Joni Eareckson Tada Helping The Disabled Flee Ukraine

Welcome back to Hope for the Caregiver. This is Peter Rosenberg and this is the program for you as a family caregiver. Healthy caregivers make better caregivers. How do you stay healthy and strong as you care for someone who isn't? We are going to see difficult things.

We are going to experience these things, but we are not going to experience them alone. Speaking of which, I want to transfer a little bit from what we have been talking about and talk to someone very special to me. She has been such a dear sister. through all this stuff with Gracie that I'm going through right now in Denver, and just a wonderful mentor to me as I have stepped out on the stages and shared the message I believe God has put on my heart.

And right now on her heart, like so many, weighs heavy of what's going on in Ukraine, and I want her to share what her organization is doing and how you could pray, how you could be involved, how you can connect. And this is Joni Eareckson-Tada. So Joni, welcome to the program. Oh, Peter, it's so good to be with you. And like many of your listeners, I've been praying about Gracie and you and standing by her hospital bed. So just know that we continue to remember you and your wife in our intercessions.

Thank you very much. We've had some very meaningful times with you in the hospital with us in this journey, and so they're just incredibly moving to see how God knits our hearts together and gives us strength for the day and bright hope for tomorrow. And you are such a big part of that.

Your heart is heavy right now because of what's going on there. The whole world is watching this aghast and you bring a different perspective than most with your teams and all the work that's going on. Talk a little bit about what's going on in Ukraine with individuals with disabilities.

Well, thanks for asking, Peter. And when I served on the Disability Advisory Committee to the U.S. State Department, we did many studies and found out that in times of great conflict, in times of war, it is the people with disabilities, the elderly, those with fragile medical conditions, the most vulnerable. These are the ones who are often forgotten, most frequently abandoned, left behind, and we are seeing that happen, unfortunately, in Ukraine. There are 2.6 million people with disabilities in Ukraine, and of course that includes a lot of family members, a lot of caregivers, and they are making as best they can the best of it, so to speak, as missiles and rocket strikes and this invasion continues. Our ministry, Joni and Friends, helped organize an evacuation of people with disabilities, a small group, only 35, but nevertheless they were able to make it to the Polish border, quadriplegics, paraplegics, young people with cerebral palsy, and their caregivers, I'm happy to say. We were able to get them across the Polish border in good time, jumping ahead of the long queue that was waiting there at the Polish border, but when the officials saw the great need of these people with disabilities, the elderly and their caregivers, they gave us clear access, and I'm happy to say that this group has now been relocated into the Netherlands, welcoming homes where there are blankets and medical supplies, things as simple yet as necessary as catheters and drainage bags and diapers, again all for people with disabilities. We are now in the process of working with our in-country partners in Ukraine to get a second evacuation of people with disabilities out, but that's only scratching the surface. As I said, there are 2.6 million people with disabilities still in Ukraine, and we're calling on the church all across Ukraine not to forget those disabled in their communities, especially when there are evacuations from major cities, because a lot of these people with disabilities and their caregivers, they're up on the fifth, sixth, seventh floors of apartment buildings. They just can't jump out of bed, run down the stairs, rush out the door, and make a dash for the border. They can't do that, and so we're asking the church please not to forget, not to abandon caregivers and their charges in these times of critical evacuation from major cities, and we're asking for prayer that caregivers, especially in facilities that serve disabled orphans, not abandon their charges as well when there is a panic, such as we are seeing in some cities in eastern Ukraine.

A lot of these staff people abandon their posts at care facilities. They feel a more urgent need to be with their own families and help evacuate them, and that leaves these people left behind in very vulnerable, tenuous situations. So please, I'm asking our friends listening to not only pray for the church that it remember the most vulnerable, but to join with us in this effort through your prayers, and if you want to assist financially by all means, visit my Facebook page at Johnny Eareckson Tata, and we are purchasing supplies in Poland and in Romania to take to the border, and we are meeting our in-country partners there at the border to make transfers of catheters, diapers, medicine, the sorts of things that people with disabilities need in times of crisis.

