I'm a protector; always have been. Maybe it's because of my size that I've always felt the need to protect people who maybe couldn't protect themselves. People I love, friends and family, it really isn't something I'm conscious of doing all the time. I have friends I just feel a need to protect, to lift them up, and to take care of them and they're grown adults who don't need my protection, so I kinda force it on them little by little. Because I have this protector's spirit, my biggest fear in life is not being there to protect those that I love. I am not afraid of dying, losing all my money, my house, the cars, guitars, or any earthly possession. I don't fear losing friendships or jobs. My single biggest fear in life is not being there if my loved ones every needed my protection.
I have a prayer, or a part of a prayer that I say almost every day and in this prayer for family and friends, I always ask God to send any blows destined for them to me. Any sickness, pain, disease, heartache, despair, or any other hardship, please God spare them and send it to me, I can carry that burden so they don't have to. I pray for that every day. I pray for it every time I read a post on Facebook about little boys and girls fighting horrible diseases, every time I hear about a parent losing a child, and every time I am reminded just how fortunate we've been to not have to endure those unthinkable tragedies.
I was up early this morning, spending some time meditating on my protector's spirit, my fear, my prayer, and I began to think about my children, Taylor and Bo, 8 and 4 years old respectively, I thought of Bill's kids, Zoe, Tripp, and Jasper. I thought about Julianna and Samantha. I thought about AP's two sweet kids, I thought of my nieces and nephews, I thought about Micheal and Amy's kids, Micheal and Melissa's kids, I thought about Patrick and Krista's kids, and I thought about all the pictures of these kids I've seen on Facebook, all the times I watched them run around the Church on Thursday nights, and all the proud comments and funny anecdotes their parents have shared in the relatively short time I've known them. And then I thought about the children and the parents involved in yesterday's tragedy and I began to weep. I don't know any of them. I have purposefully avoided watching or reading anything about this horrific shooting; I haven't seen the images, heard the stories, or seen the faces. I don't have to watch. I already know 20 kids and parents just like the ones who lives were lost or forever changed yesterday in this senseless act of violence against the most innocent of us. I wept for the mothers and fathers who didn't get the chance to take those blows; they all would have. I wept for the fathers who biggest fears were realized yesterday. These aren't people I know, but we all know them in some ways, they were just like us up until yesterday.
I was left with one prevailing thought today; WHY? Listen, I go to church a lot and I pay attention most of the time. I read a lot of posts yesterday from people who are considerably more well-versed in the Bible than I am, but I'm not sure they will ever convince me that a merciful God would ever allow something as horrific as what happened at that school yesterday. These were children, the most innocent of people who walk among us, the ones who need our protection the most. You can talk about a broken world with inherent evil, you can quote Chapter and Verse, but you will never ever convince me that any of that makes sense. I don't understand it and I never will. I have doubts about my faith and most of the time I feel really unworthy of being on that platform on Sunday morning because of those doubts and my own shortcomings. Today, I am at a loss for any sort of understanding or rationalization. Today, I am just left with WHY?
