Pastor dissed my murdered son

Dear Pastor,

Greetings to you, I am a 37-year-old woman and I have two daughters and one son.

My husband and I love our children. We were happy to have the girls but our son was the apple of our eyes. He did so very well in school, but he was killed, and we cannot understand why the gunmen took his life. Many people tried to comfort us, but it is hard to lose a son who was never involved in any crime.

We used to attend a certain church and when our son was killed, the pastor said something to us that caused us not to go back there. We wondered how a man who has been preaching for years could talk such foolishness. After he told us that "All things work together for good", we asked him how the killing of our only son could be something good. He said he was quoting from the Bible. He said that is what the Bible teaches, that all things work together for good to them that love God. The words are from Romans 8:28.

Every time I think of what he said, I break down and cry. This was our son; the person who would carry his father's name, a good son. How could it be good to see him dead and for us his parents to bury him? How could his sisters see their only brother dead and watch him buried? Sometimes when I think of what the pastor told us, I ask myself, if someone had killed his son, would he quote and apply this verse to himself?

Pastor, you see why we stopped attending this pastor's church? One of the elders of the church came to see us and asked us why we have stopped attending church and we told him that the pastor caused us to leave by telling us that the death of our son might turn out to be a blessing to us. The elder tried to explain that the pastor did not mean any harm. But every time I look at this man who calls himself a pastor, I do not see him as one who empathised with us. I see him as someone who was saying that it was good that our son was killed.

This is why I am writing to you, to ask you whether you believe that any good can come from our son being gunned down by criminals. We are not putting you on the spot; we just want to know if you believe that this was a good thing for the pastor to tell us.

P.S.

Dear P.S.,

It cannot be that the pastor meant that the killing of your son was a good thing, and that you should not weep and mourn over what happened.

I think that I would rather believe that the pastor has taken the verse out of context, because according to context, we know that the verse is saying any Christian who loves Christ and is endeavouring to walk with Christ, may occasionally face trials and tribulation. But such a person is protected by Christ and whatever happens to him or her is allowed by Jesus Christ.

I wish your pastor had tried to find other verses in the Bible to bring comfort to your family. But I will ask you to try and forgive him and not to continue feeling that he has looked on the death of your son as something to be taken lightly. I know the application that your pastor made concerning the death of your son is incorrect because the Bible teaches that no evil can come upon God's children because they are under the protection of Christ.

Pastor