09/12/2025
It has been a rough week for America…
The headlines have been rough this week.
A precious baby was born and then disposed of in a garbage bag at a college university. The mother apparently birthed her first child, placed the baby in a garbage bag, and then left the bag in the closet. So many questions surrounding this remain unanswered, and the world is at a loss for words.
A beautiful 23-year-old Ukrainian refugee, Iryna Zarutska, was taking the bus only to be stabbed from behind by a coward and career criminal. When attacked, all the people around her quietly grabbed their things and walked away. She bled out and died alone and in fear.
A 31-year-old Christian political activist, Charlie Kirk, was murdered publicly. In front of his wife and two young children, ages three and one. Charlie’s passion was to dialogue with people and to reason with people of different backgrounds. But someone who hates truth and free speech executed him.
In addition to these three events, there was yet another school shooting. In addition to that, there have been other headlines, some national and some local. A fishing accident claims the life of one commercial fisherman in Alaska. A car crash in Vegas involving a pregnant mother resulted in the baby’s death. The list could go on. You’ve been reading the news. You know the stories.
Many are finding themselves asking tough questions. What's going on with our country? How in the world ought we to think about all these? What ought we to do because of these?
These events bring to my mind to a gruesome story in Judges 19. The book of Judges tells the story of how the people of Israel went from pretty good to pretty bad to very bad to whatever is worse than “very bad.” Judges 19 is when it hits “worse than very bad.”
Here’s the abbreviated version of Judges 19. A Levite takes his concubine on a trip. He’s trying to get back home and needs to stay the night somewhere. Instead of staying in a city belonging to another country, he goes the extra distance to find a town that belongs to his people, supposing that would be better. Upon entering the city, no one welcomes him or offers him a room. He decides to stay in the town square. Eventually an old man invites him to stay with him. But just as they’re having dinner, the “men of the city, worthless fellows,” surround the house and demand that the male traveler be brought out so that they may r**e him. The house owner tries to appease the crowd by offering his own virgin daughter to the crowd and even, without asking permission, offers the man’s concubine. The crowd didn’t like that idea. Eventually, the traveler’s concubine was forced out and given to the crowd. The crowd r**ed and abused her the entire night. Her abuse was so extreme that in the morning, she walked to the front door of the house and collapsed dead. Her husband found her, loaded her body onto his donkey, and brought her home. When he got home, he did something that sounds gruesome to our ears. He cut her into 12 pieces. He sent one piece of her to each of the 12 tribes of Israel so that they would know what happened. Judges 19:30 says how Israel responded, “All who saw it said, ‘Such a thing has never happened or been seen from the day that the people of Israel came up from the land of Egypt to this day.’ Consider it, take counsel, and speak.”
The story is sickening. It leaves you with your stomach in knots. You probably had knots in your stomach when/if you watched the videos of Iryna Zarutska getting stabbed or Charlie Kirk getting shot. It’s sickening to see how little regard people have for human life.
The people of Israel needed to realize that these horrific events did not happen in isolation. There was a long line of lesser compromises that led to larger offenses that eventually resulted in the grand-scale heinousness of Judges 19. The same is true for America today. We cannot be surprised when people disregard human life when we’ve murdered 63 million preborn babies in the last ~50 and this is done with both the full protection of the law and oftentimes funding from the government. We’ve allowed human beings to be objectivized for pleasure via po*******hy. We’ve embraced the idea that personal pleasure and satisfaction are supreme, even over one’s biology. We’ve disregarded the importance of the family and normalized no-fault divorce. None of these are slight compromises or minimal errors. These are large offenses against God’s Word and natural law. Given our culture’s proud departure from God’s Word, it is no surprise that the people of our country are killing each other. Everyone does what is right in their own eyes. There is no regard for higher authorities let alone the Highest Authority, God Himself.
The people of Israel received the pieces of the woman’s body, and they were outraged. They all came down to the man’s house to ask what happened and who did it. Then they marched to the city where the offense occurred. And they destroyed it. While it was right of them to respond with swift justice against the city. Sadly, it did not result in substantial change to the nation. It didn’t change the culture at all. By the end of Judges 21, you read a familiar line within the book, “Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.” While it was right for Isreal to destroy the city, just like it would be right for America to publicly execute the murderers of Iryna and Charlie, such actions do not guarantee any change of the hearts of people towards God.
So, while swift justice is desirable and right (Ecc. 8:11), knowing that it may not result in lasting heart change (Rom. 7), how then ought we to live and respond to our circumstances in these dark days?
You have three options before you.
Option 1: shed some tears now but, forget this by next week. Get on with your life. And then eventually, you’ll grow numb to these events. Eventually political assassinations and cowardly murders will become just another weekly headline to you, kind of like how school shootings have become (there have been 46 school shootings in 2025 as of now, FYI).
