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On February 24, Russia invaded Ukraine. Amidst the news reports of death and destruction, one can read remarkable stories about people. There have been acts of heroism, as the Ukrainian military and individual citizens have fought their evil invaders to protect their country.

As the invasion appeared imminent, several million Ukrainians began to flee to other countries. According to the Jewish Press, two of those people fled to Israel. Their remarkable story actually began during World War II.

A Jewish teenager named Fanya Rosenfield lost most of her family. She managed to escape the bloodshed as Nazi soldiers killed Jewish people in her town. She found refuge for two years with a Ukrainian family, who protected her from the Holocaust. After the war, Fanya started a new life in Israel. Through the years, she repeatedly told her children and grandchildren about the Ukrainian family who saved her life.

A few weeks before the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Fanya’s granddaughters decided to contact that family. Her grandmother had wanted to take care of the family who saved her. They located two granddaughters of the Ukrainian family. News reports state that 80 years later as the country faced another war, Fanya’s granddaughters helped protect the family that had saved their grandmother by helping them travel to Israel.

Sometimes, when things seem to be falling apart, we may wonder if any good can possibly come from it; but, miraculous things could be coming together all the while. In other words, one can find some good in the midst of death and destruction, though often unseen.

Holocaust survivor Corrie ten Boom is one of my heroes of the faith. When she spoke about her cruel experiences in a concentration camp and the death of her father and sister, she would often look down as she talked.

It turns out she was always working on a piece of needlepoint as she spoke, and at the conclusion of her remarks she would hold up the needlepoint for the audience to see. A person who once heard her speak recalls what he saw, “The backside of her handiwork was a jumble of colors and threads with no discernible pattern. With this came the observation that ‘this is how we see our lives.’

“She would then turn the needlepoint over to reveal the intended pattern visible on the front. Then Corrie would conclude by saying: ‘This is how God views your life and someday we will have the privilege of seeing it from His point of view.’”

Corrie was released from the Nazi death camp due to a clerical error. She survived to tell her story. She once said, “Every experience God gives us, every person He puts in our lives is the perfect preparation for the future that only He can see.”

As Corrie’s words speak to us today, “Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.”

— Jan White is author of “Everyday Faith for Daily Life.”