Friday, 21 September 2007

Not again...

Hope College's Public Relations Office sent me an e-mail a short time ago. Two students were shot at Delaware State University very early this morning and then their administration locked the campus down tighter than a drum.

It lacks the punch of the Virginia Tech tragedy because there are less victims. It'll probably get less news coverage. Maybe less coverage is good. In fact, I'm sure it's good. Let them be. Give them space. They don't need the world staring at them for days and weeks as they work through with this.

But I still hurt for the Delaware State community, too. I'm not sure why. I don't know of any family I have that goes to school there or friends there. I think it's just a certain kinship with other college & university students that I feel.

Why? Why Delaware State? Why Virginia Tech? It breaks my heart.

Revelation 21:1-7
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away."

He who was seated on the throne said, "I am making everything new!" Then he said, "Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true."

He said to me: "It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To him who is thirsty I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the water of life. He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God and he will be my son.

In this world of violence and hate, that can't come quickly enough.