Standing in the Dallas-Forth Worth air terminal, I first heard of the saddening news concerning the devastating act of terrorism at Fort Hood.  And after my flight landed back home in Nashville, the news only seemed to worsen as the death and injury count rose.  Clearly, we are living in dangerous times.

We can never understand the face of evil.  We can analyze it, we can diagnose it, we can blame it on "compassion weariness", and yet evil is evil.  Darkness will always be darkness.  And the only thing that changes darkness - is light.

For some reason I was reminded of the quotation from Shakespear's Romeo and Juliet that Robert Kennedy quoted after the death of his brother:  When he shall die take him and cut him out into stars and he shall make the face of heaven so fine that all the world will be in love with night and pay no worship to the garish sun.  There is no darkness, where there is a flicker of light.

Those men and women, who fell prey and victim to such senseless acts, confronted the face of darkness.  Earlier in the day, they had no idea that they would stand in the way of such violence.  They began their day like so many other days before.  They were going about their business, serving their country, working jobs, raising families - simply living good lives.  They were light.  And while it may appear that "evil" won yesterday.  There is nothing farther from the truth.  For good people always leave behind, in the lives of light, a legacy in the other people that surrounded them.  Meaning, within these dark hours of the tragedy at Fort Hood, there are flickers of light in the memories of those taken from us.  Evil never wins the day.

And so, may we as Americans taken the fallen at Fort Hood and "cut [them] out in the stars and [they] shall make the face of heaven so fine."  May we remember them as the heroes of everyday life.  And in these dark times, may we remember that they exemplify the flickers of light that still abound.  There is no darkness that can overcome, when good people go about - being good people.

As my family closed out yesterday, our soon-to-be three year old chose a book for her book time - on fear.  The tiny writing closed with the following taken from the Scriptures:

Do not fear, for I am with you; Do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, surely I will help you, Surely I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.   -Isaiah 41:10

May God bless the families of the victims at Fort Hood.  May God bless those who serve our country with due diligence.  And may God never remove his blessing from these United States of America.