During my childhood, I was fascinated with pictures from the turn of the century to World War II. Life before I came to be. Pictures of hope during strife (The Great Depression), pictures of the battlefield, pictures of cities as they stood at that time or as familiar buildings now were under construction then. Then, of course, there were the crime pictures - Bonnie and Clyde, before, during, and after; mob hits such as St. Valentines Massacre; and, pictures of Al Capone, Baby Face Nelson, and others.
Violence is a theme (and there are others) of our life on earth. Certainly the events in Charleston caught my attention, as I'm sure it did yours. Emanuel AME Church members gunned down by a man who had been attending the bible study. To make it worse, race appears to be an issue (at face value, certainly he is not in his right mind) and led the man to kill 9 people. Victims families and the church in general have either spoken to the culprit or of the culprit and the crime by saying that forgiveness needs to happen, yet others ask why? Why does this happen? Why does God allow it?
Social media has simple answers to the crime. Since a gun was used, gun control was in headlines the day after the attack which has led the crime to an issue of partisanship of those who allow access to guns and those who have solutions to control it. There are other issues as well - how we handle those with mental illness and such. The church can lend its voice at times like tragedies and attempt to explain it in simple terms - sin-filled world, evil in the world, the world getting worse and worse. And we, as members of the body of faith, can sometimes give ill-counsel - "something you did," or "God wanted this to happen." Sometimes we should just hush.
We cannot speak for God. We cannot assume to know. Job demanded answers. Job demanded his day with God. Job's friends pointed to Job, saying something he did led to the calamity that afflicted him. He finally got that day with God (God spoke to him as a whirlwind and asked him a series of questions such as "Where were you when I formed the earth?") In the end, he clearly showed that God had humbled him as he concludes his confession and repentance to God by saying, "I know that you can do all things...therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, things to wonderful for me, which I did not know...therefore I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes." (42:2- 6)
We pray for people who are victims of crimes. We pray for those who lose their lives or family members for acts unexplained. We pray for our brothers in the faith who die at the hands of people who clearly are not acting in accordance with God's desires for us. These prayers are in our community, our state, our country, and for this world.
Hope Men's Ministry
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