Blinded.  Beauty.  Nothingness.  Everything.  Closed.  Light…

We live in central Florida.  Where “The City Beautiful” resides.   We are home to Mickey and Shamu, home to one of the largest universities in America, home of leading technological expertise, home of international ministries, home of Rethink Homelessness, home of Florida crackers, home of immigrants reaching their dream of coming to America, home to people of every imaginable background.    And, i am stricken…

Stricken.  Stricken by the fact we forget the value of life and one an-other.  Stricken by the blatant reminders:  As guys, we can be temporarily blinded or still blind.  We can be oblivious to beauty or have misogynistic views of beauty.  We can be driven to everything yet repeatedly finding nothing of long-lasting value or worth.  We want everything but sometimes discover we have nothing.  So we close our hearts and minds to anything we don’t understand, or that which takes hard work or sacrifice, or even worse, we close our self to truth, relationships, and to the love and identity that Jesus Christ offers to all.

Stricken.  Stricken by the so-close-to-home, gut-wrenching realities of life.  Being lost.  Being angry.  Searching for identity.  Taking justice into our own hands.  Believing in a lie.  Rebelling against what were once unquestioned, rarely broken in America, norms of behavior.  Or, sadly, being shown the blatant evidence of bad fruit that comes from one not knowing the love Jesus teaches; perhaps being abused, inconsistently being disciplined with love, confused by what society “accepts” as what is right or wrong, or not having an example from another in one’s life, to ever learn what it means that God loves us and to love your neighbor as yourself.

Stricken.  Stricken, as a concert venue where we have many fond memories of music and time with friends, has had a performer who was sharing her gifts for others to enjoy, be murdered by a guy.  Stricken, as a place my wife and i would go to (before my TBi – traumatic brain injury), where people of every age, color, lifestyle, and background would go to if you really liked to dance, is now a site of America’s greatest massacre since Wounded Knee in 1890, by a guy.  Stricken, as the home of Mickey Mouse is struck by the reality of nature, as a family loses their treasured 2 year old son to the instincts of an alligator.

Stricken.  Stricken because of the vastness of love and loss.  Stricken as our own home was hit by “the phone call”:  “…are you the parents of…?”.  Stricken as a husband, dad, and friend, i have had to face the challenges and character tests of what hundreds (if not thousands) are directly walking through right now in OUR-lando.  And, there is nothing to prepare one for this life-shattering experience of sudden and traumatic loss of a loved one.

Stricken.  Stricken because the event of losing a loved one is but the dot, the starting point of the journey of life without your loved one.  Stricken, knowing that one will face adding on the complexities of those in your life who also loved and will deal (or not deal and be dealt with), who is gone.  Stricken, knowing that there will be friends who want to help and comfort but have not experienced such loss; and, as they do their best, which often, unbeknownst to them, only exacerbates the pain.

Stricken.  Knowing a friend who lost a friend in the massacre.  Having another friend whose family member is clinging to life in iCU due to the massacre.  Having another friend whose co-worker’s loved one is only alive because of the helmet he wore as he went in to save others.

All of this is part of our home, and now many others.  The pictures and memories of our son we tragically lost in 2005.  Stricken, as heart wounds felt again.  The loss of who i was due to my TBi (traumatic brain injury) in 2006.  Stricken, as my daily battle has “more” added on top of my brain that already has limitations on it.  The loss of other dear friends and family to cancer, to accident, to suicide, to Alzheimer’s, all in the last 10 years.  Stricken, as new people and new, but familiar pain, is placed before us, once again.

And, though i (we) are stricken, we CAN do what love requires us to do.  “Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and He shall sustain thee…” [Psalm 55:22] (KJV).

When we learn to humble our self and not attempt to go it alone, we CAN make it through.  “For i can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength.” [Philippians 4:13] (NLT).

When we practice living into the new man that we are called to be, we CAN make an impact.  “…let God make you guys come all new kine inside, how you feel an how you tink.”  [Ephesians 4:23] (da Jesus book).

When we keep our heart and mind focused on God’s promises, we CAN maintain hope, receive wisdom and strength, and take the steps through this pain to the JOY the Lord promises.  “God continued… ‘I’m putting my rainbow in the clouds, a sign of the covenant between Me and the Earth.  From now on, when I form a cloud over the Earth and the rainbow appears in the cloud, I’ll remember My covenant between Me and you…’ … And God said, ‘This is the sign of the covenant that I’ve set up between Me and everything living on the Earth.'”  [portions of Genesis 9:12-17, with capitalizations] (MSG).

As another day will break through, as we in OUR-lando (Orlando’s United Response), we continue to pray together, we mourn together, we support one an-other, we choose to ignite love (not hatred or retribution or need for new laws that the lost, hurting, and disobedient don’t pay attention to anyways) for the world to see… by gathering together, by generously giving for the sake of others.  For we look to the positive and hopeful side of being stricken… to be deeply affected, to produce, to cause, to reach, to impress strongly, to meet, to achieve, to remove, to overwhelm, to start, to cause, to ignite, to go and be a light in the darkness of the evil that befell us.  To show the world that Jesus’ words still ring true.  That love wins.  Love conquers.  Love is victorious.  Love heals.  That the love that Jesus called us to be, can change anyone, anytime, anywhere, for the good that God intended in His Kingdom eternal… and this is the journey of faith to get us there.  New men.  As one can read in the Bible, sometimes life will come and we are presented with the test to “GU” (get uncomfortable), to pray, to love, for glory of the Lord and for the sake of others.  We CAN…  Prayers.  Unity.  Love.  Jesus calls us to, “Go.”