by Stephanie Conkright
The earth groaned as many rested in silence.
A crescendo of cries awakened by the shudder.
Echoes from chambers where many still lay below.
Darkness mercifully shrouding the unseen devastation.
The bright morning sunrise confirming the worst of fears.
On February 5th, I shared a post on Facebook of an ancient mosaic located in Antakya, Turkey. I’m not sure why it appeared on my feed, but I tagged a couple of my Turkish friends who are from that area and heard back almost immediately. Selin told me how she had visited the site last year and invited me to come and see it with her some time. I told her I would love that. The very next day the massive earthquake that hit Turkey and neighboring Syria reduced the majority of Antakya to rubble. We exchanged texts, and I was relieved to hear she escaped physically unscathed, although emotionally devastated. Two days later, minutes before I was about to pray for Turkey and Syria at our Renovare gathering, Selin called me in tears. She shared about the desperate situation in her hometown. I cried with her, then I cried as I shared with the ladies of Renovare.
There are countless news articles reporting the effects of the earthquake: the staggering number of lives lost, families grieving loved ones, instant destruction of homes and possessions, the loss of neighbors who had been as close as family, the poor construction of apartment buildings and the corruption that allowed it. Perhaps the greatest tragedy is that none of this is new, and that much of the suffering could have been prevented. My family and I survived the 1999 Turkish earthquake. We too were awakened in the middle of the night to a shaking world that left 17,000 dead. We slept outside and were afraid to return to our weakened building, ultimately moving to a better constructed one. Within days posters appeared declaring, ‘Earthquakes don’t kill, buildings do.’ Contractors were prosecuted, new building codes were instituted and promises were made. We prayed, ‘Never again!’ Yet here we are today, only so much worse!
So how do we pray now? We pray people will find the only true hope, that God will use this situation to bring many to salvation. We pray that radical changes will take place so that more lives will not be lost because building codes are not enforced. We pray for those who have lost their loved ones, their homes, their jobs, who now face the prospect of living in tents or converted shipping containers for months, if not years. Our previous church in Minneapolis sent a team to work with us to help establish a relief community which provided temporary housing and medical care. It was still in operation two years later. The need will continue for a very long time.
And yet, already a month on, I know that we will soon be focusing on the next disaster that dominates the news. Even when we have a personal connection we quickly move on. Garth and I are praying regularly for Turkey, but I know this will ebb in time. We could be tempted to feel guilty about this. I think we need to resist being distracted by guilt. Rather we should seek to pray as the Holy Spirit leads us, as he moves us to pray for the next thing, and gives us permission to move on. I am struck by how the Lord has burdened me to pray for many different situations over the years, sometimes for individuals I have never met or places I have never been. Sometimes I’ve prayed a single prayer and other times I have prayed for weeks or months. This time the Holy Spirit used a seemingly random Facebook post to prompt me to make a connection with Selin right before disaster struck. He then prompted her to call me just as I was about to invite a group of Calvary women to join me in prayer. My desire is that we all grow in our capacity to sense the nudging of the Holy Spirit and pray as he leads.
Stephanie Conkright and her family lived in several cities in Turkey over the course of 20 years, Stephanie met and married Garth in the region that is affected by the recent earthquake. Along with their daughter, Laura, Garth and Stephanie have hearts full of fond memories of their time in this beautiful country.