Don't turn the page

A street friend of mine named Iggy was telling me the other day about a meeting he had with his social worker.
The meeting was going well until the social worker suddenly excused herself to meet her next client. She had been taking notes of her conversation with Iggy, but as she got up to leave, Iggy said, ‘She turned the page. In turning the page to prepare herself for her next client, it was as though she’d forgotten me. All she could see was her next appointment and I didn’t matter anymore.’

Watching the images of the devastation in Haiti - the broken homes, the broken families, the broken neighbourhoods, there eventually comes a point where I turn the page, I change the channel, I move on to something else.
I’ve seen enough. I may write a cheque to one of the relief agencies helping the victims of this crisis, I may say a brief prayer, but ultimately I move on, I turn the page, I change the channel and watch something else.

But the people in Haiti - the ones mired in this crisis, can’t turn the page. They can’t be elsewhere. Their struggles will continue long after they cease to be a headline, long after the world’s attention has moved on to something else.

But God doesn’t turn the page.
‘Can a mother forget her nursing child?
Can she feel no love for the child she has borne?
Even if that were possible, I will not forget you!
See I have written your name on the palms of my hands.
Always in my mind is a picture of Jerusalem’s walls in ruins.’
Isaiah 49:15,16

Always in God’s mind, is the picture of Port-au-Prince in ruins.
He does not turn the page. He suffers with those who suffer. And he works with those who give themselves to alleviate the suffering.

God is bigger than poverty and famine. He is bigger than earthquakes. He is big enough to answer every cry of anguish, big enough to embrace every hurting person, big enough to make room for the millions now without a home.
And he asks us to join him in this work.
By prayer.
Prayer takes us to the places where God is at work.
Prayer takes us to the page where God is at work in Haiti.

We pray because without God’s help - there will not be the love that heals, nor the comfort that brings hope, nor the hope needed to give Haiti a future.
We are praying to the Lord God Almighty. He was the Lord of all before the universe began. He was Lord Almighty before there were such things as earthquakes or poverty or death. And He will still be Lord Almighty when earthquakes and poverty and death are no more.

Psalm 46 tells us that God is the refuge and strength of the helpless, always ready to help in times of trouble. The Psalm tells us that we are not to fear when earthquakes come, nor are we to fear when the mountains crumble into the sea.
Rather than be afraid, the Psalmist tells us, we are to be still and know that He is God.
We are to be still and know that he will be honoured by every nation - he will be honoured in all the world.

The Lord rescues the poor from trouble
and increases their families like flocks of sheep
The godly will see these things and be glad
while the wicked are struck silent.
Those who are wise will take all this to heart.
They will see in our history the faithful love of the Lord.
Psalm 107:41-43