Father, I pray for the families of Sandy Hook. I pray You
will be with them in their grief. I know, Lord, that You are close to them
because You promise to be close to the broken hearted. I pray that those who
know You will cling to You and that those who don’t will turn to You. For all
of them, Lord, I pray that You will heal their broken hearts and bind their
wounds.
The words of Matthew 2:18 have been hauntingly close this
week, Lord. I hear the cries of “Rachel, weeping for her children,” refusing to
be consoled. Father, it was into this kind of world that Jesus came —
vulnerable and targeted for death by a crazy king who felt Your threat to his
power. Yet, Lord, through the Father’s grace and protection, You survived. You
grew to adulthood, lived among us and gave Your life for us. You did not die as a child at
the whims of a king but as a man by the purpose of God. And because You came
and lived and died and rose again, You are here with us now in our brokenness
and grief, in the midst of yet another tragedy involving the innocent.
Father, I pray for the children who survived. In this world
gone mad, may they come to know Your love, Your peace, Your security and Your
purpose for their lives. May they grow to be strong. May this tragedy define
them only to the extent that they seek You and grow into men and women
who can be a force for good in this broken world.
Father, I pray for the parents, teachers and community of
Newtown. Comfort them in their grief. Give them the resilience to rebuild.
Lord, as they face funeral after funeral this week, I’m sure many are praying,
“Lord, if You had been here, my child would not have died.” Father, I feel Your
tears as You hear their cries. But just as you comforted Martha in the death of
her brother, Lazarus, I pray that You will comfort them. Remind them that You
are the resurrection and the life. Remind them that in You we can live
abundantly, even in the face of suffering, carnage and death. You give us hope,
Lord, when all seems lost. Help us to trust You. Help us to believe that
somehow what others intended for evil, You planned for good to bring about the
saving of many lives.
Father, I am looking to see what You will bring about
through this tragedy. May wrong fail and right prevail. I am thankful You walk among us. I am thankful You never
leave us.
In Jesus name, amen.
And in despair I
bowed my head;
"There is no peace on earth," I said;
"For hate is strong, And mocks the
song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!"
Then pealed the
bells more loud and deep:
"God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
The Wrong shall fail, The Right
prevail,
With peace on the earth, good-will to men."
- Henry Wadsworth
Longfellow