4 June 2008
Prayers for Divine
Posted by Rob under: Church life; Faith .
You may remember reading here before about Divine, a young Nigerian refugee seeking authorisation to stay in France. I won’t go over all the details again - you can read about him here and here. The latest is that, having been held in a detention centre near Rouen for about the last two to three weeks, we heard this morning that he was deported to Italy yesterday. (He originally came through Italy before arriving in France.) We really don’t know what options he has now. He was totally believing that God had everything in hand and it was only a matter of time before he had his papers. But with all appeals exhausted and Divine now out of the country, it seems difficult to see how he could end up living in France.
So far, we’ve had no contact from Divine and have been unable to reach him on his mobile. We can only hope that he’ll try to get in touch with the church. In the meantime, our pastor is in contact with an Italian relative to see whether he can somehow track Divine down and put him in contact with Christians who might be able to help him.
Of course, the reality is that God is still sovereign, and this is one of those many situations in life where our notion of a desirable outcome doesn’t tally with what circumstances tell us. Our only option is to choose to believe that God has a higher purpose and that He will work it out. We are praying that God will protect Divine in body, mind at spirit at this time, and that he will rapidly be able to come into contact with some Christians in Italy.
