194: Doug Stevens on faith-based diplomacy

Today Brian Hancock interviews Doug Stevens who is an expeditionary pastor, working faith-based diplomacy to improve international relations. The discussion is on his work travelling to partner nations to reach out to locals and leaders to overcome social trauma from war, genocide and help rebuild communities. 

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One CA is a product of the civil affairs association 

and brings in people who are current or former military, diplomats, development officers, and field agents to discuss their experiences on the ground with a partner nation's people and leadership.

We aim to inspire anyone interested in working in the "last three feet" of U.S. foreign relations. 

To contact the show, email us at CApodcasting@gmail.com 

or look us up on the Civil Affairs Association website at www civilaffairsassoc.org

Links mentioned: Hope international ministries: Hope4nations.org

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Special thanks to Dimitar Dodovski for sampling Keith Jarrett's album Spirits 20. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Yeh7OX5m4E

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Transcript

00:00:03    Introduction

Welcome to the 1CA Podcast. This is your host, Jack Gaines. 1CA is a product of the Civil Affairs Association and brings in people who are current or former military, diplomats, development officers, and field agents to discuss their experiences on ground with the partner nation's people and leadership. Our goal is to inspire anyone interested in working the last three feet of foreign relations. To contact the show, email us at capodcasting at gmail .com. or look us up on the Civil Affairs Association website at www .civilaffairsassos .org. I'll have those in the show notes.

 

00:00:38    BRIAN HANCOCK

I'm Lieutenant Colonel Brian Hancock, and I will be your host for this session. Today we have with us Pastor Douglas Stevens to discuss religious outreach, relief operations in Ukraine, and mission opportunities in Ukraine. Doug is a graduate of both Cal Berkeley and Fuller Seminary. Doug is active with humanitarian missions in Eastern Europe. in Haiti and elsewhere. He is a people lover, culture watcher, mountain bike rider, and avid world trader. Isn't that the truth? A quick disclaimer to the audience, a reminder, all remarks are solely those of the presenters. Further, due to the subject matter of our session today, some of the content may be a little bit disturbing to some audiences. Now, Doug, I first met you in the United States. when you swooped in to rescue our church as God's quick response force. Do you remember those days? I do. I remember them fondly. It seems like a lifetime ago to me, so much has happened since, but our church is still standing, so you must have done something right.

 

00:01:36    DOUGLAS STEVENS

It seems

 

00:01:42    DOUGLAS STEVENS

Well, it was a great time. I have friendships from that that continue.

 

00:01:46    BRIAN HANCOCK

Outstanding. Some of the things that you do are similar to what we do in the Army of the United States, or at least there are some similarities to it. The way we view the American military is as an expeditionary force. We often go places with large numbers, with lots of equipment and logistics and partnerships. And oftentimes these areas we are going to are characterized by great suffering. Relief agencies may not be able to get in there to operate. So that's usually when the world often turns to the U .S. military. Now, it seems to me that you've spent much of your life in a similar capacity as an expeditionary pastor.

 

00:02:29    DOUGLAS STEVENS

Well, first of all, I just want to say what you're doing and what you represent is not well enough known as a part of the U .S. military's mission, the humanitarian side of that. And I just want to encourage you. So thank you for what you're doing. Now, my experience is on a different plane and yet heading in the same direction, just trying to help people. and have been in a variety of places around the world. In Haiti, for example, serving in Colombia, South America. I have been to Bosnia during the war back in the 90s when things were very tense. That was with World Vision. I have been to Rwanda in East Africa. That was with International Justice Mission. I have been overseas to places like Beijing, China, Cambodia, in the aftermath of their genocide. And have seen light shining in some of the darkest places in the world, places that you wouldn't expect any good news to come out of. And yet some wonderful people doing some heroic work in those places. In fact, we have just returned from more than a weekend in Ukraine. I know that you personally have a podcast that you host.

