Oso, MP Shooting and Thanksgiving

www.MarysvilleNaz.org 

It almost seems cruel.  A few weeks after the shooting and days after the last funeral we find ourselves looking at Thanksgiving.  Normally this would mean thoughts of gratitude for all that God has done in the previous year.  Don't get me wrong, God as done a lot.  It's just that there have also been a couple of nearly incomprehensible tragedies in the Oso slide and the MP Shooting.  It just seems like we have had more than our fair share of late.  Honestly, the whole thing has left me a little emotionally flat when it comes to giving thanks.  

As I have pondered all this the Holy Spirit has been prodding me.  It's that poking God does when I've missed something significant and I need to catch on. Sometimes God and I wrestle about these things for a long time but sometimes the Lord clears things up more quickly.  The important revelation came last week while grappling with a Thanksgiving sermon that just wouldn't come together.  

In 1 Thessalonians 5:18 the Apostle Paul writes "Give thanks in all things, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus."   In light of the real disasters we have faced the verse seems cruel.  I get the giving thanks bit but in ALL things?  Really?  It took me awhile but God finally got the important truth through.  

The Verse says IN not FOR. 

In not For, is a hugely important difference.  Honestly it changes everything.  "In" is about geography.  You can be in a house, or in a cave.  "For" on the other hand is about causation.  For the crime of shoplifting I sentence you to...   "For" means because of.  In means during.  

Paul was not telling those early Christians to give thanks FOR their circumstances he was instructing them to give thanks IN the midst of their difficult circumstances.  I felt greatly revealed, and then the Holy Spirit sprung the trap.  

I'm an ungrateful person.  I don't like that about me but the truth is 99.99% of the time when I am grateful, I'm grateful "for" what I have.  House, car, job, vacation even family, friends and church are all things for which I am profoundly grateful. I should be grateful for all these things.  God has blessed those of us in the Western World with so much stuff that it's embarrassing when compared to the rest of the world.  Yes, please give thanks "for" stuff.  But really, thanksgiving for stuff is pretty shallow.  

The deeper, more substantive thanks-giving is the kind that is offered to God when there isn't much "for" which to be thankful.  This is the kind of thankfulness that is more important than stuff.  It bubbles up from the depths in the soul.  It is not dependent on the circumstances of the moment.  It cares not about prosperity or poverty.  It sees beyond grief and the struggles of pain.  This kind of thankfulness gives life to us because it forces us to stop looking at what we do or do not have and turn our attention toward who we have.  

Who we have is Jesus Christ who has conquered death and given us new life.  Who we have is the Holy Spirit who is the Comforter and cares for us when all else is stripped away.  Who we have is our Heavenly Father who is King of Kings and Lord of Lords and will one day put an end to all pain and suffering.  Who we have ... is God and nothing can take that away.  

This Thanksgiving is going to be different for us.  There will be a certain sadness that will hang over the day.  I will remember that there are many, many families in my community that are grieving loss, facing the first major holiday with an empty chair at the table.  We will pray for them, we will not give thanks for those circumstances for they were evil.  But then... then we will give thanks to God IN  our grief, for this is God's will for us. 

May the Peace of Christ be yours this Thanks-Giving season.

School Shooting... Marysville WA

www.MarysvilleNaz.org

Almost three weeks ago the unthinkable happened in my community, we had a school shooting.  I haven't written about it in large part because I'm not sure what to say and in many ways I'm still in shock.  It all seems a bit unreal. 

How exactly does one get a handle on this?  There really aren't words... and blogging is all about words, I'm all about words... but in this moment they seem completely inadequate.  

So here is what I think.  

First, evil is real.  None of us know what was going on in the young man's mind that day but neither can we deny that the choices he made were evil.  No getting around it, massaging it or sugar coating it.  What happened at Marysville-Pilchuck was evil plain and simple. 

We live in a world that wants to run away from the idea of evil.  We like to say they aren't bad, what they did was bad.  I get what they are trying to say, the kid wasn't Hitler but still, I think the distinction is lost on the families of his victims.  Evil is real and denying it doesn't help. 

Second, evil always damages innocent victims.  It is the nature of evil.  It would be one thing if the only person hurt by evil was the person doing it, but it never works that way.  Evil always harms bystanders.  I often think this is why God hates evil so much.  

Third... and most importantly, the remedy for evil is not justice but Love.  Don't get me wrong, there is a very important place for justice.  Locking up folks that do this sort of thing is absolutely the right thing to do, but justice can never cure the problem it can only respond after the fact.  In the case of our shooting, there isn't even anyone to lock up.  The shooter took his own life.  The whole justice mantra seems hollow and very unsatisfying.

Love is God's answer to evil.  It's not as immediately or emotionally satisfying as justice but it is the only answer that actually address the problem.  It is also the only answer that can eliminate the problem before it finds expression in destructive actions.  

The real trouble with evil is that it's a heart problem and no amount of justice can change the heart, only love can do that.  The power of the gospel of Jesus Christ is not that He came to bring justice but that he came to bring a remedy for evil.  It was love not justice that motivated Jesus to surrender his life and absorb the consequences of our evil.  It is only Love that can open our hearts to what he wants to do in us.  To use His language, "cleansing us of all sin."  (1 John 1:7)  The only cure for evil is to change our hearts. 

In the days since the shooting I've been privileged to watch an outpouring of love in our community.  There have been lots of hugs, words of support, material gifts and sometime just gathering for the sake of being together.  Somehow we intuitively know that the response to evil must be Love.  Love is the cure and Love will heal. 

I think maybe this is why Jesus added only one commandment.. "Love Each Other"