And yet another school shooting…

What a tragedy that I can even write such a title. And what a tragedy that when I heard the news, while I was horrified, I wasn’t even shocked. I guess deep down, I had been expecting yet another horrendous news story; sadly, it’s what we are used to.

We now live in a world where it would be easy to live in fear. We live in a world where the most optimistic are going to become more leery of trusting those around us. It is sad, but self preservation. We are no longer safe in schools, in churches, or in the workplace. All three have been targets of crazed people with guns. The latest title on CNN describes the latest attack a “massacre.” While CNN is in the business of overstatement, that pretty much sums it up.

What has happened to this world? This question is especially becoming paramount as we try to come to gripes with where we are and where we need to go as a society. When many of our grandparents were children, they lived in a society where everyone had guns. Read stories of the Old West. And yet, I am not aware of any such actions where the sanctity of a Church or a School or a place of work was so victimized. And yet now, when “gun control” and an “evolved” society now demands that guns be removed from such places, we have this. So how did we go as a society from one where everyone had a gun and hardly anyone used it to one where hardly anyone has a gun but many who do choose to use it… and use it in horrible and frightening ways?

It is a relevant question. It is a relevant question because what do we see on the news every day? What do we see in Israel… in Iraq? Everywhere, literally everywhere, we look, violence is on every headline.

There are many who will point to macro causes: violent video games, removing religion from school, the degrading of the institution of the family, a poor criminal justice system, increased platforms for hate with new technologies, etc. I’m positive that all of those are elements. And yet ultimately, even in a war, even in an army, it is made up of individuals who made a choice to be there. Ultimately, every vicious act is because someone choose to commit it. Someone chose their own wants over the needs of someone else, over society.

James 4:1-10 deals with interpersonal conflict which seems to be pretty relevant at the moment. Let’s see what it has to say.

What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? You want something but don’t get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures. You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God? Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God.

In other words, the root of all quarrels comes down to the battle within in us. It comes down to something wrong in us, and we need to take the responsibility for it. As one of my pastors once said, “The issue is not the issue, and the problem is not the circumstances with any argument.” Ultimately, we argue to prove our point. To prove we are right. To win. James tells us that our flesh longs for lusts and other desires (be they legitimate or illegitimate pleasures), and that causes the conflicts.

As a people, we need to change radically because this isn’t even as bad as it can get. Mark my words, I hope and pray this is the worst school shooting incident. But unless there is a radical backlash that changes our society to say that there is no excuse for this kind of behavior and we will no longer tolerate it, in the next ten years, I wouldn’t be surprised to see an even more massive attack.

Sure, we should be appalled at the actions of those that we see on the news night after night. But if we keep looking at and blaming others for the problems of the world, then nothing is going to change. As a people, we need to stop looking at the news to see the bad in the world, we need to look internally to see the bad in us. Because it is the bad in us, it is the sinful flesh that that we indwell in, that ultimately starts all of this. The biggest fire starts with a single spark, and the biggest battle, the biggest fight, heck even 9-11, can all be traced back to one person who decided to give into the hate and decided to spread it with others. If we don’t question ourselves, if we don’t root out the cause of our own problems, and if we keep criticizing the specks in the eyes of others while ignoring the planks in our own, we won’t fundamentally change like it is needed.

I once read a quote that stated, “The farthest journey that a man can make is the journey within.” Be outraged at this school shooting. It is horrible, and I am not belittling that in any way. But if we don’t start looking in the mirror and demand change as well with what we see there, then we are sowing the seeds for the next one. Remember, you may not pull the trigger directly, but don’t you think the shooter must have been pushed to a brink before they snapped? It is a sobering thought but if someone else hadn’t rejected them, said an unkind word, etc, they might not have rejected mankind.

So look in the mirror. You may not like what you find.

~ by unclewormwood on April 16, 2007.