Option 2: move into action and react to these atrocities with haste, demanding changes in whatever spheres of life you think need change. But if you do this you will more than likely end up being like Isreal when they moved into action and wound up with a king Saul instead of a king David. After the Judges 19 incident, they knew they needed a king. So, they grabbed a king. While God intended to give Israel a king, this king wasn’t God’s man. The lesson is that the costs of forcing your own will and doing so on your timeline is higher than you think and will not result in the goal you want (Psalm 127:1-2).
The right option is the third option.
Option 3: consider what has happened, seek counsel, and speak (Judges 19:30). Consider what has happened and mourn it. Be disturbed by these tragedies. Be broken by the horrors that we’ve allowed to run amok in this country. Weep with those who weep. And seek counsel. Don’t talk. Ask questions and listen. You don’t have all the answers. Many of the answers you think you have need to be weighed, evaluated, and nuanced. Remember, you have no ability to change the hearts of others. You have even less power to change the heart of a nation. So, act with humility and put aside all brashness and reckless commentary. Only after the gravity of the situation has weighed on your heart and only after you’ve asked questions, listened, and sought biblical counsel, then and only then can you speak. But when you speak you ought not to be like the fools who give full vent to their feelings and personal opinions. If you are tempted to boldly speak your opinions about what must happen so these things never happen again, you probably should go sit somewhere alone and contemplate how little you know and how much less you’re able to change others. Many people take to their social media pages and platforms to share what they think needs to happen. Many of these statements may be true and some might even be helpful. But most will amount to nothing. Most of them will end up falling into option 1 above.
How then should we speak? We should speak gospel-hope to the hurting and the whole law of God to the proud and hateful. It is only the Word of God that provides a worldview that explains both the reality of evil and the solution to evil. Hurting people need the hope that only comes through the promises of the gospel and the victory of Christ’s life, substitutionary death, and resurrection. And while hurting people need the hope of the gospel, the proud and arrogant need the full weight of the law of God brough upon them. The law is made for such as these (1 Tim. 1:9-10).
There is a lot of hate and evil in this world, and it comes from inside the hearts of men. Remember, you have no power to change another person’s heart, let alone the hearts of a nation of people. But, if God would have mercy, He can. He can change hearts. And it is my prayer that He will. I hope and pray that He may change the hearts of both many people and even the nation. I hope and pray that we as a nation may yet find mercy from God if we repent and do what is right. I know God is not obligated to grant mercy to this nation. As with the kingdom of Judah (2 Kings 22:15-20; 24:1-4), even should there be repentance, the blood of the innocent cries out for justice. There is enough blood on this nation to warrant its utter destruction and removal from history. While God will have mercy and save all who individually cry out in repentance and faith, this nation has no guarantee of preservation. But we may – and ought to – entreat of the Lord of mercy that He may grant repentance to this nation, preserve her, and allow her to be a beacon of light in this dark world.
Ultimately, you should not look for any hope in the preservation of this earthly nation. Find hope in this reality, one day the Lord will return to establish His kingdom. When evils and tragedies happen, let them draw your heart to long for the coming kingdom of Christ. All the nations of this world will one day fall, but His kingdom will be a kingdom that will never be shaken. His kingdom is a kingdom where there is no more cause for tears or mourning or sorrow. There will be no more death, no more tragedy, no more murders. When He returns, He will have a sword in His hand and His robe will be dripping in the blood of His enemies. Those who do evil, those who pervert justice, those who mock the mournful and rejoice over the death of the righteous – all of these will meet the sword of the Lord of lords on that day. Knowing that He will judge justly, we do not take vengeance into our hands, but we wait patiently for the justice of God (Rom. 12:19). The scales of God’s courtroom will be balanced. Either on the cross of Christ or by the sword of the Lord, all evils will be accounted for.
Tragedies like the ones of this week remind us of how fragile life is. Jesus died so that death itself would die and so that all of us who are subject to death can find life in Him through faith. Atrocious evils cause us to pray for the return of our King. “How long before you will judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?” is the cry of the saints of heaven, killed unjustly for their faith (Rev. 6:10).
For now, we consider the loss of life and mourn it. We weep with those who weep. We find comfort in the promises of the gospel. We seek counsel, pray with one another, and we pursue peace. In seeking counsel, we must remember to always seek counsel from the One who is Truth. Pray for yourself, for your community, and for this nation, that God would grant repentance and healing. And we speak words of gospel hope and the law of God as we wait patiently upon the Lord for His justice and for the establishment of His kingdom.
Find hope and comfort in Christ. He sees all, and He hears your prayers. As with the people of Israel in Exodus 2:23-25, as they groaned under the burdens of their oppression, God heard their cries and God knew their burdens. God hears your groans (Rom. 8:26), and He knows your burdens. And He cares.
