Prayer is universal. It was as much present in the park in Pematangsiantar early that morning in northern Sumatra as it had been when we left Boston for a round-the-world business trip. The young people sitting on a wall in the park that was covered with mud from the heavy rains that had fallen, nodded hello shyly and smiled.
It wasn't long after we'd returned to the States that political and religious unrest surfaced in Indonesia. Students, approximately the same age as those in the park, were killed. I couldn't help wondering about the safety of the young people we'd had a brief exchange with, even though they were several hundred miles from where the unrest had taken place. So to ease my thinking about this, and to hopefully contribute to a more peaceful mental environment regarding that violent situation, I prayed. Not for the students, specifically, but for peace in general.
Exactly how I prayed I don't remember. But I did reach out to God with love, with concern for those young folks and for others around the globe who face danger every day. And I thought about those who have to enforce the law—to keep demonstrations under control and quell riots. They, too, deserve to be enveloped in God's love, because sometimes they, too, are victimized by circumstances—perhaps even more than those being persecuted. It's usually the dynamics that need to be taken into consideration, or prayed about, in any tense or harmful situation. Individuals, really, are all children of the one God—their makeup is constituted of spiritual qualities and values that contain no contaminated thought of hatred and destruction.
