Virginia Tech Reflection and Prayer
Rev. Fulton
First Presbyterian Church
Athens, OH
There is a letter of compassion in the narthex today, please stop and sign it before you leave or before you head down to the fellowship time. You do not have to be a member to sign, this may be your fist visit to our congregation but this letter is a way to show support, love and care. It is for the Blacksburg Presbyterian Church, several student members were killed or wounded in the shootings earlier this week and they are one of four Presbyterian church that support the campus ministry of our denomination there.
At Virginia Tech, at Ohio University, in our personal times of sorrow, we must resist trying to explain the unexplainable.
Sometimes the answers to the tough questions just don?t come. And when they do, they don?t come easily, or often they come up short.
Today We, like the Prophet Elijah ? are listening for the still small voice of God.
Students are dealing with the ?what if?? questions: what if it had been my dorm where the shooting first broke out? What if I had been in an engineering class in Norris Hall where most of the victims died? What if I weren?t one of the lucky ones?
Help those in shock and despair, comfort those who now have empty seats beside them in class and empty places at dinner tables. We pray for those who are angry and those who feel guilty for not being there, for still living while so many are not.
Some are propelled forward by rituals that bridge life with death. We are reminded of our own mortality. We are made aware of what we have not done with our lives. We are called act and be Christian, believing that a God is with us around and in our hearts and we cross this burning bridge.
Perhaps the hardest struggle ?is confronting the age-old question of evil. America wrestled with that demon in Oklahoma City, at Columbine High School, at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
The evil that lingered in Blacksburg on Monday was ?way bigger and more absurd than we?ve got language for,? a VT campus minister said. Rev.Appleton, the Baptist minister, called it a ?hideous? evil. With limited language even to describe it, the answers become harder still.
The answers may come in time. We, who are but dust, are in a whirlwind not of our choosing. So we struggle, we cry, we act and we pray. Please pray with me now.
Almighty God,
Soothe our hearts and ease the pain of those who are in the midst of strife. We pray this day to be aware of the blessing we have and the blessings we can offer. Curb the sharp edge of our tongues and allow us to express our anger at injustice and hatred in ways that silence evil, heal our souls and plant peace in what is thought to be tainted space. May we bend to your mercy and act at your will. Through Jesus Christ we pray together saying?
