He will wipe every tear from their eye...

 I have no words for the unimaginable tragedy that happened yesterday in CT.  I heard about it at work in the afternoon and immediately felt like I was going to vomit and I have pretty much felt that way since.  I don't understand how someone could execute children.  

 

We have not told B about this and are intentionally trying to shield him from it. Please DO NOT mention this around him in any way.  Although this horrible incident highlights that in fact, we as parents can not protect our children from everything/anything (a sobering and terrifying reality) it is important for young children to believe parents can completely take care of them.  If B was 8 or 10 this would likely be a very different conversation in our house, but B is 4.  He has already come through complex and difficult circumstances, does not feel safe at school, and after 18 months of hard work on all our parts is just starting to trust that we will take care of him.  He does not need to grapple with this right now. We will address it with him in an age appropriate way if/when it comes up but we are hoping that it will not.

 

 Although we are shielding him from it, we are not shielded.  My heart breaks for all who are mourning today.  I cannot stop hugging and kissing B.  I cannot swallow the lump in my throat.  I cannot hold back the tears that stream down my face at random moments.  As a mother I cannot imagine how I would feel if something happened to B at school, let alone if he died.  Devastated is not a strong enough word.  As a wife, a sister, a daughter, a friend...oh my heart aches for these children and teachers and their families.

 

 This horrible act of violence clearly violates God's commandments.  It goes against every shred of decency in our society and annihilates every convention of behavior.  It is unfathomable to me. I cannot understand it.  I don't think I ever will.

 

Our world is sinful and broken.  There is a tension between the image of God reflected in us as his creation and the gaping void of sin that twists and lies and corrupts everything. Most of the time I live in a fairly insulated world where I acknowledge this, but push it aside and stuff it down.  When confronted with yesterday's events, a glimpse of the depths of sin and depravity are silhouetted in stark relief and it scares the shit out of me.

 

As scared and sad and hopeless as I feel in this situation, the one thing that I know to be true is that God loves me.  He loves you.  He created us.  He created this world.  He is the most Powerful.  The most Wise.  The most Loving.  The most True.  The most Just.  The most Holy. I don't understand why he allowed sin to enter the world or why he allows it to continue in the world, but I know that He has triumphed over sin and death and Satan, and that He will come again...with Justice, with Healing, with Renewal, with Life!

 

Tonight as I tucked  B into bed we read a paraphrase from Revelations in his Bible and it seemed so apropos that I have included the whole chapter here.    

 

Revelations 21

Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea.  I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”

He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.” He said to me: “It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To the thirsty I will give water without cost from the spring of the water of life. Those who are victorious will inherit all this, and I will be their God and they will be my children. But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars—they will be consigned to the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death.”


One of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues came and said to me, “Come, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb.” And he carried me away in the Spirit to a mountain great and high, and showed me the Holy City, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God. It shone with the glory of God, and its brilliance was like that of a very precious jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal.  It had a great, high wall with twelve gates, and with twelve angels at the gates. On the gates were written the names of the twelve tribes of Israel. There were three gates on the east, three on the north, three on the south and three on the west.  The wall of the city had twelve foundations, and on them were the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.


The angel who talked with me had a measuring rod of gold to measure the city, its gates and its walls. The city was laid out like a square, as long as it was wide. He measured the city with the rod and found it to be 12,000 stadia in length, and as wide and high as it is long. The angel measured the wall using human measurement, and it was 144 cubits thick. The wall was made of jasper, and the city of pure gold, as pure as glass. The foundations of the city walls were decorated with every kind of precious stone. The first foundation was jasper, the second sapphire, the third agate, the fourth emerald,  the fifth onyx, the sixth ruby, the seventh chrysolite, the eighth beryl, the ninth topaz, the tenth turquoise, the eleventh jacinth, and the twelfth amethyst. The twelve gates were twelve pearls, each gate made of a single pearl. The great street of the city was of gold, as pure as transparent glass.


I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.  The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp.  The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it. On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there.  The glory and honor of the nations will be brought into it. Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.