In our small town?!

Unless you live under a rock, you have probably heard about a home invasion and attempted rape that happened right in our little town of DeMotte.

Yesterday the kids were forwarding a picture of the suspect via text message on their cell phones. Have you seen the picture? If you want to see it follow this link: http://kvonline.info/articles/2008/11/20/news/news01.txt

When my daughter showed the picture to me last night, it took my breath away...the picture shows what is in my view a boy. Not a creepy looking old guy, no... this kid looks like every other high school kid to me.

My heart goes out to the woman in the story. She is my same age, and to wake up with a strange guy in her bedroom?....she must be devastated, how will she ever sleep soundly again?!

But my heart also weeps for this person who looks like a kid that somehow in life didn't learn the boundaries. What kind of breakdown in the family system must have occured to make this kid think his behavior was okay. I just have to wonder.....who hurt him so that now he wants to hurt others? Or maybe he's from a perfectly normal family and his addictions make his terrible actions seem okay in his warped mind.

While a little bit of fear has crept into my normally secure home over this would be rapist on the loose, I am more concerned about the state of our children in general. With all the killing and mayhem any kid can watch on prime time TV any hour of the day, and with video games that promote killing and picking up hookers in most houses, is it really any wonder our society is turning out kids who don' t know how to behave?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not giving anyone an excuse for horrible behavior, but I am taking a little closer look today at what is seen and heard in my house. As for the boy in that police sketch who is accused of rape, I can not fix him, I can not save him, all I can do is pray that somehow this kid will first of all get clean, see the errors of his way, and come to salvation. But I can do something in my house, for my kids, even though they think they are grown, I am still the mom. Tonight will be a cleansing, and my husband will be happy to know that I will no longer be on the side of our kids who bug him constantly about getting satellite tv. The 3 channels we currently get are bad enough.

Let's pray for not only the victim in this horrible situation, but also for this kid who is accused of doing something so vile.