I Should NOT Have Had to Talk About This Today

The last thing you want to do is explain to anybody why someone has so much hatred that they would enter a church building and kill people....well, make that "anybody" my 8 year old boy and that's what I had to do today.  See....#2 is infatuated with my phone.  He will get it and read all the CNN news alerts and any text messages that I have (yes, I'm working with him on this one) when he picks it up.  There were a lot of alerts on my phone about the shooting in the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church building in South Carolina and #2 happened to read them all.  Now, we're not gonna shield our #s from this kind of stuff, but it's not what I wanted to discuss this morning before breakfast.  From #2, the questions came pouring in:
Why would someone kill people worshiping God?
Why would he want to sit with them and then kill them?
Does he not believe in God?
Why does he hate people?
What do you mean he doesn't like their skin color?
What's wrong with people's skin color?
Are we safe at our church?
Will God keep us safe at church?
What happens if someone comes in and tries to kill me or you?

All I could do was think "why in the world do I have to explain this to my child"?!?!?!? 

As I answered his questions, I held back tears.  Tears that I have to explain about hatred and murder and how some people can't stand other people and how no matter what happens, God loves him.  Tears....tears I tell ya. 

We talked about safety measures in our schools and church.  We talked about how God made us different and He loves every one of us, but evil gets in people's minds and hearts and they don't follow God and they want everybody to be the same.  We talked about how we have to love people.  How we need to remember that God loves us very much.....

So, as I reflect on all the funny things that happened today and all the BLAH things that happened today.....I realize that being a parent and teaching my #s about love is how today went with our life by numbers.