Pray For Them

I was working on something today and I started thinking about atheists.

Madelyn Murray O'Hair in particular. She suffered a terrible death.

I can't tell you if she would have been spared if she were a Believer. I can't tell the future and perhaps her murder was always looming at the end.

I do think that it was her unbelief that paved her path down that road, that put her and her family in harms way. Her unbelief coupled with her own troubled life and dishonest ways.

Ironically, William Murray, the very son that she fought the battle to remove prayer from schools for, all the way to the Supreme Court, became a Christian and a Pastor.

O'Hair's reaction was, "...I repudiate him entirely and completely for now and all times...he is beyond human forgiveness."

(Fortunately, Murray isn't depending on human forgiveness when he meets Jesus at the Throne.)

After O'Hair, her son and granddaughter's bodies were found, Murray said:
"My mother was an evil person... Not for removing prayer from America's schools... No, she was just evil. She stole huge amounts of money. She misused the trust of people. She cheated children out of their parents' inheritance. She cheated on her taxes and even stole from her own organizations. She once printed up phony stock certificates on her own printing press to try to take over another atheist publishing company....Regardless of how evil and lawless my mother was she did not deserve to die in the manner she did."

Murray was right. Despite all that she did, O'Hair did not deserve to be murdered.

No one deserves to die like she did.

But I can't help but think that if she had found her way to Christ, He could have turned her life around. God's Path was not her path, but if it was, couldn't she have been saved?

Maybe, maybe.

We, as Christians, need to pray for our brothers and sisters who embrace the religion of nothingness.

Religion?

Oh, yes, it most certainly is. And it's adherents follow it more rigidly and stridently than most Christians follow Christ.

If only Believers had as much Faith in Jesus as atheists do in nothingness.

I keep praying for the atheists I know. Yes, they'd probably be offended if they knew, but it's my right and duty to pray for them, just as it's their right to reject it. So I pray. And pray. And pray.

As I am quite sure that Murray prayed and prayed and prayed for his mother.

We have to accept that, while God does not want any to be lost, we are also Blessed with free will. Thus, people choose to die alone and comfortless in their unbelief.

We can't fix that.

We can only pray for them.

We can pray that seeds be planted, watered, and with time, the harvest is gathered, and our loved ones willing join us as members of the Body of Christ.

We can pray for them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madalyn_Murray_O