So that's the update, Peter, and it's pretty urgent. The Russian Army is pretty ruthless. Sometimes we've heard, and this is not verified, but we have heard that the Russian Army is using the elderly and children with Down Syndrome as shields so that the Ukrainian freedom fighters cannot counter-attack, so that's a tenuous situation as well. You know, when you were talking about that, and the people at the border saw this group of people coming who had such afflictions, it reminds me of that passage in Matthew when Jesus looked out of the crowds and he saw them, the lame, the blind, and in one translation, it's the only translation that actually refers to those missing limbs, and of course there's a husband of somebody who's missing two limbs, I resonate deeply with, you know, when it says Jesus looked out and he had such compassion over them, and I think that's something that we can all unite, is that those who are seeing this will be moved with compassion. You know, we have common grace in this world, that God has extended common grace, and I have heard, and I've seen several news reports that there are many Russian soldiers who are aghast about this, that they're not wanting to do this, so they're trapped between their military service and their humanity, and I'm asking also for us to specifically pray that more and more we'll see that this is wrong. Johnny, as you know, Gracie is in the hospital now, I can't imagine having to evacuate her, she wouldn't make it, and we're spoiled here in America because we have all types of modern facilities and so forth, but trying to push somebody in a wheelchair on streets that don't have a lot of cutouts, and wheelchair ramps, and things such as that, and cobblestones, and things, I can only, I can barely imagine the fear and the panic that's going on, and I appreciate very much that your team is there, and I'm asking for folks that are listening today to really not only lift them up in prayer, but also prayerfully consider supporting this. I've known Johnny for a long time, and what she does with her outreaches, whether it's through Wheels for the World, her Wheelchair Ministry, whether it's through the Family Retreats, all these things, and now here they are right in the thick of this, helping with such a thing, such as catheters, and diapers, and you all, this audience understands how important those things are, and I'm asking for you to prayfully consider this. Johnny, share with us a little bit more on your heart on this, and you know, as somebody who lives with significant disabilities, you know, what do you pray in this? What scriptures are you, you know, in your heart just chewing on to keep you sustained in this as you watch this?

Because you understand this plight in ways that very few can. Well, I think of Second Corinthians chapter 4, verse 8, Peter. It's an incredible promise.

It says, though we are hard-pressed on all sides, we are not crushed. And I'm just asking God that the caregivers who live in Ukraine, those Ukrainians with disabilities, the elderly, that they not, that although they are hard-pressed on all sides, that they not give up, they not despair, that they not plummet into hopelessness, because they've got the promise that if they trust in God, they will not be crushed. And you mentioned a good point a moment ago, Peter, you talked about compassion, the compassion of some Russian soldiers, and certainly the compassion of those Polish border officials who allowed our group safe passage and quick passage across the border.

I think also the compassion of the people of the Netherlands, good friends of ours, all of them who have opened up their homes to these 35 individuals. That's going to be the miracle in this conflict. We've been asking God for a huge miracle in Ukraine, and I believe part of that miracle may welcome from people's hearts being turned that compassion will overwhelm them, that they will take great pity, and they'll observe the needs of the Ukrainian people, the heroics of the Ukrainian people, the fact that they are valiantly standing strong and resisting a true Goliath at their borders. And who knows what God will do, but I'm praying for a miracle, because Peter, I simply cannot bear the thought of elderly people, disabled orphans, children with disabilities, adults, paraplegics, quadriplegics, stuck on the floors of apartment buildings because they can't get out, they can't escape, they can't run out of the city when the bombs start falling.

I can't even imagine the anxiety and terror which might be in their hearts. And so we're praying for compassion in a big way. Indeed, and Joni, I want you to know how meaningful it is to me personally, how you've been such a source of encouragement to Gracie and me through these difficult times. And if you think that somehow we don't have enough to be, what can we do against such overwhelming nods, it starts with one person sharing the hope of Christ with one other person. Let God take care of the big things, okay? Be faithful to just share your own relationship with Christ and communicate that to the best of your abilities, and you watch what God can do. Go to JoniAndFriends.com, J-O-N-I-AndFriends.com, and help be a part of what's happening here. Joni, thank you so much for being here today.