But what do we do next? As believers, we should quickly go to the Lord in prayer. We should lift up those who have had great loss. We should ask that the Lord would comfort those in distress. We should pray that God would take this tragedy and raise up something good from the ashes in the ways that only He can.
I often hear people say “all we can do is pray”. I’m not a big fan of this phrase for two reasons. One, it makes it sound like prayer isn’t really that important, as though we’re saying “we can’t really do anything, so I guess I’ll just pray.” Prayer matters. God hears us, and helps people through their grief as they are lifted up and supported in prayer. But secondly, “all we can do is pray” is simply not true. There is a fund set up to help the families who have been affected by the tragedy, and if you’d like to donate, you can do so at:
www.communityfoundation.net/uvaldestrong
Thirdly, as I’ll talk about today, we can use events like this to remind us to be even more vigilant in helping prevent future problems by loving and caring for people and pointing them towards Christ, because only He can expel the evil that causes one to kill.