Newtown Tragedy

How do you reconcile the innocents of Christmas with the horrifice nature of a madman walking into an elementary school and shooting children?  You can't.  A friend of mine put it well when seeking solutions.

"Bear with me. I'm trying to process a few things and have been sharing to help with that as well as hear others opinions. That being said I have a few thoughts on the Sandy Hook School Shooting. 1) controlling guns is not going to solve this issue. He was a crazed man who would have found a way regardless of laws. Yes we can make things harder for criminals, but if they want to do harm they are going to find a way.


"2) there are no right or wrong answers about how we can prevent this in the future. We simply have no answers as to why and only the killers have those answers. We can do our best to figure it out and hope it's enough to make a difference, but unless we start taking blinders off of our eyes and see that there are some people in this world that really are evil we can't change.

"3)we need to take an honest look at mental health in this country. We need to stop labeling those who do not need labels and HELPING those that need help. Parents need to stop pretending that children can never do wrong and see that they can. We need to learn the warning signs for potentially dangerous people and get them help. And we need to give law officials a chance to do the same.

"4) parents need to teach their children violence is NEVER a solution to their anger or fear. We need to teach them that anger and fear are healthy but that we need to address it appropriately and calmly."

She's right.  They didn't need guns in Oklahoma City.  They used common fertilizer.  People are shifting blame to guns.  To schools.  To video games.  (For the record, I won't play games like Call of Duty for this reason.  It's one thing to shoot aliens or zombies.  It's something else to go for realism that my friends have lived through.  There is something wrong about fantasizing about real deaths and tragedy.) 

The bottom line is evil just exists in the world sometimes.  Like 9-11, OK City, Aurora, and Newtown.  People like Osama bin Laden, Timothy McVay, Joseph Stalin, and Adolph Hitler.  Part of me thinks we will never truly understand these people.  At least I won't.  You can't legislate morality.  This boy didn't have a legal issue or a self-esteem issue.  He was not right in the head, and for some reason, did an act of great evil. 

The hope for this world isn't the law.  It isn't a political party.  It isn't video games, or lack thereof.  The only cure for evil is Jesus. 

Then again, that's what Christmas is really about, isn't it?

Embassy attacks

Mad yet?  You should be.  An embassy of any country counts as that countries sovereign territory.  So attacking a US embassy is the same as attacking the white house.  And worse, the first attacks were coordinated to take place on 9-11. 

There are several points to be made here.  First of all, a leaked statement came out after the attack in Cairo, apologizing for being there.  And while Obama has rightfully distanced himself from this idiocy, even if it was not his words, it IS his philosophy.  One of the first things he did was to go to Cairo and apologize for the war on terror.  We were ATTACKED.  We have been attacked now.  Apologizing for being attacked is the same as desecrating our own dead.

Second, I would like to point out that the attacks in Egypt and Libya come after we helped to dispose two men who were considered our allies.  Now let me be clear, by targeting civilians, both men showed a great evil.  If I were in Obama's shoes, I probably would have made similar calls in both cases.  However, this is a case of out of the frying pan, into the fire.  Mubarak and Qaddafi were both considered allies, barely, but they did keep the Muslim Brotherhood in check.  There is a saying, "Better the devil you know than the one you don't."  In this case, we replace the devils we knew with terrorists.

Third, I hate political responses.  "We condemn these attacks in the strongest terms."  No, you don't.  That is in effect saying "We thought long and hard about it and decided murder is bad."  That's stupid.  You should order Marines to guard embassies and our American flag with sniper rifles and machine guns.  The crowd gets out of line, you carefully select a few of the worst behaving and put them down like a rabid dog.  Maybe without instigators, the crowd will disperse. 

Fourth, and this is a question, why did we support the "Arab spring" against our allies, but not in Syria and Iran where it might actually do some good by overthrowing those who seek to kill us and our friend Israel, and have the means to do so?  Answer me that.  (further discussion coming later on this).

Fifth, Mitt Romney's response was dumb.  Even if what he said was correct, it was not appropriate.  Yes, the white house perhaps should have condemned the attacks BEFORE Mitt told them to do so, but still, you don't criticize the president while the attacks are happening.  He should have waited (not that the other side of the aisle did against Bush, but their misbehavior does not excuse his). 

Sixth, shame on the morons who blame us for getting attacked.  They did the same after 9-11.  "We provoked it."  Yes, we totally provoked 9-11 because the towers didn't fall when they were attacked in 1993.  That's entirely our fault for not rolling over and dying right then.  The Quran says to kill.  This is a violent religion.  If you say that those who do these attacks pervert a peaceful religion, you are ignorant.  Read the thing for yourself.  And read history, about Mohammed's attacks on others.  It was violent before it was peacefully.  This is a religion that teaches murder and terrorism.  They are taught to kill and enslave anyone who disagrees with them.  They will never be appeased.  If we were no longer a world superpower, they would still try to kill us because that is all they know.  It is not our fault, as evidence by the fact that they also kill each other.  It is simply their paradigm.  So all these people that call themselves "elite" and teach that we are the cause of people hating us are just plain STUPID.

