One of the deep joys of my years in Colorado was the time I spent as a member of the Partnership Committee of the Partnership of Zimbabwe and Denver Presbyteries. The Presbytery of Denver had ended up involved in ministry in Zimbabwe through the work of a couple in one of its churches, and decided in consequence to establish and build a presbytery-to-presbytery relationship with the Presbytery of Zimbabwe, which is part of the Uniting Presbyterian Church of Southern Africa (UPCSA). I was never able to travel to Zimbabwe (though I would have been offered the chance if we hadn’t been leaving), which I regret, but I did have opportunities to meet a few of our partners on their visits to Colorado, and there are a couple whom I consider dearly-loved friends.

Which is why my heart breaks, and has been breaking, for the country of Zimbabwe. I could give you a long list of links about what Robert Mugabe has done to his nation over the last eight years—he was a good leader before that, as long as people kept voting for him, but once the voters began to tire of him, he turned on them; whether he rules well or ill, all that matters to him is keeping power—but I think Peter Godwin summed up the story well enough in the Los Angeles Times, at least for starters. Godwin, who dubbed Mugabe “Zimbabwe’s Ahab,” knows whereof he speaks, as a native Zimbabwean; he’s written several books, including the memoirs Mukiwa: A White Boy in Africa and When a Crocodile Eats the Sun: A Memoir of Africa, and still laments what was lost.

The presidential election is this Saturday, and there are those who have hope that maybe this time, the opposition and the international community will prevail, and the election will bring about the end of the Mugabe government. Please pray that it is so, and with a minimum of bloodshed. Please pray for the peace of Zimbabwe.