Dear Harpeth Hills Family,

How many times have you said recently, “I just want to get back to normal”? Perhaps you are just happy the month of May is over. May usually brings green grass, flowers, and graduation celebrations, but this year it has opened our eyes to the injustice faced by people of color through the tragic murders of innocent lives. As I watched the life ebb from George Floyd, I thought, “I can never unsee this! Please God, do not let me just move on and pretend we can ever get back to ‘normal’.”

And now we see senseless violence on the streets of our cities. Good men, like David Dorn, doing their duty to protect and serve, killed.

Is this why the prophet Habakkuk cried out to God?

How long, Lord, must I call for help,
but you do not listen?
Or cry out to you, “Violence!”
but you do not save?
Why do you make me look at injustice?
Why do you tolerate wrongdoing?
Destruction and violence are before me;
there is strife, and conflict abounds.
Therefore the law is paralyzed,
and justice never prevails.
The wicked hem in the righteous,
so that justice is perverted.

I am reminded of a scene from J.R.R. Tolkien’s, The Fellowship of the Ring. Frodo states, “I wish the ring had never come to me. I wish that none of this had happened.” Gandalf responds, “So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to do is decide what to do with the time that has been given to us.”

Our church family has prayed in 2020 for God to open our eyes. Now that God has answered our prayers, may our eyes and hearts never be closed again.

We love you.

—Your Shepherds