sandy hook: where was god?


1 Samuel 8:18 And ye shall cry out in that day because of your king which ye shall have chosen you; and the LORD will not hear you in that day. Chapter 8 in the Book of 1 Samuel describes times, I believe, much like ours today.  The leaders were godless, immoral people, who used their position for personal gain and who had stopped walking in the ways of Samuel the prophet, in the ways of the Lord, Himself.  The people of the nation, looking for better leadership, asked Samuel to make for them a king to rule over them 8:5 … now make us a king to judge us like all the nations.  Samuel was angry with the people but the Lord spoke to Samuel and said, Hearken unto the voice of the people in all that they say unto thee: for they have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me, that I should not reign over them.  And as described in verses 11 through 17 Samuel warned the people This will be the manner of the king that shall reign over you: He will take your sons, and appoint them for himself, for his chariots, and to be his horsemen; and some shall run before his chariots. 12 And he will appoint him captains over thousands, and captains over fifties; and will set them to ear his ground, and to reap his harvest, and to make his instruments of war, and instruments of his chariots. 13 And he will take your daughters to be confectionaries, and to be cooks, and to be bakers. 14 And he will take your fields, and your vineyards, and your oliveyards, even the best of them, and give them to his servants. 15 And he will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and give to his officers, and to his servants. 16 And he will take your menservants, and your maidservants, and your goodliest young men, and your asses, and put them to his work. 17 He will take the tenth of your sheep: and ye shall be his servants. 18 And ye shall cry out in that day because of your king which ye shall have chosen you.  But the people would not listen to Samuel and chose instead to have a man rule over them in place of the Lord God Almighty. The people elected to be like the other nations, instead of being set apart as God’s nation, and all that Samuel prophesied regarding this man, eventually came to pass.    It has now been four days since Sandy Hook and the loss of 20 more children and 6 more adults. I have heard pastors, and psychologists, doctors, news commentators, politicians, and parents speak volumes of heartfelt words. I listened as the President of the United States said “we must do a better job; we have too.”  What does that mean exactly, I wondered?   I have heard the question “where was your God?” a dozen times from many people these last few days. I have listened as pastors or other religious officials attempt an answer; some good, some comforting, some not so much. But no one, it seems, is willing to say the obvious, my God, Jesus Christ the Messiah, the God and Father and Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, was right there, like He always is.  He did not pull the trigger. He did not kill those children. Instead, He received them back to Himself. They all returned to their God and to their home, to the safety and love of the Father, their heavenly Father.  He knew from before the foundations of the earth their ministry would be short, their job difficult, and He was not surprised to welcome them home that day. The debate is already raging, - stricter gun control, more psychological screening, better reporting of “odd” children.  The list is always the same, pulled out and dusted off during times like this.  Learned people trying to make sense of something that can never make any sense to them, and because these children were so young, it is somehow even more difficult.  But it was not the size of the clip, or the type of the weapon, guns laws were not the cause, and the school security was not to blame.  The reality that no talking head is willing to say, is that this murderous young man did not have a heart to follow Jesus, he did not respect his family. In chapter 4 and verse 8 of the Book of Genesis we are told the account of Cain rising up and murdering his brother Able. We are told of Esau’s desire to kill his brother Jacob, we read about Ishmael and Isaac, and are all familiar with what Joseph’s brothers did to him, and Herod murdered all the Hebrew children under two years old.  We have had 6,000 years or more of experiences like Sandy Hook.  Many far worse, and the answer is clear every time.  Cain, Esau, Ishmael, Herod, and I would submit, any murderer, all have one common trait. They all have rejected the God that made them, and disrespected the family into which God placed them. Each believed that he could worship his own god, or go his own way, and each believed he would be better off than if he submitted and followed the one true and living God, Jesus, Yeshua, our Father, the Lord.  Each wanted to become, and successfully became, the master of his own destiny, without Christ, and history records it was not pretty. As we consider the pointless and senseless killing of hundreds of school children since Columbine, we clearly see what ties them all together, the killers did not have a relationship with Jesus, while the “victims” it seems, did.  Cain rejected God, but Able followed God.  Jacob is the very picture of the follower of Christ, being called Israel, but Esau wanted to kill him.  Ishmael gave up his birth right but Isaac believed God.  Joseph was used mightily by God and as a result his brothers were saved. It is a constantly recurring theme in Scripture, God’s people wander away from God, false prophets arise and tell the people lies, and some willingly leave the protection, safety, and goodness of the Lord for something, or someone, like King Saul.  Where was God at Sandy Hook? Just like He told Jeremiah, He did not send the prophets teaching self esteem. He did not send the prophets that create an entitled society. He did not send the circumstances that lead to mental illness. He did not force that young man to murder those people. Jeremiah 23:21-27 I have not sent these prophets, yet they ran: I have not spoken to them, yet they prophesied. 22 But if they had stood in my counsel, and had caused my people to hear my words, then they should have turned them from their evil way, and from the evil of their doings. 23 Am I a God at hand, saith the LORD, and not a God afar off? 24 Can any hide himself in secret places that I shall not see him? saith the LORD. Do not I fill heaven and earth? saith the LORD. 25 I have heard what the prophets said, that prophesy lies in my name, saying, I have dreamed, I have dreamed. 26 How long shall this be in the heart of the prophets that prophesy lies? yea, they are prophets of the deceit of their own heart; 27 Which think to cause my people to forget my name by their dreams which they tell every man to his neighbour, as their fathers have forgotten my name for Baal. On the other hand, He does want to be involved in schools. He does want to be involved in Government. He does want to be in involved in every part of our life, yet our government and society now “thinks to cause the people to forget my name.”  