Remember when the badly ridiculed Hunchback would run into the church of Notre Dame and cry, “Sanctuary” and no one could enter to harm him?

Remember when the church steeple rising above other buildings meant that there was some degree of light, morality, and safety in a city?

Today, believers who go church to find a moment of respite from the daily grind of the world and worship a God of love cannot even hope in those two hours to find peace! Such was the case at First Baptist Church Sutherland Springs on Sunday morning, November 5, 2017 as 26 churchgoers were slaughtered and 8 are still fighting for their lives.

But this, Children of God, is no time to cower or run from our churches and congregations and from the God-given mandate to assemble ourselves together! As surely as the Islamic Jihadists war against democratic societies, the enemy is waging war against the church. One of his greatest tactics is fear. May those of First Baptist Sutherland Springs who got up, dressed themselves, and went up to the house of God, unbeknownst of their fate, receive the blessings of the martyrs: “Blessed are you when men shall revile you and persecute you … for GREAT is your reward” (Matthew 5:11-12).

And May their sacrifice be the fuel by which we, even more aggressively, advance the Kingdom of God! May Texas, like South Carolina, respond in love and forgiveness. And let us, as fellow believers, not waste one drop of their spilled blood!!