grace like rain, falls down on me

**DISCLAIMER:: If you have a difficult time reading about: Death, Shootings, Forgiveness (and such things)-- you may want to avoid this entry.**

Now. On to what I came here for.




Tonight, I watched something I rarely watch. That's right, folks: Lifetime Movie Network.
I don't tend to go here because these shows always seem to make me feel depressed and lonely and just gut-wrenching so often. But tonight, as sad as this true story was, I couldn't help but to be moved by it.

Tonight's special was Amish Grace. The title says it all. Did you know that I have a mild obsession with the Amish? It's true. More than likely one of the most fascinating things about my time in the Midwest was our closeness to the Amish. Not in how we lived our lives, but just that they were down the road a few miles. They have such a different life and I've always been curious to know more about it. Not just by word-of-mouth, not by book, but by those who live their lives there.

Back to the topic: the movie!! Once more, one more disclaimer: SPOILER ALERT!!
The movie is about a true story of a man who went into an Amish school house and shot several female students before killing himself. The point of the movie was about what Amish Grace is. (aka. their forgiveness of those who have done wrong)

I don't think I'll have the time, patience, and/or focus on everything I was thinking and writing as I watched this movie. I'll follow the path that things spilled outta my hands.

1. Their prayer life is outstanding.
Makes me feel like a tool when I think I've done well at praying and keeping my conversations with God constant. It felt like, everytime someone announced ANY kind of news, someone replied with, "We will pray for you/that thing/it." And then they would turn and pray together. I'm nowhere near that walk. And honestly, it wasn't something that I thought seemed weird. I just felt ashamed and convicted that I needed to stop being such a baby about my prayers. I don't need everything in my head. Even if I stumble over my words, God knows my heart and I need to stop stopping myself from praying so freely.

2. Forgiveness.
The Amish men IMMEDIATELY wanted to go to the family of the Gunman and offer their forgiveness to the family. This is something my heart ached over. I have never been in that position, so I cannot claim to know it. But I just can't imagine forgiveness coming that fast to my heart. As a Christian, I think that's hard for us to admit. I know I keep wanting to go back and reword it so that I don't have to admit it, but it's true. I suck at forgiving people. And it sometimes takes me quite a while before I even want to try for it. Quite a while, as in YEARS.

3. What is "unforgivable"?
The main character in the story is the mother (Ida) of one of the girls (MaryBeth) who died. Early in the story, you learn that Ida's sister was shunned for being a widow who fell in love with an Englishman (what the Amish call those who live outside the Amish way). She brings forward a tough question: how can they forgive a man who murdered their children, yet turn their back on her sister? How is what the Gunman did forgivable? And what her sister did, unforgivable?
Truthfully, I have no idea. Truthfully, I think I'd feel the same as Ida.

4. The Gunman's wife: Amy.
More heartache for a woman who had NO IDEA that her husband had been PLOTTING to murder these children he KNEW (he was the Amish community's milkman who hauled away the mail). Sometimes marriage scares me. There's a lot of fears and insecurities that I have about divorce or separation or just the loss of whatever held us together. Amy cries out in anger: "He actually picked going to hell-- over being here with me." Annnnnd thus spurs my fears even more.

5. What Hate Is.
The Amish father talks to their surviving daughter about what hate is. He tells her that hate is a monster that has giant sharp teeth that eat away at us and want to thrash us into piece. So much so, that there is no place left for love in us. Sometimes it takes hearing this to remind me how much I've allowed hate into my life and how little I allow love in. I'm not trying to say that I'm a person full of rage, anger, malice, and hate-- but I definitely have let it take many-a-bite at me.
Later, someone else mentions that we are not to make our hearts a battleground between hate and love. It's true. Love should just overcome. It has the power to. But if I allow hate to stay and keep residence, it has power as well. It's definitely MY choice as to what consumes my heart, it doesn't have to be a battleground. The war should have been won long ago when I allowed Christ to be in charge of things.

6. Faith.
"Faith is not faith when everything goes as we please. Faith is only true faith when our lives are falling apart." At first, I wanted to fight this. But really, faith proves itself as the stronghold when we've got nothing else to grab hold of. I'll come back to this concept of faith.

7. The battle for his heart.
The mother we talked about before, Ida, decides she wants to leave. She cannot take being a part of the Amish community anymore and wants to leave. She says she will take their remaining child in the morning with her. Then she asks her husband to leave as well. He looks away-- indicating his disagreement with her decision. She becomes angry (again) and yells, "You will not even leave for me!!" Does she EVER consider that maybe he's staying for GOD?? Why do people have to make things about themselves and how you're somehow disappointing them. When really, you're following what God wants. STOP TRYING TO DISTRACT PEOPLE FROM GOD!!! EVEN IF IT HURTS YOU!!!!!

8. Faith, again.
The father explains that maybe we don't understand their faith. That faith does not equal pardon. Or forgetting. But that it's about not holding anger and resentment.
One of the other Amish mothers explains that when she wakes up in the morning, she waits to hear her daughters, but they are not their anymore. Before she can stop it, anger has overtaken her and she cannot breathe. And that's when she has to give her anger to God and ask for forgiveness. Sometimes, she has to do it an hour later. And then an hour after that. And an hour after that. If she didn't do that, she'd never breathe again.
I've definitely gotten to the point of not being able to breathe. But do I get rid of it like I should? Yikes, another stinger.

9. Grace.
Near the end of the film, Ida finally learns that she and Amy had quite a lot in common and both struggled to see how someone could forgive someone they both saw as unforgivable. Ida also gets to hear from one of the girls who survived. That young girl tells her that Ida's daughter offered to pray for the Gunman as they stood in that one-roomed schoolhouse at gunpoint. Ida learned that even those in the worst places can go to God for the good of it.
At the funeral of the Gunman, many people from the Amish community show up to mourn death. Ida reaches out to Amy's hand and clasps it in her own. She tells her the simplest thing that finally broke me into tears:

"Before she died, my daughter had forgiveness in her heart.
I can do no less."

I can do no less.
Hmm.
What a change in the way I live my life.

simply,
ME