Heart Control

I have been watching with interest the “walking out” and protests recently due to school shootings. No one disagrees that one killing is one too many. But gun ownership is also a right guaranteed Americans in the Constitution. The problem is that the protesting is one faceted when there are many layers. When experts profile the people who are murdering others they tend to come from broken families, fatherlessness, bullying, isolation, playing violent video games and watching homicidal television and movies. There are many who are dealing with mental illness. All these areas need to be addressed and there are people who should be kept from guns. But in the protests there is an ongoing theme that shows up on the signs people are holding, “Thoughts and prayers are not enough.” Really? Our actions should begin with our thoughts and prayers looking to Heaven for answers. Murder is not in the weapon, killing comes from the heart. Jesus reminds us, “ For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander.” Matthew 15:19. After the fall the first sin noted in the Bible was brother killing brother. Cain didn’t need a gun to kill his sibling, Abel. A lonely heart full of bitterness will find a way to murder. Our society seeks “freedom from religion” as a spirit of hopelessness arises and life is devalued. Systems of men including government can’t fill that void or control hearts. John Adams wrote in 1789, “We have no Government armed with Power capable of contending with human Passions unbridled by morality and Religion. Avarice, Ambition, Revenge or Galantry, would break the strongest Cords of our Constitution as a Whale goes through a Net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” I hope this is a time where our nation doesn’t just “walk out” May we “look up” as we seek God’s truth and pray for His direction in this land of liberty, especially on today, which is National Day of Prayer.