When His friend Lazarus died, Jesus was four days away. When tragedy struck my community on Oct. 15, I was four hours away.
As my mom, sisters, and I stood in a surgical recovery room with my dad, who had just undergone surgery for his cancer, I got an alert that Trinity in Bend, Oregon, where I serve as lead pastor, had gone into lockdown. Soon, information began pouring in that there was an active shooter at Silver Rail Elementary School, just a few miles from our campus. As our small city became a national headline, we learned with horror that a 16-year-old gunman had shot and killed three children and one teacher, and that another student and another teacher were in critical care. My dad, a fellow pastor in the NOW District and barely out of anesthesia, urged me to go home to be with my family and my grieving community.
The next several days were a swirl of emotions and experiences. Within three hours of the shooting, Lutheran Church Charities (LCC) K-9 Comfort Dog Ministry was in touch with us and had already begun to mobilize its teams from around the region. Over the next week, five comfort dog teams from Washington, Idaho, California, and Colorado would join us. LCC’s Hearts of Compassion team provided memorial crosses for Silver Rail and lovingly tended to them. We are so thankful for their presence among us and their support and care, both for our Trinity family and for the broader Bend community. Their ministry has opened doors for meaningful connections within our community that would not have happened otherwise.
In this devastating time, I have been so proud of how our Trinity family has shared the hope of Jesus with our community. When we opened our doors for prayer and support the morning after the shooting, Jesus was among us as we comforted one another by looking to Him. Among those who came was one of our high schoolers, who often babysat for one of the children who had been killed. When we gathered that Sunday morning for a service of lament and hope, we lifted our cries to the Lord and found refuge in the resurrected Christ. Worshiping with us were the aunt, uncle, and cousins of little Saylor, who was injured in the attack and continues to recover in Portland.
When we partnered with LCC to gather with the community at the memorial at Silver Rail, our congregation showed up and stood in support of our community, offering hugs to weeping strangers and sharing words of comfort, hope, and light in the midst of darkness. And when we welcomed our students back to school the following Tuesday, we did so with an all-school chapel where we got to sing along with more than 600 children and be assured of Christ’s presence and eternal protection.
God has also humbled us by connecting us to hurting members of our community. Along with Mike Schiemann, Trinity’s executive director, I was able to join the LCC comfort dogs on their visits to the 911 dispatch call center. Hearing the dispatchers’ accounts of the calls they had taken less than 48 hours earlier was very moving. Reese Rountree, one of our DCEs at Trinity, met a man who lives across the street from Silver Rail and whose wife witnessed everything unfolding from their apartment in real time. For the past two weeks, Reese and our young adult group have been providing them and their four children with meals. My family and I were privileged to meet a Silver Rail teacher whose classroom is just across the hall from where the shooting took place. It has been a blessing to check in with her regularly and help meet some of her needs during this difficult time, showing her that Jesus loves her and we do, too.
We at Trinity have also been the recipients of so much love and support from the body of Christ all across the country. God has blessed us immensely with calls, texts, cards, and letters from family, friends, and our fellow churches and schools. We are truly grateful.
John 11 was the focus for our service of lament and hope. Like me on that Thursday afternoon a couple of weeks ago, Jesus knew He was journeying to people He loved whose whole world had been shattered and shrouded in sorrow. Jesus joined with them in their mourning and wept with them. And then, He raised Lazarus from the dead.
Christ is risen! In the end, Jesus wins, and in the meantime, He is with us. May He continue to comfort Bend and all of us with His gospel hope until He comes again to heal us completely and make all things right.
Note: There was extensive local and national media coverage of how the LCC comfort dog teams cared for and supported the Bend community during this tragedy. Here are some articles about them:
4 Golden Retrievers Traveled to Bend, Oregon To Help Comfort a Heartbroken Community
And each of the comfort dogs who was deployed posted regular updates on their Facebook pages. We are so grateful for the love they showed to our friends in Bend!
Isaac Comfort Dog
Zacchaeus Comfort Dog
Micah Comfort Dog
Fisher Comfort Dog
Rahab Comfort Dog