Et la vie continue...

If you've taken a gander at the news lately you saw that Côte d'Ivoire is in a political pickle, to say it lightly. Two men have claimed the presidency after the run-off elections last Sunday, in fact both had themselves sworn in yesterday. If you want to know more check out the BBC news page here.

In past week I have had some interesting experiences: I've visited with a mourning young widow and family of a man who died from malaria, a family who had a small fire in their house, a woman whose father is in Abidjan trying to get chemotherapy and I attended my first Ivoirian burial of a man about my age who died in a moto (motorbike) accident. I think it's interesting that the week that the country is in political turmoil, I have had many experiences with the pain and heartache of 'normal' life. While the world has finally turned it's attention to Côte d'Ivoire, I've seen the tears of a woman who's husband died too soon, prayed with a woman who is scared for her fathers health, and heard a father's cries as he buried his son. Life goes on, even in the midst of this political mess. Not to say that life hasn't been affected by the state of the nation, it certainly has.

My perspective of it all has changed. In the last few years, I have studied, prayed for, and read the news stories about these types of situations. And when I did, I defined people's lives by whatever national issue was affecting them. It was easy for me to think that a country is made up of some uniform group instead of individuals who are simply living. Individuals who mourn, love, get scared, celebrate, laugh, visit, sit, sleep, rest, play, cry. They live.

God sees the nation and its problems while simultaneously seeing, knowing, and loving each individual. He knows all the issues in their complexity and HE is the answer to the problems. He doesn't forget each person as we pray for peace, for the elections, for reconciliation.

And so I am asking for you to pray for this country, for peace. I am also asking you to pray for Ivoirians, whose lives in many ways are strangely the same as they wait and watch and pray for peace here. Pray also for those whose lives may never be the same after this past week.