IisJustMe
10th December 2007, 03:01 AM
Its 10.30 p.m. Sunday December 9, and I just got back from New Life Church in Colorado Springs where the pastoral care staff invited me among several other counselors, therapists and psychologists to help the witnesses to this afternoon's tragic shootings. It was necessary to keep about 100 people at the church until they could all be interviewed by the various police agencies, and because it wasn't known until well after sundown that the building was actually secured and safe, it took time to get to all of them. Naturally, they were frightened, and in need of help.
I can only describe those who I spoke with this evening as very much in the same state of mind as a rookie soldier returning from his first combat experience. Fearful, filled with doubt, remorse, and memories of horrible things people outside of a war zone should never have to experience. My purpose in writing this is, first, to ask you to pray for these folks. They were forced to view something they never wanted to experience, and now the events of 1.10 p.m. today are indelibly burned into their memories. They will need counseling and spiritual guidance for years to come.
The second half of my purpose is to tell you that no one can know why this tragedy, and the one in Arvada 12 hours earlier, happened. There was no warning in either case, though the gunman at the Youth with a Mission dormitory talked for nearly a half hour before pulling his weapon and snuffing out two beautiful lives and seriously wounding two other people. At New Life, the gunman started walking toward the church after the noon service let out, and shot five people, killing two, before a brave security guard confronted the man and killed him herself. Only God knows why these events happened, though I'm sure in the next few hours and days the media will be happy to regale us with the intimate half-truths of the "facts" as they discover them.
God is in control. When I arrived at the New Life campus late this afternoon and looked around, I was struck by the numbness in the air. Veteran police officers, fire fighters, EMT's and even FBI and ATF agents were wearing looks of mixed somberness and intensity. Ever vigilent, they were nonetheless affected by the ground upon which they stood that this tragedy was acted out upon.
This is a church! This shouldn't happen here, especially not in the "ministry capital of America," Colorado Springs! There are over 400 Christian ministries located here, not the least of which is Focus on the Family, just a few miles down I-25 from the shooting scene. How can this happen in a church?
I ask you, how can it not happen in a church? Are we specially endowed with protection from the evil of the world? Are we exempt from having lunacy and violence visited upon us? Are we to believe that nothing like this can happen in a church? The answer is no, none of these things. To be certain, the dead, having made a true confession acceptable to God for their salvation, now rest in the arms of the Lord Jesus. Their wounds are healed, their faces wiped clean, the trials and unfairness of this world but a distant memory. But what of the rest of us?
I looked into the face of fear tonight. People who never should have had to endure what they saw, heard and felt were forced to see, hear and feel these unspeakable things. They don't understand. They wonder if it can happen again. They fear that, if it does, the next victim might be themselves.
Colorado has seen a plethora of this kind of tragedy over the years. Jack Gilbert Graham blew up an aircraft taking off from Denver's Stapleton Airport in 1955, killing 44. Columbine in 1999, 15 dead including the perpetrators. Now Youth with a Mission, and New Life Church, two dead at each. But ... a church? Yes, a church, and a missionary training center. We are not exempt, but we do not need to fear. We need not give in to the ways of the world and quake in our boots at every loud noise, or wring our hands and cluck our tongues while reciting the mantra,"The end times are here."
Yes, of course they are! But these events are no more a sign of them than "wars and rumors of wars" have been for thousands of years. Remember, God is in control. There will be a media frenzy over these killings for a few days, until the next big sensational story comes along, and then it will just be "Youth with a Mission" or "New Life Church" just as it is "Columbine" or "Oklahoma City."
Don't lose sight of who you are in Christ. Don't lose sight of the work He has given us to do until He returns to call His church home. Don't lose sight of the need we have to remain focused in Him, confident that even if we step in front of a bus or we are met at our church door by a homicidal maniac ...
... we are not citizens of this world, but citizens of heaven, and our death to this life means birth into eternal life in Christ, if we know Him as Savior and Lord. That should give us confidence to face any challenge, any tragedy, any crisis, either of life or of faith.
And if you don't know Him? Let me introduce you to Him. God bless you all, and remember --
God is in control!
I can only describe those who I spoke with this evening as very much in the same state of mind as a rookie soldier returning from his first combat experience. Fearful, filled with doubt, remorse, and memories of horrible things people outside of a war zone should never have to experience. My purpose in writing this is, first, to ask you to pray for these folks. They were forced to view something they never wanted to experience, and now the events of 1.10 p.m. today are indelibly burned into their memories. They will need counseling and spiritual guidance for years to come.
The second half of my purpose is to tell you that no one can know why this tragedy, and the one in Arvada 12 hours earlier, happened. There was no warning in either case, though the gunman at the Youth with a Mission dormitory talked for nearly a half hour before pulling his weapon and snuffing out two beautiful lives and seriously wounding two other people. At New Life, the gunman started walking toward the church after the noon service let out, and shot five people, killing two, before a brave security guard confronted the man and killed him herself. Only God knows why these events happened, though I'm sure in the next few hours and days the media will be happy to regale us with the intimate half-truths of the "facts" as they discover them.
God is in control. When I arrived at the New Life campus late this afternoon and looked around, I was struck by the numbness in the air. Veteran police officers, fire fighters, EMT's and even FBI and ATF agents were wearing looks of mixed somberness and intensity. Ever vigilent, they were nonetheless affected by the ground upon which they stood that this tragedy was acted out upon.
This is a church! This shouldn't happen here, especially not in the "ministry capital of America," Colorado Springs! There are over 400 Christian ministries located here, not the least of which is Focus on the Family, just a few miles down I-25 from the shooting scene. How can this happen in a church?
I ask you, how can it not happen in a church? Are we specially endowed with protection from the evil of the world? Are we exempt from having lunacy and violence visited upon us? Are we to believe that nothing like this can happen in a church? The answer is no, none of these things. To be certain, the dead, having made a true confession acceptable to God for their salvation, now rest in the arms of the Lord Jesus. Their wounds are healed, their faces wiped clean, the trials and unfairness of this world but a distant memory. But what of the rest of us?
I looked into the face of fear tonight. People who never should have had to endure what they saw, heard and felt were forced to see, hear and feel these unspeakable things. They don't understand. They wonder if it can happen again. They fear that, if it does, the next victim might be themselves.
Colorado has seen a plethora of this kind of tragedy over the years. Jack Gilbert Graham blew up an aircraft taking off from Denver's Stapleton Airport in 1955, killing 44. Columbine in 1999, 15 dead including the perpetrators. Now Youth with a Mission, and New Life Church, two dead at each. But ... a church? Yes, a church, and a missionary training center. We are not exempt, but we do not need to fear. We need not give in to the ways of the world and quake in our boots at every loud noise, or wring our hands and cluck our tongues while reciting the mantra,"The end times are here."
Yes, of course they are! But these events are no more a sign of them than "wars and rumors of wars" have been for thousands of years. Remember, God is in control. There will be a media frenzy over these killings for a few days, until the next big sensational story comes along, and then it will just be "Youth with a Mission" or "New Life Church" just as it is "Columbine" or "Oklahoma City."
Don't lose sight of who you are in Christ. Don't lose sight of the work He has given us to do until He returns to call His church home. Don't lose sight of the need we have to remain focused in Him, confident that even if we step in front of a bus or we are met at our church door by a homicidal maniac ...
... we are not citizens of this world, but citizens of heaven, and our death to this life means birth into eternal life in Christ, if we know Him as Savior and Lord. That should give us confidence to face any challenge, any tragedy, any crisis, either of life or of faith.
And if you don't know Him? Let me introduce you to Him. God bless you all, and remember --
God is in control!