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Dear NC Synod,
This is madness. As Wendy and I look to welcome our three grandsons into the world this summer, we are keenly aware of the broken world into which we are welcoming them. Newtown...Aurora...Virginia Tech...San Bernardino...Charleston...Orlando. Where does it end? How?
Like in Genesis with Adam and Eve who blame the serpent, each other, and God, I am quick to place blame. Guns? Muslim extremist terrorism? Mental illness? Cultural polarization that itself blames and targets others, such as the LGBTQ community, to the point of mass murder? Lord, have mercy.
Sin, and fear, and hate, and violence don't originate in those external places of blame. They originate in the human heart. We are captive to sin and cannot free ourselves. Politicians and preachers, myself included, strive to make sense of and offer solutions to our "fix" our brokenness. That usually just polarizes us all the more.
So I invite you to pray, and in giving deep contemplation to God's will in Christ for our lives, to discern what it is we are each called to do amid all this violent madness. How do we best work for reconciliation? How best do we work for and bear the peace of Christ to the world? As Dr. Charles Rice, my homiletics professor at Drew University, used to remind us, "The deeper a crisis gets, the less you need words and answers, and the more you need presence." May you know the presence of Christ in your life and stay connected to the places where we are promised to experience it in Word and Sacrament, and may we all, in our own small yet essential way, BE the peace of Christ to this world.
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