messiah,
Offering each the bloom or blight,
And the choice goes by forever
Twixt that darkness and that light.
Afghanistan has fallen to darkness but many will resist.
We pray for the church, for persons who fought with us, for human rights advocates, for women and minorities, for their protection, that they might be covertly subversive.
We pray especially for the church that its witness will be subtle, bold and effective.
All of us who believe in divine sovereignty know that the Taliban will not endure and even now the seeds of its overthrow are germinating.
We pray specifically for the conversion of members of the Taliban from darkness to light, that they will play a role in restoring their nation to the family of lawful nations.
We pray for divine surprises in the days months and years ahead, that God will use unlikely persons for His purposes in Afghanistan. We pray that God will bless and redeem all the labors and sacrifices over 20 years by Afghans, Americans and many others who hoped for a country of freedom and law. God will be faithful and righteousness will prevail.
Though the cause of evil prosper,
Yet ’tis truth alone is strong;
Though her portion be the scaffold,
And upon the throne be wrong:
Yet that scaffold sways the future,
And, behind the dim unknown,
Standeth God within the shadow,
Keeping watch above His own.
Comment by Larry Collins on August 27, 2021 at 6:17 pm
Amen. Very well said. Thank you. Loved the hymn quote.
Comment by Lee Cary on September 1, 2021 at 9:16 am
There’s a scene in “Apocalypse Now” were the cynical Captain Willard comments after the crew of the patrol boat taking him up-river over reacts and shoots up the Vietnamese civilians on a small boat carrying vegetables.
” It’s a way we had over here with living with ourselves. We cut ’em in half with a machine gun and give ’em a Band-Aid. It was a lie. And the more I saw them, the more I hated lies.”
So, “We pray for the church, for persons who fought with us, for human rights advocates, for women and minorities, for their protection, that they might be covertly subversive.” Really?
This after we leave “many of the persons who fought with us” behind.
We would be less hypocritical praying for forgiveness for our betrayal. Don’t you think?