 

00:03:34    BRIAN HANCOCK

know that you personally have a podcast that you host. Yes. Very, very inspiring. Hello, darkness. Stories that transform. And I'll tell you, having read about... The scenario in Rwanda you mentioned, I think a number of people have watched the movie Hotel Rwanda. Yes. Very dark. You've got Hutu mothers murdering their neighbors Tutsi Chol. Yeah. You've got massive numbers fleeing. Yes. You have the radio saying there is work to be done. Kill the cockroaches. Right. You have female leaderships in the government calling the men in the camps, often stadiums, other places where, Hutu have herded the Tutsis to kill them brutally with machetes and complaining, saying, well, you need to rape these women before you kill them. And they're saying, well, we're just too tired because of all this killing. It's what they were saying at the time. And of course, the international community, we have some bases there and some other things, but we are not allowed to leave the base. There is no protection that is offered by the international community. There is no sanctuary. Clearly, this was hell on earth. It was. Have you seen some light come out of something like that?

 

00:04:48    DOUGLAS STEVENS

It went on for about 90 days back in 1994. That took nearly a million lives, as I understand it. We were there in the aftermath and the recovery time. And they had these wonderful trials for people who had been convicted of murder. But in these trials, you actually had the opportunity for reconciliation. You had the opportunity to extend forgiveness. potential repair of communities. And so we were close to that. We were supporting efforts as that was happening. There was a filmmaker who was there with us. So that was our time in Kigali and the countryside in Rwanda. And pleased to see the development since then. And of course, there are more complications now politically, and that's happening in our world. So that's a whole nother story.

 

00:05:33    BRIAN HANCOCK

I hear you. But I'm also glad to hear that some justice, some reconciliation, some path forward does exist there that you were able to see. Now, in Army Civil Affairs and United States Marine Corps Civil Affairs, both of us work with what we call united action partners. These may be local allies, they may be host nations, oftentimes the non -government organizations. We often can't work directly with them if they need to maintain a neutrality. help both sides, such as Doctors Without Borders. You are for World Vision and I believe a few others. What is it like working with a non -government organization doing this type of work? And did you ever have any interaction with the military in that role? And would you have even liked any interaction with military civil affairs?

 

00:06:30    DOUGLAS STEVENS

Well, we primarily worked with churches and NGOs that were there doing a variety of things, and those folks are the heroes on the ground, often unsung and unrewarded for what they did. But they didn't do it for that reason. They were doing it for the people they loved, the people they were sacrificing for. And we worked very closely with them and wanted to support them because they were the ones who were on the ground. We're going to be there for a long time after we left doing whatever we were doing. And often we were bringing in humanitarian aid. Sometimes we were doing leadership training. Sometimes we were doing reconciliation, conflict resolution, working with local churches that were... suddenly coming back to life again and wanting to encourage them, and the work they were doing in drawing people close to the, well, the work of God, if I can put it bluntly, because what needed to be done seemed impossible. How do you crawl out of this deep, dark hole? But it was happening, and there was a tremendous resurgence of faith in the hearts of many people who were then living it out. Hard to explain how this happened except to call it a miracle.

 

00:07:35    BRIAN HANCOCK

And I'm glad that miracles still do happen.

 

00:07:37    DOUGLAS STEVENS

They do. You have to invest in it. It doesn't happen because you're hoping for it.

 

00:07:42    BRIAN HANCOCK

Right. May of last year, you found yourself in Moldova. Now, that may not be a household name for many folks in America. I knew nothing about it until I went there.

 

00:07:51    DOUGLAS STEVENS

knew nothing about it until I went there. Next door to Ukraine.

 

00:07:54    BRIAN HANCOCK

We have a regionally aligned civil affairs commands who get to know some of these places. And for the European region, civil affairs command is... the 353rd Civil Affairs Command, which is back on the East Coast. And in January 2023, they actually published an excellent article in our flagship publication in the military, the Military Review. You've arrived if you get peer review publication in Military Review. And the functional specialty team, a couple of brilliant captains, published. an article regarding food resiliency in Moldova. So this is a hot topic. Can you tell the audience a bit about the mission that you were doing in Moldova, as well as what you experienced?

