World Day of Prayer
Matthew 5:13-16: You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot. You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven
Matthew 5:13-16: You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot. You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven
Every once in a while God pokes her loving Presence into my very secular life and gives me a holistic vision to keep me going in spite of the terrible actions of the principalities and powers of this world. I take the greatest hope from events that have happened over time and place. In my life one of these “over time and place” events is the World Day of Prayer!
This year on 4 March Christian women in Istanbul will hold the annual World Day of Prayer service, as will Christian women in other cities and countries of the world. Each year the liturgy is written by women from a different country – the 2005 service was written by Polish women. Each year the women of Istanbul put great thought and effort into translating into Turkish the service that has been written in one country’s language and then translated for them into English. This year I have the honor to work with these Christian women of Turkey as they plan the service. They come from churches I did not know much about until I came to Turkey – the Armenian Orthodox Church, the Syrian Orthodox Church and the Chaldean Church, among others. These women speak Turkish, but the language of the liturgy in their own church service is varied – Armenian, Aramaic, Greek, Arabic, etc. It is part of their Istanbul tradition to read the central scripture passage from the World Day of Prayer service in as many languages as are spoken by those attending the service. This year Matthew 5: 13-16 could be read in as many as thirteen languages!
The World Day of Prayer has been taking place in Istanbul since the 1960s. It was started by a group of women who included my predecessors in the American Board (Global Ministries in Turkey.). Through all those years a woman from the American Board has taken part in the planning.
Even more amazing is that I credit the World Day of Prayer service with helping to bring me to Turkey. In the 1970s Ken and I were working for Global Ministries as teachers in Kafue Secondary School in Zambia. Two women – one an American Board missionary – came to Zambia from Istanbul to promote the World Day of Prayer in Zambia. They stayed at our school and invited everyone there to visit them in Istanbul. Ken and I did visit on our way home from Zambia to the USA. Later we were offered positions at the American Board founded school in Izmir, Turkey. There in the last few years I also worked with women who were organizing the World Day of Prayer. This year we moved to Istanbul. I have come full circle. I am actually helping to plan the service that those women who came to Zambia in the 1970s helped to initiate.
World Day of Prayer is indeed an “over time and place” event in my life and in the lives of many other women. It brings women of different backgrounds, liturgical traditions, languages and countries together. God is poking her Presence into our lives and reminding us that her Presence transcends time and place. Someday I hope that the service will be planned by women from even more diverse faith traditions.
Ken and Betty Frank
Ken & Betty Frank serve as missionaries with the American Board in Istanbul, Turkey. They share the job of General Secretary of the American Board. They also serve on the board of the Istanbul Interparish Migrant Program (IIMP).