The New York Daily News today came out and said in response to those praying about the tragedy in California that “God Isn’t Fixing This.” Here’s my response to the headline:
Dear New York Daily News:
As I saw your headline announced on social media that said “God isn’t Fixing This”, I was totally caught off guard. I had been watching the news on TV, when I heard about the tragedy in California just like many Americans. My first reaction was to turn to God and pray for His healing touch and comfort for those who were hurting. After I said my prayer, I later read your headline and it shook me up, because now more than ever we need prayer for our country and we long for God’s touch, but yet we doubt God is working. I couldn’t help but collect my thoughts and write to you not in hate, anguish, or anger, but in Love, for Love is the source that motivates this response to reach people.
Personally, I believe that instead of us trying to ask God to fix things, we should allow God to Fix Us. As a nation we have shifted our focus from Him. Although His name is stamped on our currency, buildings, history, and monuments, we fail to stamp his name on our hearts, actions, homes, families, and lifestyles. Sure, none of us are perfect, but the moment we kick God out of our lives is the moment when we reject everything God has for us.
Your Headline goes further to say that our prayers do nothing, and people with influence (You Hint at presidential candidates) need to be taking action rather than praying prayers. Question: When was prayer not considered a course of action? In fact, when many of our founders were in turmoil, their first instinct was to pray. Prayer works and you don’t have to look far to see that. When we choose not to pray or to not believe in its effectiveness, we are causing more harm than we can imagine, we are basically slapping the Lord in His face with that type of thinking towards prayer. The Bible tells us many times to pray without ceasing, because for one, the Lord cares about His people and two, He longs to have a relationship with each of us. And every relationship is rooted in the essence of trust. It’s true that we proclaim: “In God We Trust” in this country, but imagine what could happen if we all started to live this motto out as a country? When we turn away from doing wrong, cry out to the Lord and trust in Him, I believe His Healing Touch will come forth to America. Oh how we need His touch.
When we pray, we are speaking to the Creator of the Universe, the One who fixes hearts, mends souls, brings joy, restores peace, gives grace, walks with us daily, and pours out His love on us. But yet, we question His greatness, we discount His abilities. As an evangelical millennial, I refuse to believe that prayers do nothing, they mean more than we know. They activate our faith and speak volumes into our relationship with God. This notion that “God isn’t fixing it” can be the result of a hard heart which shakes it’s fist at the Heavens when tragedy occurs. The easiest thing we can be in life is critical. Often times, when we think of God, we find ourselves to be critical of Him, because we don’t understand His actions or His plans, but if we truly understood His love, our criticism would cease. Truth is our human minds are so flawed in our own thinking, that we can’t even grasp the wholeness of who He is or what He can do. But a long time ago, I learned that never once in the Bible did God promise an explanation, but He did promise to walk Beside us.
The fact is, God is Fixing, although, many may not see it, God is fixing hearts everyday. He is intervening in circumstances all the time, healing people from illnesses, preventing tragedies, giving strength to those who are in need, bringing divorced families back together, and providing hope to us who were once hopeless. He has Blessed America, because many of those before us chose to Honor Him. Will our country once again choose to Honor Him rather than turn our backs on Him?
The evidence of God’s repair is too great to acknowledge in just one simple Facebook post. It’s everywhere and even though you may have the Freedom of the Press, as a Christian I have the Freedom to Confess that this God is my God. I pray to Him and He answers. He saw my brokenness when I was a boy, I asked Him to come into my heart and repair me. And you know what? He fixed me up and now He lives in my heart.
So New York Daily Times, you may think that gun control is the answer and God is not. You may think Prayer is a worthless action, but in reality, it’s the best action to take. But as for me, and countless of others all over this nation, the answer isn’t God Fixing IT, it’s allowing God to Fix US.
Sincerely,
An Evangelical Millennial American
“If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.” -2 Chronicles 7:14
#GodFixUs #NewYorkDailyTimes
Brandon Baumgarten 