 

00:08:41    DOUGLAS STEVENS

Well, Moldova is a relatively poor country inside the EU, hoping to get in, not in NATO yet, hoping to enter, be approved, along with Ukraine, of course. that took in a million refugees in the last couple of years that were flooding out of Ukraine, looking to escape. The Moldovans themselves, many of them literally have their bags packed in case Ukraine is overrun by the Russian invaders. And they know that they would be next and they have no defense. And NATO is not officially obligated to intervene. So right now, for the moment, they look relatively safe, but they have absorbed an awful lot of special needs. coming in from Ukraine. Now, Moldova is also an agricultural country. They produce a lot of what they need, but they were overwhelmed by this crisis that took place. And so there is help coming in from other places. We were able to bring some of those materials in, and we were very impressed by the work of many different missions and churches working together in ways they never have before. And that's happening all across this area. People are working together like they never have. So it's a great thing to watch that happen and be part of it.

 

00:09:54    BRIAN HANCOCK

That's outstanding. And of course, right now, you've got a lot of Russian interference in going Moldavian elections.

 

00:10:00    DOUGLAS STEVENS

We've heard about that. It's still a controversy because Russia apparently is jealously looking at other parts of other countries they would like to retake as part of the Soviet venture. Now, no longer part of the Soviet experiment, which closed down in 1989, 91, somewhere in there. but want to now reestablish, according to Putin, the Holy Russian Empire. And it now has a religious overtone, backed by the Russian Orthodox Church, that basically wants to reclaim all of these lands, whether it's Poland, whether it's Georgia, whether it's Moldova, Ukraine, the Baltic states. We don't know how far this ambition goes, but we've been shocked so far, so nothing right now is going to shock me.

 

00:10:44    BRIAN HANCOCK

I thought we had closed the chapter on large wars in Europe. Maybe not. It sounds like Putin styles himself a bit of a czar. We know how well that worked out. It's a shame that we seem to be heading that direction. Putin's language, of course, is, hey, we want to open another front just to take Ukraine.

 

00:11:02    DOUGLAS STEVENS

And, of course, the war in Ukraine has been going on from at least 2014 when they took Crimea. And then the oblasts in the east, they've been occupying there. And now, of course, trying to come across. Right now, the front is essentially frozen, although I will defer to you and the military for a better estimate of what is actually happening. And we don't know where this is going. And my role, our role, is to come in and support those who are doing this good humanitarian work, especially in the faith -based areas.

 

00:11:30    BRIAN HANCOCK

Yeah, I'd like to tug at that string a little bit, because you just literally, a few days ago, got back from a mission in Ukraine. And I understand that it was a multifaceted mission. You're doing a number of different things, all important works, why you're there. Now, while most of the audience is at least to some degree aware of the mental suffering that's taking place in Ukraine, can you, having some firsthand experience, tell us a little bit about what you saw, what you did, and what you found?

 

00:12:00    DOUGLAS STEVENS

A year ago, when I went into Ukraine, we went from Odessa all the way to Kyrgyzstan, all the way to the front lines, essentially, visiting along the way, doing leadership training, because the churches were asking for that. As people left, all kinds of new people flooded into these churches, which was a surprise to me. I didn't know about that. I wasn't expecting that. I thought maybe they'd be emptied out. But because they are serving so well, not just their own congregation, but the whole community now is looking to the church, even more than the government, which is busy fighting a war to supply those needs. And there are... Of course, other organizations that are there are Samaritan's Purse, World Vision, World Central Kitchen, various other churches in that area. And I had no idea how strong the church was in Ukraine, the evangelical, Protestant, Pentecostal, Catholic working together. Not the Orthodox so much. They tend to be a little bit more aloof. Some of them are still aligned with Russia, even though Russia is the invader. But the other churches working together and mitigating the trauma and the food insecurity and everything else that's needed and providing more than they thought they could. We were there this time primarily to pay for the cost of these Ukraine pastors and wives to come and be there for the week. And we're delighted that there was something practical they could do to really bring encouragement and some relief and renewal. And it was even more than we dreamed of doing. We just felt like a family being together. And, of course, they have to go back now to wherever they were, all within range of Russian missiles that are being sent across the country at random times. And while you were there, I mean, you were hearing the explosion.

 

00:13:41    BRIAN HANCOCK

were hearing the explosion.

 

00:13:43    DOUGLAS STEVENS

We heard a few. We saw a few happening. And, of course, the terrible destruction of the children's hospital in Kiev happened while we were there. And we were right in the middle of that for quite a while. This is the first time my wife had come in. I was reluctant to bring her there because I feel protective. But I'm married to Joan of Arc, so there was no keeping her away. And she wanted to be with the women, with the wives. And she did tremendous work there, even across some of those barriers I mentioned. Nancy is an amazing woman.

