“Lament”

I grieve with you

my ancient cousins…

in soulful horror

twelve thousand miles away.

My mind runs on a reel

of viscous helplessness,

a horror film in real time.

There is no earthly speech

nor lofty language—

The sweetest notes on earth

would not suffice—

to ease your aching sorrow,

my impotent inertia. 

Can “my thoughts are with you”

scatter your grief or meet your needs?

No, they are like chaff in the wind,

a mindless banality.

I give the dust of my wealth,

a drop in your desert of parched tongues.

In my impotence, my anger unfolds

towards your futile leaders

 and I spit on their neglect.

For they have sat, smug and glib–

acting important and doing little–

While you, the soul of your country,

are crushed under wobbly foundations

thinly built through greed and avarice!

These tentacles of the wicked

clench your native balls

as the ground rumbles beneath.

All I can do, in every prayerful breath,

is remind you of your ancestors,

who cradled the infancy of Christianity

in their hearts and lives,

 and inspire you to cry out to Jehovah

 in the name of Yeshua the Messiah—

the most powerful prayer in any language.

I lift you up in my prayers,

away from political harangues,

human to human, soul to soul.

What does it take to move us out of our collective inertia? Does human suffering need to be at a level “10” to be noticed in the cacophany of media? Am I just adding to it or adding something raw and meaningful? I hope it is the latter, and that you will immerse yourself in my feelings of impotent empathy for these people. If you can do nothing, you can pray actively and creatively, give resources and raise these people up to your churches and meeting places.

I, in horror, sit here in puzzlement over some really bad decisions by the leaders of Turkey. Why do leaders sit on something so important as safety? Your people are only as strong as the foundations on which they rest! But do not allow indignation to subside into smug indifference. Yes, using precious resources to attack Kurds is representative of these foolish leaders. But as to any indifference to the suffering of the people, I will remind you of what happened to the great city of Tyre, whose people dared to rejoice in the sufferings of Jerusalem in Ezekiel. For this, over time, the Lord caused nations to sweep over them in waves upon waves of invasion before their final destruction in, I believe, the middle ages. Never rejoice in another country who is suffering, for the Lord will not stay His hand long before striking yours. I fear our time is around the corner.

There are those who say the Old Testament is not for us, and I will reply with Solomon’s “what has once come will come again”. The principles of good living and what is right and wrong will never be outdated. Christianity swept the world through the Messiah (whose ancient promise is most prominently outlined in the OT Septuigint, the version most read by gentiles of the day) and through the power that Jesus gave to believers in the first century. It will never be outdated to those with eyes to see.

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