Ever wonder why “time flies” when you’re having fun, but conversely, losing a loved one can feel like the longest moment of your entire life? My heart anguishes for the families and friends of the Uvalde, Texas elementary school shooting who, I assume, are all experiencing the longest moment of their entire lives right now. Time, it seems, is frozen and will be for a long time. If only we could find a way to make the moments when the smiles of our loved ones, containing all the love and hope in the world, last forever. Though I never knew them, I still feel like something is missing now that they’re gone.

As we grieve, we must remember those smiles. We cling to the past, not because it hurts to do so, but because something almost tangible was left behind. And if we are to move forward, then we must discover what that is. Though death irrevocably changes us, it’s only because life changed us first. Let us decide then which changes us more.

God’s Messiah to Earth died in a way that left consequences still felt to this day. When Martin Luther King Jr. died, it shook a nation. And the absence of all those that we’ve lost because profits and position matter more than human life, is saturating every corner of comfort with the deepest longsuffering and loneliness. Yet even at midnight, we can still see the stars. And the gifts they left us with remain unspoiled because their lives mattered to us, and still do. For they are the true reasons why we will never be the same – though they were only here for a moment.

Prayer

Dear Lord,

Change us in a moment, in the blink of an eye. Transform us into a people that have been healed from the poison of corruption. Revive us from the sting of death. Guide the souls of the loved ones we’ve lost into your loving embrace. May they find your eternal peace and everlasting joy. And comfort those left behind.

Amen.