 

00:14:10    BRIAN HANCOCK

Indeed. She has my deepest respect, absolutely. Can you share a story or two about the brokenness that you found in Ukraine? And after you share an example of a brokenness for the community, which is... many of which are so disconnected from the reality of what's happening on the ground there. Could you share your thoughts as to what you think the proper response should be for caring individuals who are exposed to these kinds of situations?

 

00:14:42    DOUGLAS STEVENS

Yeah. Well, so many stories. I'm thinking of one that I'm sitting with a pastor who was in a village between Belarus and Kiev at the beginning of the war. They were marching right in, and they were going to take Kiev within a week or two or three. It was ground zero, and they were on that highway going in. They were near Buka, they were near Irpine, and they were in another village. And very quickly, of course, the soldiers took over the houses where people were living after shooting a number of people who were on the streets at the wrong time in the wrong place, just gunning them down. So these soldiers showed up, and in his particular town, in his house, actually, He had sent his family out to the hinterlands where they would be less likely to run into Russian soldiers. But he and his brothers stayed there and these Chechen soldiers.

 

00:15:32    BRIAN HANCOCK

soldiers. And these are very skilled fighters, by the way. These are some of the best fighters in the Russian military.

 

00:15:38    DOUGLAS STEVENS

And even though they had been attacked themselves by Russian forces years earlier, they were now conscripted, really had no idea where they were, what they were doing exactly. When they heard how large Kiev was, they thought Kiev was... you know, a town. Well, it's a city of five million people. They were starting to get a little nervous about how are we going to take this town? Anyway, they were part of a force that was there. They came into the house threatening with their guns drawn. They didn't know how long occupied, whether they were going to be shot, what was going to happen. But they ended up having these conversations. This is the interesting part. This is the kind of the more spiritual part. When human beings meet, and there's not only guns in the room, but also human beings who actually have to communicate with each other, eventually the guns were kind of laid down. In fact, at one point, the commander came in and saw the guns laid down, and he was furious with his own troops, because these guys, the pastor and his brother, could have picked up a gun and shot. At one point, they let him go and visit his family, and then come back, and he brought back bread that his mother had baked. And he voluntarily gave it to, I want to give it to you as a gift. And there were moments when deeper conversation happened. Like one of the Chechens was asking about religion. And you say you're a priest, but you don't have a beard. And then the pastor asked him, he said, well, what is the worst sin according to the Quran? And the Chechen thought for a moment, he said, to kill an innocent person. And so the pastor said, well, then why are you here? Because that's what you're doing. Was that an aha moment? The Chechen had no answer to that. To make a long story short, after a couple of weeks, they had a parade in front of this town. Everyone was in their kind of their dress military uniforms. And the Russian television was there. The propaganda was running. And they were on their way to Kiev. That was the whole point of this television program. The next day, they dressed down. They went back into Belarus. So they didn't do what the propaganda alleged was about to happen. And that's what happens in war. You can't predict and you can't control. And it looked like it was going to happen like it happened to us in Afghanistan, but it didn't happen like that at all. The Ukrainians stood up and they stood firm, and Zelensky and others did not flee as predicted. They stayed the course very brave.

 

00:17:56    BRIAN HANCOCK

Now, in the story you tell, did the Chessian Muslims, after having been confronted... Yeah,

 

00:18:04    DOUGLAS STEVENS

Yeah, and having been there together for two weeks.

 

00:18:04    BRIAN HANCOCK

having been there together for two weeks. Been there two weeks.

 

00:18:07    DOUGLAS STEVENS

Yeah.

 

00:18:08    BRIAN HANCOCK

And being confronted with the reality of their action. Yes. Dead bodies in the street, right? There were dead bodies in the streets.

 

00:18:15    DOUGLAS STEVENS

were dead bodies in the

 

00:18:15    BRIAN HANCOCK

in the streets. Right.

 

00:18:16    DOUGLAS STEVENS

There were terrible things happening, lots of fear. Did they make any attempt at reconciliation before they marched away?

