School violence - the answer?
by executive director Ken Ham
The late scientist/author Carl Sagan is certainly remembered for his stand against Biblical Christianity. In his book Contact (upon which the movie of the same name starring Jodie Foster was based), Sagan portrayed Christianity as not having answers to life's struggles.
I vividly remember a scene in the movie when the young girl's father had just died. A minister (representing Christianity) came up to this distraught girl, but could offer no hope - no answer to help this youngster. No doubt Sagan wanted people to get the idea that Christianity had no answers as to why a young girl would be left in a sad situation.
As much as I don't want to admit it, I think this movie scene accurately portrayed the attitudes of the Church today. When tragedies strike, whether they be a building blown up in Oklahoma or teenagers killing their parents, fellow students and teachers, it seems many of our church leaders react the way the minister did in Sagan's fictional story.
But before we get down to the real issues in regard to this matter, let's summarize the reaction of various groups of people to the tragedy in Oregon When a 15-year-old student killed his parents and then wounded and killed students at the public school he attended.
The Counselors
School counselors admitted they had no answers.
From one newspaper: But the hardest question from a child to deal with is "why?" counselors said. "kids want to know, why would a boy do that?" Dickey said. "As parents and adults, we don't know." (Register-Guard newspaper)
They told parents not to give advice, but to let the children express their feelings.
The educators
The State Superintendent of Education implied that the tragedy could have been avoided if only some project or another had received money.
Norma Paulus our State Superintendent of Education said that this tragedy could have been avoided, that she asked the legislature for money to fund Head Start and they didn't give it to her, maybe now they will. (TV broadcast on MSNBC - 5/21/98).
The clergy
What about some of the local church leaders?
After meeting Thursday and Friday, about 60 local pastors and Christian leaders issued a group statement "of concern and compassion for our community," with two points: that they stand together, and that they will emphasize God's love and compassion. (Register-Guard newspaper report)
According to the newspaper reports, the emphasize coming from the Church in response to this tragedy was about God's love.
From an ABC news report taken off their web site, we found this revealing quote: "We're a community long on questions and short on answers," said Pastor Zane Wilson of the Springfield Lutheran Church, across the street from one of the hospitals where injured students were taken. "I don't have answers and I can't find them in the Bible, But I do know that God has not moved out of Springfield."
To Summarize:
1) The Church responds by only emphasizing God's love, but there is so much more that the Church needs to say - and one clergyman was quoted as stating that the Bible doesn't have the answers to why such tragedy occurs.
2) Counselors emphasize not giving advice to children, but just letting them express themselves - and one counselor says that we don't know the reason why these things occur.
3) The educator quoted believes money will solve the problems.
People (including children) need to understand the real cause of this horrible event. This is an opportunity for the Church to give very necessary answers.
I recall watching television news the day the federal building in Oklahoma was blown up, killing many children and adults. In an interview a clergyman stated something to the effect that he didn't know why anyone would do this. My youngest daughter (8 years old at the time) piped up and said, "isn't it because of sin, Dad?" She hit it right on the head!
Sadly, I believe that the reason much of the Church does not have answers is because it has compromised with the teaching of millions of years of Earth history, or evolutionary processes.
Why?
Just as my daughter so simply stated, sin is the ultimate cause of these tragedies (Rom 3:23). Until people are prepared to accept the literal event of Adam's fall, they will not understand why we see the evil around us. If children are allowed to express themselves without any advice from parents, they may just blame God. After all, if they've been told God is a God of love, they can't reconcile why He would allow such a terrible thing!
You see, to understand sin as the ultimate cause is also to understand that the blame lies with you and me - with everyone! We all sin in Adam (Rom 5) - that's why there's death, violence, and bloodshed in the world! It's collectively our fault!
Unfortunately, the same public education system that is looking for answers to such tragedies is teaching students that they are just evolved animals - that there is no absolute authority - and there is no such thing as sin. Thus, they really teach there is no purpose and meaning is life; life is all about death, violence, bloodshed, and suffering because these are the processes by which we evolved!
As a result of this teaching, of course our students don't see themselves as accountable to anyone but themselves - and there is no value on human life. Secular counselors thus have no answer. And all the money in the world will be largely useless - if the truth about who we are and where we come from is not taught!
Love?
And is God's love the answer? Only when we understand it in terms of the literal truth of Genesis.
Sadly many of the Christian leaders who responded to the tragedies only with the message of God's love probably (on the basis of our years of experience in this ministry) do not accept a literal Genesis, and thus compromise with the billions of years for the age of the Earth and other evolutionary teaching.
Imagine if the young man who murdered his parents and fellow students were to sit down with one such pastor and have the following conversation:
pastor: "Young man, you need to respect and love your fellow man just as God loves us. God loves you and wants you to be just like Him."
young man: "Pastor, do you believe that the fossils and the rocks are millions and billions of years old?"
pastor: "of course, son. But that doesn't have anything to do with violence and you killing people."
young man: "well, pastor, in the fossil record, there are billions of dead things. Many of those bones show evidence of violence, disease, and suffering. After all the animals and plants were on Earth, which you say was after millions of years of death and struggle, then God said everything was 'very good'.
If God uses death, violence, suffering, disease, and bloodshed as how He creates - and He describes all this as very good - then I'm just like God, pastor. I really didn't do anything that wasn't very good."
The Church and compromise
The reason many church leaders don't have answers is because they have compromised with Genesis. It's only the Christian who believes and understands Genesis as literal history - as truth - who has the real answers to such tragedies. God is a God of love, but also one of holiness.
It is only through understanding Adam's Fall in Genesis and the Curse on a previously 'very good' world that we can understand how both make sense together: that the world is full of death and violence, and God is a God of love.
Until the Church and our nation allow God to be the absolute authority, and accept His Word as truth (beginning with Genesis), then violence, suicide, murder, and all manner of evils will continue to proliferate in the school system and the nation as a whole.
That is one of the reasons AiG is constructing a creation museum and family education center in the Cincinnati area. It will be an outreach to the world to tell visitors (including non-Christians) that the Bible is true from the beginning, and encourage them to combat the onslaughts of evolutionary humanism. Children and adults will learn that the Bible can be trusted and that the solution to today's problems is Jesus Christ!
Yes - the answer's in Genesis!
(Taken from AiG newsletter July '98 vol. 5, no. 7)
