While tens of thousands of Jewish people have left Ukraine since the outbreak of the war and found a new home in Israel, most seniors have stayed where they were. The ailments of age have kept many from leaving their apartments. The fact that there are Christians supporting them in prayer and practical help gives them new hope.
It’s two o’clock in the morning. I am awakened by the shrill sound of a siren. Is this live? Or is my hotel neighbor getting an air raid warning from a more Eastern city in Ukraine he may have registered for?
I am back in Ukraine for the first time in a year. Were it not for the tank traps along the side of the road, no one would suspect a war in this golden October land. God gave me a time window, a small team and a driver to visit some of the needy in our sponsorship program—those who have stayed behind, which is true for most of them. The elderly, who all received an apartment from the state through their work during Soviet times and lived their entire lives there, find it incredibly difficult now in their advanced age to leave their familiar four walls behind.
The seniors of the Jewish community in Uman sit around the checkered plastic tablecloth like in the olden days. Their meeting place is a ground floor flat in an apartment block from the 1970s or so. Most of the elderly are Holocaust survivors. Several have died since our last visit; others have been added to the group. The table is set with homemade honeypie and “Sharlottka” – a delicious apple cake. How grateful they are to know they are supported by their Christian friends during these difficult times. The walls are decorated with photos of our many visits, which used to happen regularly with international groups—all before corona.
Then we venture out to visit the less mobile community members. We climb the stairs with a large bag of fresh food items in hand and sound Galina’s doorbell. She leads us to the living room and immediately breaks out in tears.
“Look at this—this is what my son-in-law sent from the battlefront! This is what he received from some volunteers, and he sends it off to ensure I’m taken care of!”
A large bag of freeze-dried meals sits in front of the wall unit, a pair of felt boots standing next to it. Volodya is deployed to somewhere in Eastern Ukraine. He was in hospital with a concussion resulting from heavy combat, but soon had to return to the frontlines.
So many tears. It is a time to weep with those who weep, embrace Ukraine’s Galinas and comfort them with the words of Psalm 91: “He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High … will say of the LORD, ‘He is my refuge and my fortress’…”
Galina knows there are people in far-away countries who pray for her and share what they have. This comforts her. She asks us to say a special thankyou to the woman who knitted the beautiful socks for her.
“I leave this world the same way I entered it – in wartime,” says Lilia, who ended up in a ghetto with her grandmother as a 4-year-old. Her Ukrainian mother was able to buy her out and hide her; the grandmother was shot.
Then Lilia corrects herself. “No. I still want to live to see the end of the war!”
Before we say goodbye, Lilia takes her crutches and makes her way downstairs, step by step. “I made so many food preserves for the winter—raspberries, blackcurrant, pickled cucumbers. I want you to take some with you!”
It’s already getting dark. A few hours ago, Koen, the director of Christians for Israel’s work in Ukraine, left for Zaporozhe with his team and hundreds of food parcels—in the eye of the storm. Just a few hours earlier, the city was heavily bombed. Now many in the Jewish community are waiting for our team’s arrival—some wait for material help, others for a seat in the bus that will take them to safety. By the end of the week, 81 members of the Jewish community will have been evacuated from burning Zaporozhe by our bus. New requests keep coming in.
Aliyah and comfort, returning to Zion and packing food parcels, listening and hugging are some of the ways God uses us to help restore His Jewish people.
0 Comments