‘Ukraine will win,’ says Jesus? | Rogerharper’s Blog (wordpress.com) But how?
By creative, unexpected, harassment which has far greater impact than imagined. Not so much through force of arms supplied by The West. More through small manoeuvres of surprise and emotional impact. A few people will dream up minor ventures which seem crazy, could well be a waste of time, but make a big impact on already demoralised Russian soldiers. Like the Tigrayans recently ridding their land of Ethiopian and Eritrean soldiers.
In September it was reported ‘Russian soldiers are running away, ditching their equipment, asking to surrender.’ https://www.anneapplebaum.com/2022/09/11/its-time-to-prepare-for-a-ukrainian-victory/ Since then, Russian soldiers have been made to toughen up, keep fighting. The underlying sense among most Russians remains a desire to get out of Ukraine, without losing their lives. Russians are used to hearing and saying one thing and thinking, believing, the opposite. In Communist times everyone knew how to repeat Party propaganda, to do what they were told, but carelessly and sloppily. Putin is now trying to recrate the Communist Russian Empire and is thereby recreating the careless and sloppy obedience of most soldiers. Their hearts are not in this fight. Their capacity for killing Ukrainians is stretched to the limit. Worth continuing to pray for the demoralisation of the Russian soldiers.
Despite the reputation of the Old Testament God as blood-thirsty, the actual texts show a God working with, accommodating to, blood-thirsty people, trying to minimise the killing, encouraging them not to rely on military strength.
This God, shown more fully in and through Jesus, is being called on now to help the Ukrainians. We can expect the help He sends to be similar to that given to the Israelites of the Old Testament. and the Tigrayans of today.
In the Old Testament we read of Gideon taking a ludicrously small group of soldiers against the huge Midianite army which had invaded the land. Trumpets blown from very close, clay jars smashed, lights suddenly appearing, all terrified the Midianite soldiers. Helped by previous demoralising dreams and rumours spread by God’s Spirit. The Midianites fled. Judges 7:1-22
We read also of the Israelites being given godly information on the movements and supply lines of enemy troops. This leads to an enemy special military operation which fails because an army of angels blinds them. 2 Kings 6:8-23. The blind army is taken captive and the Israelites are told to feed them and send them home. This time, they do as they are told.
The ungrateful enemy return and besiege Samaria, the capital city. Food runs out, the people are starving. Then the enemy army flees in unexplained God-sent, terror – 2 Kings 6:24 – 7:20
Expecting God’s surprising, death-minimising, help against an invading army is not magical, fairy story, thinking. Look at the recent invasion of the national Ethiopian and Eritrean armies of the province of Tigray. Outnumbered and outgunned, the Tigrayans drove the Ethiopian army out of their capital and out of their land. The parallels with Ukraine and Russia are notable. Including Tigray containing the ancient centre of the country’s Orthodox Faith.
The Tigrayan victory echoed Biblical victories: Welcome to Independent Tigray and New Eritrea | Rogerharper’s Blog (wordpress.com) The Tigrayans tried to minimise killing, not targeting civilians, feeding and sending back Ethiopian soldiers, as Elisha’s Israelites had fed and sent back their Aramean enemies. Difficult when your enemy routinely attacks, abuses, rapes civilians, your neighbours, cousins, brothers and sisters.
And we Brits remember tenacious, odd, Alan Turing, who thought he could break the Nazi Enigma Code. He was deemed crazy but allowed to try. The course of the Second World War was changed and many lives saved.
(Turing’s intervention was in the tradition of Gideon and Elisha. Bomber Harris’ intervention was in the tradition of King Ahab and King Herod, the slaughterer of the innocents.)
May the Ukrainians be open to odd, out-of-the-box, little ideas. Not exact copies of the initiatives of Gideon and Elisha and the Tigrayans. Fresh, clever, apparently crazy, thinking which aims to impact the enemy while minimising bloodshed. The people who come up with these ideas may be conscious of the God and Father of Jesus leading them. Or may not. Our God can work through anyone.
May the Ukrainians be open to the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Jesus, so that they feed and release Russian prisoners of war. No retaliation nor revenge. Minimal killing, especially of civilians. Even though there is a risk that these soldiers may invade again, as they did in old Israel and new Tigray, God has that covered too.
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