Good morning…
I just woke to news of a shocking tragedy. “We need URGENT prayer,” an email from a man named Steve was forwarded to me. “There was a tragic car accident on Saturday with 5 American college students from Texas heading to Frontier Ranch to work at camp. One girl – Anna, who was Gina Ramey’s campaigner girl from Tyler – died at the scene. Another boy, Blake – the son of Young Life College Staff Leader from Austin, Brett Rodgers – is in critical condition in a coma in a hospital in Waco, Texas. Please, let’s pray for full healing and recovery for Blake. Pray for Brett and his family. Pray for Anna’s family, Gina, and the whole Tyler and Texas A&M communities. Pray for the other 3 kids who were in the car. Let’s keep this up for many days…thank you.”
Wow. How incredibly devastating. These college kids volunteering their time to serve high school students the love of Jesus at Young Life camp were killed and injured? What’s that about, God? It makes no earthly sense. No sense at all.
Then at 4:44 am, I opened yesterday’s blog post, a post I had pre-programmed before I headed to bed. I sensed God’s reply to my “Why, God, why?” My thoughts are not your thoughts. Neither are your ways my ways. My ways, my thoughts are higher. My word rains down and waters. My word initiates budding and flourishing. My word yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater. My word will not return to me empty but will accomplish all I desire, achieving my purposes. You will go out in joy and be led for in peace to join the cycle of life’s sacred seasons (paraphrase of Isaiah 55:8-12, NIV).
Then at 5:07 am, I opened up the Henri Nouwen morning meditation, Dying With A Grateful Heart. Nouwen writes: “We often wonder how death will occur for us. Through illness, accident, war, or a natural disaster? Will our deaths happen suddenly or gradually? There are no answers for these questions, so we really should not spend time worrying about them. We don’t know how our lives will end, and this is a blessed ignorance! But there is an important question that we should consider: When our time to die comes, will we die in such a way that those we leave behind are not devastated by grief or left with feelings of shame or guilt? How we leave others depends largely on how we prepare ourselves for death. When we can die with grateful hearts, grateful to God and our families and friends, our deaths can become sources of life for others.”
In unison, let’s urgently pray for God’s word to rain down upon all who are touched by this shocking tragedy. Watering, budding, flourishing, may the LORD’s powerful word accomplish eternal purposes. Only God can orchestrate holistic healing in the lives of those injured and those grieving loved ones. Loving-kind LORD, enlisting your higher thought process, may this tragedy miraculously become a source of life for others. Let’s keep up these prayers for days and days and days…thank you.
…Sue…