God is exactly where He has been put over the last 50 years:  Away, forgotten, marginalized. Baal sought children for sacrifice.  Those that walked away from the Lord sacrificed their children to this idol, and it was an abomination to the Lord.  To this day, archeologists still unearth many children buried in clay pots, built into walls, sacrificed to Baal, this false prophet. It seems impossible to believe that parents, any parent, would sacrifice their own children for any reason, much less to a wood and clay idol that could not speak or see.  Yet, we have seen the false prophets in this country rewrite our history to exclude the truth that we were founded as a nation promised to Jesus Christ.  We have let these false idols replace God in our schools, to remove the name of Jesus from our government, and from our daily walks. The people of the one true and living God have become bywords and the butt of crude jokes, home Bible studies raided and made illegal, and crosses torn down.  Those with a heart to follow Jesus Christ have been ridiculed and belittled and when the wisdom of the ungodly rises to action, and children are gunned down in cold blood, these same godless people cry out to us,” where is your God now?”  He is exactly where they put Him, exactly where we believers let Him be placed.  He is letting society have the desires of their collective hearts and now, just as in the days of Samuel, the hearts of the people are wicked, they are godless, and we are all reaping what we have sown.  I don’t know the relationship of any of the parents with the Lord, and from what many have said they do love and honor our God.  I cannot even begin to imagine how they might cope with this loss without Jesus. I do not suggest that it was a failing on their part, I only suggest that the false prophets who have turned the face of this once God fearing country into the tolerant, homogenized, secular country it has become, have lead the people astray and our children are being sacrificed once again to fictional gods of tolerance, self esteem, and secularism. Jeremiah 6:16-17 should give us goose bumps Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk therein. 17 Also I set watchmen over you, saying, Hearken to the sound of the trumpet. But they said, We will not hearken. This sounds chillingly like America today; “we will not walk therein” and “we will not hearken” to this God. In every instance of history and Scripture, when the children of God walked away from the Lord, He called to them. He warned them what would happen, and it came to pass until they cried out to God and He restored them.  But it is because of His love for His children that He must let them walk away, that they would one day return and He would welcome them back with open arms.  With every school shooting I wonder just how far we will have to go before we see our spiritual condition, before we will return to our Father, our God.  With my words I say it will be soon, but honestly my heart is broken knowing that Sandy Hook is, historically speaking, a very small event. People are evil and sinful, and it may have to become much worse before we as a nation turn back to God and allow Him to heal our nation.  I pray that it is not long and that with each new tragedy, our eyes will be opened, and we as a nation will return to our God.  2 Chronicles 7:14 If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.  It might do us good to remember the root of the problem is not so much with those that do not know God.  It is more with those of us that do.  Certainly, it is those with no personal relationship with God that pull the trigger and murder innocent children.  But we as true believers are called to be light and salt to a dark and sinful world.  When we are set apart and bright, those in the dark will see and follow.  How easy it is to follow a dark garden path when only a 7 watt garden light is on at night.  We do not need to be 500 watt halogen bulbs.  God has called others to do that.   We are to be salt, to a tasteless world.  Salt not only flavors and preserves, but is never changed by the food to which it is added.  Instead, it changes the food with which it comes in contact.  Too many who call themselves Christians are all too easily changed by the world they come in contact with.  That is not being salt.  Too many who call themselves Christians fear turning on their light, as they will be marked as followers of the Lord Jesus, and there is a price to pay in this world for following Him.  The result is this world has no one in authority speaking the truth, the media will not allow it, news magazines will not print it and too many pastors are afraid to say it.  But it is not really about them, is it?  We are called, not these institutions. We must share with our friends, or those in our neighborhood.  If our lives don’t reflect Jesus in what we say, what we do, where we go, how we spend our resources and time, how can we think those with no relationship with Jesus will see and desire what we have; it looks just like their life.  What if a neighbor had shared Christ with this young man, could the Lord have healed him? To be sure there will always be Cain’s, Esau’s, and Ishmael’s - those who knew of God but never sought to actually know God.  Society, any society, teeters on the reality of God to its people.   Does the general society love and follow after Jesus the Messiah, or will it choose to follow false idols and embrace man’s wisdom? To the extent it follows Jesus, society will be peaceful and content.  To the extent it follows man’s wisdom, it will be violent and angry.  So then the ball is in our court, isn’t it?  Many throughout history, beginning with Cain, heard God, perhaps even knew Him, but found nothing in Him they desired and “harkened not to walk therein.”  With no disrespect to the many psychologists and pastors I have heard over the last four days, the answer is far easier and more reliable than they think.  We must first individually, and then nationally, turn back to Jesus and stop following after idols and today’s false prophets.  We need to clear our minds from the noise of the world to be able to hear the voice of the Lord Jesus in our ears.  We need to return to the sensibilities of the founding fathers and put our trust in Yeshua, and all should be willing to answer like Rebekah. After the unnamed servant asked if she would come and be the wife of Isaac, she was asked by her family, “Will you go with this man?” she replied “I will go”.  Rebekah could only guess at the future that was ahead.  She trusted and believed, and without assurance or promise, she simply followed.  She left her life, her country, her people and her customs, to follow after something, someone, better.  The unnamed servant was of course Eliezer, meaning God of Help or a picture of the Holy Spirit.  Isaac was the father of Jacob, or Israel, and Israel is God’s chosen. If each of us would answer like Rebekah, “I will go with this man” and leave the worldly and follow the Godly, our country would be transformed.  It really is just that simple. CB 12.18.2012