My heart is grieving, but it also cries out for justice. I must admit that a large part of me asks for no mercy for someone who would abuse, and then kill, a child. Another part of me wonders what could cause someone to commit such unspeakable acts, and wonders at the injustices along the way that allowed this.
I am not condemning the relatives or neighbors in this case. I don’t know their situations, so I have no right. What I do know, and what breaks my heart is that we live in a world where we have shut ourselves off from our neighbors, or in some cases, our own families. We leave our houses in the morning, drive to work by ourselves, spend our day barely interacting with our coworkers, drive back home, where we shut the door to the outside world. At the most, we wave to our neighbor as we drive away. How many of us spend time with those who live around us, getting to know them as people? How many of us who call themselves followers of Christ spend time with our neighbors without an agenda to “get them saved?” How many of us see them as beings made in the image of God, rather than as those on the “outside?”
My heart grieves. It also cries, ‘Enough!” It is time for the body of Christ to stop acting like a bunch of unconnected parts, and begin spending time with one another, building into each other’s lives. This will be revolutionary for many in the institutional church, because it will mean that the majority of our time will need to be spent in going from house to house rather than from meeting to meeting. We will spend more time building relationships than building programs. Our money will go to help individuals in need instead of a building program. We will know who has need and giving will come naturally, not from a “benevolence ministry.”
Relationships are not easy. They can be very messy, and sometimes painful. The alternative is continuing in the, “How are you doing?” “Fine,” way of dealing with people. We can let down our guard and develop deep relationships fueled by love, or we can stay on the surface and never get to know others. We can know people and be known well enough to step in and help when it’s needed, or we can say we never saw it coming when the world collapses on them. We can be the body of Christ, or we can be people who just “go to church.”
Choose wisely.
My niece attended the same school as Zahra. Today would have been Zahra's birthday. My sister said all the students wore white today because Zahra's name means "white flower."
We had students wearing white for the same reason at our school.
Wow. What a sad story. A child's death never makes sense. When I think of justice my heart goes to that verse in James that speaks of caring for orphans and widows. Somehow I think that society has separated justice and victims. Most victims never see justice in the sense of reparations from the one who victimized them. Maybe out justice system should somehow find a way to mete out justice for victims?