 

00:18:19    BRIAN HANCOCK

they make any attempt at reconciliation before they marched away?

 

00:18:23    DOUGLAS STEVENS

Well, the pastor was, in his own words, reaching out to them, offered to pray for them. And before the Chechens left, there were at least a couple of them who apologized for being there. Wow. We're sorry. This was wrong. We did not know what we were doing. Wow. And that's what they were saying as they left. So a ray of light into the sea of darkness, into this very dark place. Obviously, the danger continues. There are bad actors everywhere, especially back in Moscow. And so the war goes on, and we don't know where it's going.

 

00:18:39    SPEAKER_00

what they

 

00:18:47    SPEAKER_00

are bad

 

00:18:55    DOUGLAS STEVENS

Your second question, which was, okay, now what do we do regardless of if the war continues for years, if it ends tomorrow? Everybody in Ukraine knows that if the war ended tomorrow, there would still be trauma to heal from. There would still be recovery and rebuilding to the tune of, what, half a trillion dollars? At least. Something like that. And climbing. Nobody knows, and where's the money coming from? So a lot is uncertain, which is what happens as a war continues. Yeah.

 

00:19:15    BRIAN HANCOCK

climbing.

 

00:19:23    DOUGLAS STEVENS

But the efforts that the Ukrainians are making to survive, first of all, and secondly, to take care of one another. deserves all the help that we can provide. And it can be governmental, it can be NGOs, it could be nonprofits, it can be churches, it could be individuals who have people of good faith and goodwill. And obviously you want to give through a trusted source, through a channel that you know is going or almost all of it going directly to the need. And the organization that I was working with this time, which is called Hope International Ministries, all the money we raised, 100 % of it, went directly to them because we covered our own costs and expenses. So there was no overhead. Become the answer to your own prayer.

 

00:20:08    BRIAN HANCOCK

Absolutely. You know, Muhammad Gandhi said, be the truth you want to see in the world, right? Yeah. Lead by that example. I really love that story that you shared and why it was a little bit frightening with that pastor having the home invasion. Reflecting on that, you and I both know that Muslims don't always get the best press out there for different reasons, right? And here in your story, what we have as an example, the Russian Orthodox Christians are not operating on a moral compass. But the Muslims in the same situation stop and reflect. Appealing to their conscience. They received that, whereas many of the Russian Orthodox Christians did not. And then they act on that. Yeah.

 

00:20:56    DOUGLAS STEVENS

We pray for the Russian people, too, because they are only hearing one story. It is pure propaganda. They believe Nazis have taken over. They believe their homeland is being threatened. They're believing things that aren't true, but they have no independent way of discerning.

 

00:21:11    BRIAN HANCOCK

They're getting a little bit of independent information we found from YouTube, but the Russian government is working very hard to try and figure out how to close that down. Right,

 

00:21:19    DOUGLAS STEVENS

Right,

 

00:21:19    BRIAN HANCOCK

right. Put up the wall.

 

00:21:20    DOUGLAS STEVENS

up the wall. When you're hearing from 99 channels,

 

00:21:21    BRIAN HANCOCK

you're hearing from 99 channels, one thing and then you've got just this one little outlier voice, right? That can easily be lost. So certainly the Russians does not have access to a reasonable volume of objective information.

 

00:21:37    DOUGLAS STEVENS

And as you watch... The reports that come out of the Ukraine war, I mean, literally every day, if you're watching, there are certain reports that come out. And we know that nearly 600 ,000 Russian troops are casualties of this war. 600 ,000. Now, maybe 200 ,000 have been killed, and the rest have been wounded,

 

00:21:50    SPEAKER_00

,000. Now,

 

00:21:54    DOUGLAS STEVENS

the rest have been wounded, grievously wounded, can't return to war.

 

00:21:59    BRIAN HANCOCK

That's not even including the PTSD and all the other things that happen, right?

