Remembering the people of Oklahoma City in the wake of a catastrophic tornado:
My joy is gone, grief is upon me, my heart is sick.
Hark, the cry of my poor people from far and wide in the land.
For the hurt of my poor people I am hurt, I mourn, and dismay has taken hold of me.
Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there?
- Jeremiah:8
Jeremiah hears the sound of grief coming at him from two directions. From the ground, from the direction of God’s people he hears wailing and lamentation: women keening, men moaning. It is a wailing that fills the land. At the same time, but from the direction of heaven, Jeremiah hears God’s great distress and pain ... a wailing that fills the skies.
God’s distress is empathic. If God’s people are in pain, God is in pain. If the people of Oklahoma City are wailing, so is God. If God is wailing, so are we.
In some sense our Christian discipleship is measured by the ways we are engaged in this empathic work ... this work of hurting because the other hurts and, in what ways we can offer balm, making each others’ burdens bearable.
Here’s what we can do to help, right now:
1. Pray. Pray. Pray. Hold the suffering people of Oklahoma on your hearts and in your prayers. Remember them. Grieve with and for them.
2. Send financial donations to the Salvation Army. Text “storm” to 80888 to make a $10 donation. Or, text “Red Cross” to 90999 to make a $10 financial donation.
The people of Oklahoma City are experiencing the deepest grief. Grief erupting from them in fits and starts, in fragments and shards, in sobs and groans. I imagine they are experiencing the profoundest disorientation. Let us gather them in prayer and send them aid.