Colorado Springs nightclub shooting
This past Sunday a five people were killed and twenty five people were wounded when a gunman opened fire at an LGBTQ night club in Colorado Springs, Colorado. I couldn’t help but compare it to what happened to our city in 2016. I was living in Orlando when the Pulse shootings happened and it was devastating not just for the LGBTQ community but for the whole community.
As people of faith, how do we process and respond to a tragedy like this? We begin with lament for the loss of life, it is never God’s intention that a life would end early due to violence. We also lament that this act of violence was targeted at a specific marginalized community. The violence is a sin, and the targeting of the LGBTQ community is a sin. We acknowledge that there are many people in the LGBTQ community who do not feel safe because of shootings like this. We lament and we name the sin.
We as people of faith also yearn for a future that better reflects God’s heart. If mass shootings, violence, and fear are not God’s intention then what type of world does God want for us? The prophet Isaiah dreams of a future where “swords are turned into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks.” This image is beautiful! Stop and think about this for a second. Isaiah is dreaming of a time when weapons of violence are used to till the soil, grow vegetables, and bring people together around the table. A modern equivalent would be turning a machine gun or assault style weapon into a piece of farming equipment like a hoe. There are Christians like Shane Claiborne and organizations like Raw Tools who are literally doing this as a reminder of God’s peaceful vision for humanity. If you would like to pray or talk further please email me at PastorMike@SpringChurch.org.