I've been thinking and praying about the recent tragedy
in Connecticut. The irrational slaughter
of twenty innocent children, seven adults and a young man just out of his teen
years, in a small hometown should alarm and sadden every one of us. But in a week or two all of us, except for the
families of the twenty-eight, will be able to put this behind us. We’ll move on
with our Christmas holiday as usual. We’ll
gather around family tables most of which will have each chair filled. We’ll
open gifts that seem all-important, but in the face of eternity are
frivolous. We’ll sate our bellies with
delicious, homemade food until we can barely move. (Not that these are evil or bad things. They
should be the norm.) But in reality for
most of us, life will go on as usual: tedious, monotonous, chugging along, with
just a blip here and there in the static. But that’s not how history will be written in a
small town in Connecticut.
For those families and those towns in Connecticut
the date of will inhabit a “special” place in history. Each of the twenty-eight
victims has family members; direct and extended family. And yes, Adam Lanza is victim as well as a perpetrator. No parent raises their
child to find fame in the manner in which he
found celebrity. Each name will be added to the
ever-growing list of victims of a random act of violence. Each will be
commemorated in the fading annals of history as being a victim in one of the
saddest incidences in American history: as they should.
However, what we might not realize is that this is
another bucketful of water has been dumped on our culture’s psyché. It’s said
that each one of use is only seven relationships away from knowing every person
on the planet. That means that each
single person – not only in our country – but worldwide is somehow affected by
the overwhelming heartbreak. The ripples from December 14th are far
reaching. The bucketful of evil, unleashed a mere sixty miles from New York
City, affects each one of us more than we realize. Each of us has ripples lapping at our feet.
Oddly, I kept thinking
about the words “exponential growth.”
What does that have to do with what happened in Connecticut?
In the beginning, most people
don’t even recognize the trend as exponential. For instance, a single lily
growing to cover one-tenth of one percent of a lake hardly seems noteworthy,
let alone deserving of special attention.
The problem with this
negligence is that it can cause people to ignore or dismiss some very big and
significant trends. All the while exponential math continues to weave its
inextricable magic. Unfortunately, all too often, by the time people finally do
grasp how fast things are progressing–say on Day 28 of the pond example–and
hope to either capitalize on its explosive growth or, alternatively, avoid
being overwhelmed by its growing power, it is too late.
Another example concerning
lily pad growth applies:
There is a pond in France
in which water lilies grow. The lilies double in size each day. At this rate of
growth the water lilies will completely cover the pond in 30 days. On what day
will the pond be half-full of water lilies?
The pond will be half-full
on the 29th day (the lilies will double over night and the pond will be full).
This is the nature of exponential growth — it sneaks up on you.” http://www.seacoastonline.com/articles/20110823-LIFE-108230396
The last lines of each quote should grab us! “It sneaks up on you!” “Unfortunately, all too often,
by the time people finally do grasp how fast things are progressing…and hope
to…avoid being overwhelmed by its growing power, it is too late.”
The earliest school
shooting in the U.S. was recorded in 1764. However, it’s not only school
shootings that lap at our feet. It’s any senseless act of violence: terrorist
bombings; 9/11; mall shootings; postal shootings; drive-by shootings; gang
violence; TV violence; abortion, etc. Each
assault slowly decays our morals: our sense of safety is eroded, the boundaries
for what is acceptable bulge at each undulation. It sneaks up on us!
Before we know it Sandy
Hook will become another “normal” in the ebb and floe of humanity. But in
reality what has happened is that we find that this last ripple now laps at our
knees instead of our feet. Continually
finding ourselves engulfed in another ever-rising tide of evil. We become
desensitized. Yes, we run to our Maker in times of terror, but most of us
return to life as usual, waiting for the next rise in the water to drive us to
His feet. How long before the water rises over our collective gasping heads?
How long before we can no longer tread water long enough for normal to return?
How long before the exponential growth of violence undoes us?
It’s not merely a matter of tighter gun control.
It’s not only a question of personality disorders, or drug-induced abnormal
behavior. The answer includes the Body of Christ. How long, church? Will it jolt us back into the
reality that life is fleeting and “tomorrow is promised to no man?” Will it jerk the church back into
understanding the spiritual battle in which we are engulfed? Will it yank us to
knowledge that Sandy Hook is not just another random rise in the tide? How long before the church realizes that we
“do not wrestle against flesh and
blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the
darkness of this age, against
spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places?” (Eph 6:12) Sandy Hook is
another bucketful of water dumped into our pshcyé by the evil one.
What is the answer?
Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil
day, and having done all, to stand...and for me, that utterance
may be given to me, that I may open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of
the gospel, for which
I am an ambassador in chains; that in it I may speak boldly, as I ought to
speak.” (Eph 6:13-20)
Stand, Church!! Speak, Church!!
