In 2012 during the Sandy Hook shooting, Charity and I were staying in a village about an hour from Kathmandu doing some Nepali language learning. We had intentionally disconnected from the outside world to throw ourselves into language and not be distracted. We found out about the massacre at least a week after it occurred. We were not around America to see and hear the outcry and that week still seems like a bit of a blur as we just didn’t have the emotional presence to really sympathize.
Ten years later, a similar event has unfolded and I no longer sit in a remote village. I am having difficulty expressing the pain I feel over the Robb Elementary School Massacre. I have sat in silence staring straight ahead for minutes at a time as I grieve.
So much has changed for me since Sandy Hook. We returned to the US for several months after that village stay in Nepal only to return to the Himalayas to live permanently. I lost my mom suddenly in our first months there. Our boy was born in Kathmandu. We transitioned back to the US sooner than expected. Being without children for so many years afforded us a lot of flexibility in life and ministry but events like the ones flashing across my phone screen have shaken me up to new levels now that we have a child.
When we returned from Nepal we moved to a neighborhood with high crime as it was affordable for many newly arriving Bhutanese-Nepali refugees. I don’t think I fully realized the depth of despair and violence while I was there. There were multiple shootings around our house in those days. A good friend from our church had her 11-year-old son murdered right in front of her in a likely botched drug interaction. Her teenage son was shot as well and we sat with her hearing the aftermath of coping with this news. It was all over the media. Last year another member of that same small house church was tragically killed at point blank range by her boyfriend. Now, many miles from that neighborhood, we often hear gunfire throughout the night. A few months ago Charity was talking with a neighbor who had gotten hit by a stray bullet just a few buildings over. We call the police often.
Part of me wonders how in all these years of chaos that we have been spared. How have we been this fortunate compared to kids in Uvalde. . . grandparents in Buffalo. . . students at Parkland. . . Columbine. . . Virginia Tech. . . . . . the list goes on. Very time I hear a shot I tense up. Every. Single Time. How do you stay vigilant as a blind guy when the first time you notice anything is once the shots are fired? I was less than 100 feet away from shots last November and I thought it was over. Imagining 10-year-olds not just tensing up or wondering if these were their last moments on earth but actually discovering that fate leaves me in deep sadness.
What is the appropriate response? More security? Gun laws? Arming teachers? More prayer? Everyone suddenly becoming godly. More mental health screening? So many are processing and grasping for something, anything really to deal with this atrocity. Did the police wait too long? Did they have misinformation? We all have a grenade in our hands wanting to throw it in the right place to once and for all rid our society of this cancer but I’m not so sure most of us know where to throw it. As I read the quick responses, the grasping for meaning, the outrage – it is just hard to read. It feels like our grenades of good intentions are just timing out and are just exploding in our hands. Where do we go from here?
I don’t know.
I still need more time to feel what I didn’t feel ten years ago. I sit in silence not as a trite response but simply to try to steady myself in the midst of such chaos. I mourn with those in the Uvalde community, knowing that mourning will one day have to end and true justice sought. This stuff isn’t going away. For today though I don’t have answers.
I read through the book of Psalms this week. I am going to stay here for a while. Despair, hope, triumph, loss – this is worship. I am learning to worship from a place that feels pretty rough right now. Psalm 121 is where I keep returning, though even in this there are so many questions:
I lift my eyes up to the mountains. Where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth. He will not let your foot slip. He who watches over you will not slumber .Indeed he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord watches over you. The Lord is your shade at your right hand. The sun will not harm you by day nor the moon by night. The Lord will keep you from all harm. He will watch over your life. The Lord will watch over your coming and going, both now and forevermore.
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