As of this writing, seven-year-old Saylor Graham fights for her life in an Oregon hospital — struck down by a mass shooter last week at Silver Rail Elementary School in Bend, Oregon. Saylor was already suffering from medical complications related to a genetic disorder. She is well known in her community for her infectious joyfulness. Pray for Saylor and her family.
Another precious little girl, 5-year-old Rhoam Summer, did not survive the attack. An 8-year-old and an 11-year-old, whose names had not been announced when this was written, were also killed, along with Megan Lambert, a teacher, herself only 25. One other teacher, Becky Drury, was shot and, as of this writing, remains hospitalized.
It’s a big country, and the chance of any one child being the victim of this kind of school violence remains extremely small. But kids are afraid. Parents are afraid. It feels random. Schools across the country are spending billions to keep kids safe. But the killings continue.
What’s going on? The Bible warns of large portions of societies being given over to “reprobate minds” (Romans 1:28) as a result of rejecting the knowledge of God. Is that what’s happening here? If so, we as a nation are in deep trouble.
When school shootings occur, some reflexively call for stricter gun laws. In this case, others have expressed gratitude that there was a good guy there with a gun, a man who was able to stop the killer before he killed more — maybe a lot more.
At best, gun debates seek to employ bandages on a much deeper wound. We need to ask ourselves what is happening to the minds of some of our young. The killer’s mother said he was “a good boy, he really was.” How, then, did this “good boy” turn into a maniacal killer — a killer of children — a school shooter? How does our society manage to produce so many people capable of such unthinkable levels of cruelty?
Also last week we learned about a Los Angeles man accused of planning a mass killing at a Jewish preschool. Preschool! His weapon of choice against these 3-to-5-year-old children? Molotov cocktails! Thankfully, the FBI was able to stop and arrest him before he carried his plan to fruition.
Also last week, police arrested a 19-year-old on the very day they say he planned a large attack in Aurora, Illinois. In Los Angeles, a man recently shot his two sons before turning the gun on himself. In a social media post shortly before the killings, he wrote, “Don’t judge me cause I am quiet, no one plans a murder out loud.”
We see these things so much that we hardly notice them. It’s like “nose blindness” — when you smell a terrible odor so long that you stop being bothered by it. These horrors are becoming normal to us. Many see violence as the answer to even minor disputes.
In rejecting God, our society has also turned against God’s ways. We create mental anguish when we rebuff our Maker’s design. Today, things like generosity, kindness, sexual morals, circumspect language, and godliness of thought are treated as jokes. But we abandon the ways of God at great peril — not just to souls — but to minds, especially the minds of our young.
