Thursday morning proved that even small campuses like Oregon’s Umpqua Community College are vulnerable to hate and affliction. One person’s choice to clothe himself with body armor and enter a college heavily armed, with a large amount of ammunition, led to 10 people losing their lives and 7 left wounded, according to law enforcement officials.
Several articles have posted that this shooter targeted students that were Christians. CNN reported that one student, Anastasia Boylan told her father the gunman entered her classroom firing.
"I've been waiting to do this for years," the gunman told the professor teaching the class. He shot him point blank, Boylan recounted.
Others were hit too, she told her family.
Everyone in the classroom dropped to the ground.
The gunman, while reloading his handgun, ordered the students to stand up and asked if they were Christians, Boylan told her family.
"And they would stand up and he said, 'Good, because you're a Christian, you're going to see God in just about one second,'" Boylan's father, Stacy, told CNN, relaying her account.
"And then he shot and killed them."
As I read this article I thought…
I’m a father.
I’m a Christian.
This scares me.
I’d be perfectly fine throwing some protective bubble around all those that I love in order to protect them from the heinous circumstances that this world presents. Many will debate about guns and mental illness. Others will focus in on this being about standing up for religion. All of these topics should be talked about and worked through with the betterment of humanity at the forefront.
The thing is - we’re promised a world of tribulation. We just tend to forget. This is an over-promising and falsely captivating place of residence that teases us with safety. And even when we give all we have to make this world safe, this is not our home!
Whether you are gun rights, Christian rights, right wing, left wing, and chicken wing - you’ll never find sustaining peace in a broken, fragile world. But we aren’t left here to just drown in a cesspool while crying over a beer.
How should we respond?
Grieve.
Hold tight to the ones you love.
Support in every way all those in Oregon that have been hurt and affected by this senseless tragedy.
Pray reverently and fervently.
Stay away from Facebook banter and social media hating…
And mostly, take heart and hold to this promise offered to everyone that believes…
“I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” John 16:33
