How long, O Lord?

How long, O Lord?

Will you forget me forever?

How long will you hide your face from me?

How long must I take counsel in my soul and have sorrow in my heart all the day?

How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?

Consider and answer me, O Lord my God!

(Psalm 13:1-3a)

There was joy this weekend (over a friend's engagement), but there was pain.  I cried over the shooting in Connecticut.  There have been two shootings, more recent, and closer to home, but they didn't affect me like this one.

I know, come Monday, my students are going to have questions.  They're going to be scared.  They're going to wonder if school is a safe place for them.  As much as I will assure them that I would do everything I could to protect them, if something were to happen, I can't guarantee that.  It just isn't fair.  Why has the world become a place where we have to live in fear?

I've struggled with finding answers to this tragedy.  I know God could have stopped it, but He didn't.  I feel myself asking why, without an adequate answer.  I know I can never fathom His plan, I know we live in a rampant, sin-filled world, I know He continues to be sovereign.  But sometimes, it doesn't feel like enough.  

I know He has heard everything that has been cried out to him over the past few days.  I know He is pained and saddened by it; I know He cries with those who are weeping.  He's gone through the pain of losing a child too.

Come, Lord Jesus.  Come soon.  Because the world is evil, and we are weeping.

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If you haven't already done so, please take time to read the post that is being called "I am Adam Lanza's Mother", by Liza Long.

Her son is one of my students.  Not literally, but he could be.  He displays the characteristics of the children at my school, and in our center's residential treatment center.  I skimmed through the comments, and saw parents chiming in about their youngsters, residing in mental hospitals or treatment centers.  I wondered if any of the comments were from the parents of my students.

Could my students be described as monsters?  Probably.  But I certainly don't see them that way.  I see kids who are vulnerable, hurting, confused and in pain.  I see kids who need our help, because they can't help themselves.  Sometimes, truthfully, I have to force myself to see them in this way.  But that is who they are.  

I don't know if Adam Lanza has a history of mental illness, and frankly, I don't want to know.  But if there is the tiniest inkling of something good to come out this, maybe it will be an acknowledgement of all the kids like my students, and the help they could receive.