 

00:22:03    DOUGLAS STEVENS

And you wonder if those families back home in Russia are raising questions they did about Afghanistan when Russia invaded Afghanistan. And ultimately, Russia quit because they couldn't take it. So here we are yet again. And nobody expected this, but we all should have seen it coming, I suppose, because Putin has dropped signals all over the place. Right. In Syria, in Georgia, where else he's been. But I'm more interested, again, in the humanitarian part and what we can do. I'd like to end the whole thing. I don't know how long we can keep doing this, but we're going to keep doing that as long as we can, just as you and the work that you folks do. You don't hear as much about that as I would like to hear, because what you're doing is critical. I know you're doing it in Gaza as well, trying to help the Palestinians and try to set it up, but it's almost impossible to do that. And of course, you're risking your life.

 

00:22:52    BRIAN HANCOCK

Yeah, one of my colleagues just got back from the Gaza mission. I'm hoping to get him on the show. But that is one of the beauty of civil affairs and the things that we get to do to help. strengthen nations.

 

00:23:03    DOUGLAS STEVENS

These are the taxes I want to pay. I really want you to get it all.

 

00:23:07    BRIAN HANCOCK

I wish you were in charge. I wish I was. You raised the elephant in the room. You mentioned Vladimir Putin. A lot of people say this is Vladimir Putin's war for his legacy, whatever the reason may be. But one of the casus bellies or justifications that Russia is using for what amounts to outright invasion and perpetrating mass murder is the fact that they see this as protection of Christianity. as defined by the Russian Orthodox Church. Can you just give a real quick rundown of the history of that? And what are your thoughts as to whether Vladimir Putin's actions are aligned with Christian principles?

 

00:23:46    SPEAKER_00

of that?

 

00:23:54    DOUGLAS STEVENS

My answer is no, not at all aligned in any form by any distortion of what the Bible is teaching or even what the facts portray. So the story is that... First of all, Ukraine's already part of Russia. He claims it as our own, the larger mother Russia, even though, of course, they've been independent. And Ukraine has a deep history. And they are brothers. Slavic brothers. They're Slavic brothers. And that's why this makes us even more sad that Cain and Abel, you know, Cain's going after Abel. And he has a pretext. You know, he has resentment. Right. And supposedly the Nazis in the form of a Jewish president. That's unlikely, by the way. has taken over and is now an existential threat to Russia somehow. Ukraine is threatening Russia and NATO's behind that. Ukraine is Western and therefore part of Western corruption. And of course, there is corruption in Western culture. There's no doubt about that, as there is corruption in Russia, for heaven's sake, with the oligarchs and so on. So there's hypocrisy all over the world. Does that justify naked aggression? I don't think it does. at all. This is a terrible injustice, and injustice is treated harshly by God. And there's no justification that I can imagine, and being with the Ukrainian people just solidifies what was already obvious to me.

 

00:25:19    BRIAN HANCOCK

Now, when in history does the Russian Orthodox Church split from the Church of Europe? Because they don't see the Church in Europe as legitimate. Well,

 

00:25:31    DOUGLAS STEVENS

the Eastern Orthodox Church. which would include Russian, Ukrainian, Greek, and others split from the Holy Roman Church, the Roman Catholic Church, back in the Middle Ages. So that split took place then. Now there are splits within the Orthodox Church. And the recent split, many of the Ukrainian Orthodox, which was subject to Moscow, they have now broken away because of what this war does. Let me ask you this question.

 

00:25:59    BRIAN HANCOCK

me ask you this question. It's a difficult question. A number of the Ukrainians are claiming that Putin's war in Ukraine, because of the way it's being perpetrated, the indiscriminate shelling, the nature of the targeting, etc., effectively amounts to attempted genocide against the Ukrainian people. Yeah,

 

00:26:20    DOUGLAS STEVENS

Yeah, that argument can be made.

 

00:26:23    BRIAN HANCOCK

It can be. But when we look to the Old Testament, you know, as Christians, You know, we see how God orders the Israelites to attack Canaan and completely wipe out the Canaanites and take their land for their exclusive use, which seems to me very much to be the strategy Vladimir Putin is executing. How is Putin's war against Ukraine different than the word of God to the Israel people? Or is it different?