My 9-11 story

Eleven years ago, the bell rang at 10:05 to let me out of Algebra 2. There to greet me was a friend of mine. He told me terrorists had hijacked a bunch of planes, and had already rammed two into the World Trade Center. I told him, "Somebody is messing with you. No one is dumb enough to attack the United States of America." I walked into US History next, as saw one smoking tower on TV (the other had fallen). When the bell rang to start History Class, Mr. Eckart got up in front of the class and said "This is History." We spent the rest of class in silence listening to Peter Jennings.

Never forget.

Osama bin Laden

Everyone remembers where they were when they heard that terrorists had hijacked four airplanes and were using them as weapons. I remember a friend telling me after leaving Algebra 2 at 10:05. I told him someone was messing with him when he told me that terrorists had rammed airplanes in the World Trade Center. I told him no one was dumb enough to attack the United States. Then I walked into my US History class to see a television showing a single smoking tower (the other had just fallen). I remember hearing Peter Jennings explain terrorists had rammed airplanes into the WTC and the Pentagon. I remember them showing a split screen, and saying these were the first images of the damage to the Pentagon. I remember them saying a fourth plane was overtaken by the hostages and downed in PA. I remember looking out the window, trying to see if there were more planes out there headed for us. I remember and eerily empty sky, no clouds and no planes (unusual considering our proximity to an airport). I remember days later when Pres. Bush made an announcement that Stealth Bombers had bombed a country I had never heard of before, and walking into that same US History class to try to find Afghanistan on a globe.

Yesterday morning, I awoke early and pulled up twitter on an iPhone. I saw tweets that made no sense, something about Pres. Obama making a speech and people staying up late to celebrate. I turned my TV on to Fox news, who had the headline "UBL killed in Pakistan." Fox has always transliterated "Osama" as "Usama." I knew instantly was "UBL" stood for. I knew bin Laden was dead.

I must say, this was emotional for me. I never thought I'd live to see the day. I thought he'd die of old age. My phone rang, a friend headed to work. He was calling to tell me what I just learned. I watched TV as I talked to him. I shed a tear when they showed the Air Force Academy breaking out into singing the National Anthem.

I'm not the patriot that I used to be. As my loyalty to God increases, my loyalty to a country decreases. But, something within me was lifted up. Not that a man was dead. Not that I hated him. But that justice for something so evil was taken care of. I heard jokes about Jack Bauer and John McClain (speficically, "Yippie-kay-aye bin Laden").

Then I saw this quote.

Matthew 5:43-45
"You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven."
NIV

I knew I'd see that quote. Christians celebrating death is not what Jesus wanted. But I don't think using this passage as a weapon was what he wanted either. You also have to consider this (and many other passages on God's judgement and justice).

Romans 13:3-4
"For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right and he will commend you. For he is God's servant to do you good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword for nothing. He is God's servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer."
NIV

Navy Seals where that sword, an agent of God's wrath on bin Laden. But there is a balance to this. Though I am glad that justice is done, I bore no ill will toward the man. The opposite, actually. I could not have done it. My love, for this man, my enemy, would have prevented me. Being a Christian, I look to bin Laden and must recognize that he was deserving of hell, and by pulling the trigger I would have sent him to hell. I am not willing to send him there. Because I am also deserving of hell, but Jesus extended his grace to me.

I can't help but think this whole time about bin Laden. One thing that cannot be denied is that he was a charismatic leader and recruiter. People flocked to him. What if, instead of being an agent of hate, he would have been an agent of love? What if, instead of being an ambassador of descruction, he would have been an ambassador of restoration? What if, instead of being a man of death, he would have been a man of life? What if, instead of being a terrorist, he would have been a missionary? What if, instead of being a weapon of Satan, he would have been a tool of God? What if, instead of creating suicide bombers, he would have made disciples of Jesus?

It is strange to think about how this world could have changed if someone had reached Osama bin Laden for Jesus. I am grieved that he went to hell. I grieve for him, as well as for the man that he could have been in Christ Jesus, as a new creation as I am. I know that though God is willing and able to punish him for his sins, that God was also willing to forgive and cleanse him of those same sins. God gifted bin Laden to draw people to himself. If he would have used that ability to draw people to the cross, imagine how our world would be.

So I pause, and though a small part of be celebrates justice, it is not as big as the part of me that grieves the what if's.