This morning’s post is not a happy one. It reflects the question in my mind–why? Why the riots and violence and hatred? Yes, I know the trigger and the hatred and disregard for human life that prompted what I’m seeing now. But, how did we as a nation get to this point?
It almost seems as if God has turned His face away, doesn’t it? Or, could it be that it wasn’t God who turned away? For several decades, we have been de-valuing human lives. Our new laws have given legality to actions that God said were wrong. Times have changed, we said. We are more enlightened now, we said. So, if right and wrong are relative and constantly changing, where is the wrong in disregarding a man’s pleas to let him breathe? If right and wrong depend upon popular beliefs, where’s the wrong in responding to violence with more violence and destruction and anarchy which have nothing to do with the original wrong in the first place?
When the President of the United States has to be taken to a bunker for safety, when the parish house of an historic church across the street from the White House is burned, when American flags are burned and stomped on, when people are threatened and injured, when livelihoods are destroyed, it’s past time to pray.
All lives are precious and valuable. Life is a miracle, whether it is an unborn life, or whatever race or color of skin or belief that person has, it is irreplaceable and is made in the image of God. Sin distorts all that is beautiful and right. It blinds eyes and hardens hearts, and in the end, it leads to death. The violence has gone beyond reasoning and is like a wildfire, devouring whatever and whoever it finds, and like wildfire, it is mindless and leaves ugliness in its wake. Prayer is powerful, no matter what the ridicule of the naysayers, and it’s the only answer I see. Pray and hope that God answers.
Amen!