Why would an otherwise “normal” truck driver walk into an Amish schoolhouse and execute innocent children?

People are asking this question and there is no easy answer. This type of manmade tragedy is not usually the result of just one factor but many that collide at a single point in time. Contributing factors can range from repressed childhood memories to mounting stress in a marriage to isolation to a whole slew of mental disorders. Supposedly the truck driver who destroyed these innocent young Amish kids had some kind of a vendetta against girls for something that had happened to him twenty years ago.

Whatever.

As a pastor, it is not my job to psychoanalyze psychotics but to offer hope in the midst of profound evil. So where is the hope?

It is in the courageous spirit of the survivors of such tragedies. As they fight their way through their fears and work their way through their loss, they become shining examples of what it means to overcome.

It is in the determination that something can be done to change the hearts of men, even evil men. That something has to be more than what the medical establishment can accomplish through medication, the psychiatry world can accomplish through therapy and the government can accomplish through incarceration. The problem of evil is that it is beyond the grasp of what any of these can touch. It goes much deeper than any psychologist or doctor can probe.

Ultimately, evil is a spiritual problem that can only be answered with a spiritual solution. Jesus Christ provided this solution for evil when He allowed Himself to be murdered for the sins of humanity. His death provides the forgiveness of sins for all who accept it by faith. His resurrection provides hope that we too one day shall rise from the ashes of this broken, sinful world into a real and everlasting hope.

My prayers go out for the victims and their families. My hope is that the Good News of Jesus and the strong will of the survivors will lead to an eradication of future school shootings.