photo by Rafael Miranda @stocksnapI've been asking Jesus to please show us how to face the evil that unleashed itself on Paris Friday evening. And He reminds me of the counted and named lives, beyond our awareness, suffering these atrocities every day. Yet it is Paris that makes us acutely aware. We become a global community again -- connecting and crying out and pleading and praying for Paris.
Because we are all His children -- there is not a hair on a single head He does not know, see and long to free with His love.
Not one.
I cannot make sense of the senseless -- the violence, the death, the suffering. I can only pray for the victims, the innocent, the families, the fear that holds our world by the throat in the wake of witnessing.
But there is another prayer Jesus asks of me, and I do not know how I will come to genuinely pray it.
You have been taught to love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I tell you this: love your enemies. Pray for those who torment you and persecute you... He, after all, loves each of us -- good and evil, kind and cruel. He causes the sun to rise and shine on evil and good alike. He causes the rain to water the fields of the righteous and the fields of the sinner. It is easy to love those who love you -- even a tax collector can love those who love him. And it is easy to greet your friends -- even outsiders do that! But you are called to something higher...
I can hold this verse, even wrestle with its bitterness, as I apply small doses of it to my own life. But how can I pray for suicide bombers and those that lead them with hearts full of hate?
I do not know how, except to ask Jesus, "Lord, teach me to pray."
"But I do not want to learn!" I go screaming and kicking to my knees, throwing punches and excuses.
Truthfully?
I fear Jesus will show me, and I will not like what I learn -- that I am His child and so are they -- those people who do heinous things -- that we are related. I'm afraid He will remind me we are each and everyone made by Him and for Him and in Him and through Him, that there are no exceptions.
Not even those terrorists.
And I'm raging inside that He calls me to this place -- this place of praying for the enemy. And yet He calls me anyway. He whispers, "No label but Love, my child. No contempt or condemnation."
I think Jesus reminds me of this because the world will not be transformed by digging deeper ditches and filling them with more toxic sewage of hate. The world has traveled this route, nearly to its ruin.
Love is the only answer we have left.
These men want us to eat fear and breathe loathing, just like they do. But what if, instead, we prayed for their healing? For their hate-smothered souls to be resuscitated by the redeeming grace of Jesus?
If we are to truly represent His creed and character in this diseased world, then don't we need to aid the Great Physician by being nurse-maids to the most afflicted hearts?
I know this is near heresy -- to say this thing on a world stage that is under such gruesome attack. But someone has to. And why shouldn't it come from those of us whose lives Jesus has also pulled from the pit of separation and despair?
Believe me, I cannot do this from my own ego nor my personal sense of what is just. But I know that His thoughts are higher than my thoughts and His ways higher than my ways.
And He tells me to pray.
So I am trying. I have not yet been able to do it gracefully or sincerely; obedience is all I can muster for now. But I pray knowing, coupled with His steadfast love and sovereignty, my prayer has the power to change hearts.
Even the hearts of terrorists.
And we might not directly see how the vibrations of our prayers shift the spiritual realm and combat evil afoot in the world, but we can be sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.
You can join me (or stone me) in the comment section.
We are trying desperately to live with no label but Love and recruit people who dare to pray this prayer. If you're with us, will you share this with your tribe? (#prayerdare #changehearts #prayforparis)
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