Good morning…
When I woke yesterday, I re-read our life-giving post, To My Surprise. Again, I thoroughly enjoyed the photos of the beach, the rainbow, and the nest of baby cardinals being protected and nourished by their father. A few minutes later, I checked out the headline news on my phone, and I was heartbroken by the July 5th interview with Atlanta mayor, Keisha Lance Bottoms (who by the way, a fifty year old mom of four, ended the day with an asymptomatic positive result on her COVID test).
“Enough is enough,” Bottoms said. “Enough is enough. We have talked about this movement that’s happening across America and this moment in time when we have the ears and the interest of people across the country and across this globe who are saying that they want to see change. But there’s a difference in this moment in time and the civil rights movement – in the civil rights movement, there was a defined, common enemy. We’re fighting the enemy within when we are shooting each other up in our streets.”
She continued: “You shot and killed a baby. And there wasn’t just one shooter, there were at least two shooters. An 8-year-old baby. If you want people to take us seriously, and you don’t want us to lose this movement, then we can’t lose each other.”
“It has to stop,” Bottoms added. “You can’t blame this on police officers. It’s about people who shot a baby in a car. We’re doing each other more harm than any officer on this force.”
Baby. The word baby lingers with me. An 8-year-old baby was shot and killed. Newborn baby cardinals. An innocent baby child. Baby. Baby.
Tell me, what do birds instinctively know that we-people have forgotten? Peaceful dependence upon our Provider. The Lord has told you what is good. He has told you what he wants from you: Do what is right to other people. Love being kind to others. And live humbly, trusting your God (Micah 6:8, ICB).
The prayers of my hurting heart go out to this 8-year-old’s mother and father, her family and her friends, these self-centered shooters and their mortified families. “Heavenly Father, please protect and nourish all of us, individually and collectively, as we grieve and we grow, as we grow and we grieve.”
Yes, weep and grieve until the Spirit is poured down on us from above and the badlands desert grows crops and the fertile fields become forests. Justice will move into the badlands desert. Right will build a home in the fertile field. And where there’s Right, there’ll be Peace and the progeny of Right: quiet lives and endless trust. My people will live in a peaceful neighborhood— in safe houses, in quiet gardens. The forest of your pride will be clear-cut, the city showing off your power leveled. But you will enjoy a blessed life, planting well-watered fields and gardens, with your farm animals grazing freely (Isaiah 32:15-20, MSG).
LORD, as we weep and we grieve, please pour out Your Spirit and build Your home in our fertile common ground, where Right and Peace will grow safe neighborhoods and well-watered gardens, quiet lives and endless trust. Clear-cutting the forest of our own self-centered pride, please break into our hearts so You can transform the world.
…Sue…
P.S. In this Unsplash.com photo above, another baby helps us to remember what we have forgotten: “Treat people good.”