 

00:26:54    DOUGLAS STEVENS

Yeah. Well, thanks for playing devil's advocate here. That was great. Very eloquent. And I want to punch you out right now, even bringing that up. I was in Bosnia in 1995, and I sat down with an imam there in a village that had been destroyed, where everybody had turned against one another. The Croats and the Bosnians and the Serbians had turned against one another in a village where they had once coexisted. I said, how in the world is this village ever going to recover? He said, well, forgiveness. And I went, okay, I'm not expecting to hear that from a Muslim. I didn't know that was a theme in the Quran. I said, tell me, what does the Quran teach? He said, well, there are two theories. The first theory is that forgiveness can be extended once you have drained the last drop of blood from the last living relative of your last living. enemy that doesn't bode well it said it chilled down my spine when i heard that i said you said there was a second theory yeah what's this other what's the other option he said well you take the hate out of your heart you give it to god who is the judge the only righteous judge and you ask him for the strength to turn your enemy into a friend and i was thrilled to hear that and i said that is in the quran he said well and he smiled we stole it from the prophet isa jesus

 

00:27:01    SPEAKER_01

even bringing that

 

00:28:11    DOUGLAS STEVENS

who teaches this forgiveness, which is an otherworldly kind of ethic. There's nothing in this world that ordinarily leads to that. And the people of Ukraine, many of them are believers in this Christ, in the Christ of the New Testament. And they're even practicing that, and they pray for the Russians, as furious as they are about what is happening to them, as hard as they are fighting, they know that the answer ultimately is, Probably not going to be solved by a war in itself because it just keeps going. And the bodies keep mounting up. And the children are afraid. And the women are being abused. And that isn't ultimately the answer. So we pray for that miracle. We really do. We want to be peacemakers. We want to see reconciliation happen. And we want to see evil stopped, for sure. We want to see it stopped in its tracks.

 

00:29:05    BRIAN HANCOCK

Well said. Now, I want to thank you. Doug, for taking the time here to share the civil affairs community. We also have a heart for service. I know you do. And thank you for what you're doing.

 

00:29:13    DOUGLAS STEVENS

know you do. And thank you for what you're doing.

 

00:29:15    BRIAN HANCOCK

doing. Yeah, absolutely. We're allies in this.

 

00:29:18    DOUGLAS STEVENS

allies in

 

00:29:19    BRIAN HANCOCK

I think we are. For those in the audience who want to get additional information on some of the relief efforts that you've been part of and that are happening in Ukraine, where would you recommend they look?

 

00:29:33    DOUGLAS STEVENS

Well, I want to, first of all, recommend, if you're thinking about Ukraine, there is this wonderful ministry that I've been a part of. It's called Hope International Ministries. And you can go to Hope4Nations .org. Hope4Nation. Hope4Nations .org. Okay. World Vision, Samaritan's Purse, World Central Kitchen. Those are the people I trust and love, and I'm sure there are many others who are doing good work. I appreciate your recommendations.

 

00:30:05    BRIAN HANCOCK

appreciate your recommendations. I know a number of us donate to those organizations, but we're never doing enough. We don't necessarily understand what some of these difficulties are like. Do you have any final thoughts that you'd like to share with the audience before we wrap up the session? I have so many,

 

00:30:21    DOUGLAS STEVENS

have so many, but the first thing I think of is we need to lead from a baseline of gratitude. for all that we have. This adventure that we're on, if it's a time to give and not just a time to take, a time to care about others, not just a time to elevate yourself, this adventure is the thrill of a lifetime. To live grace -based and joy -driven is my motto. I hear it.

 

00:30:49    BRIAN HANCOCK

hear it. And thank you too for the amazing work that you've been doing all your life. And of course, recently around the world. It does matter. It does make a difference. Anyone who says that they alone can't make a difference, that is not true. Many people around the world make a difference. You are one of them. And I can tell you if there are more people like you in the world, Pastor Stevens, this would be a better world to live in. So thank you very much for what you did and for your time here with us today. And thank you so much.

 

00:31:18    DOUGLAS STEVENS

thank you so much.

 

00:31:21    Close

Thanks for listening. If you get a chance, please like and subscribe and rate the show on your favorite podcast platform. Also, if you're interested in coming on the show or hosting an episode, email us at capodcasting at gmail .com. I'll have the email and CA Association website in the show notes. And now, most importantly, to those currently out in the field, working with a partner nation's people or leadership to forward U .S. relations, thank you all for what you're doing. This is Jack, your host. Stay tuned for more great episodes. One CA Podcast.