Suicide Bombings and Compassion

Tuesday March 11, 2008:
At 9:30 in the morning, two powerful explosions rocked the city of Lahore, Pakistan. The twin suicide bombings have left 31 people dead and more than a hundred wounded. According to the BBC, more than 600 people have died in Pakistan within one year as a result of suicide bombings. I wrote the following entry in my journal in January which I think is relevant to the situation.

January 18th , 2008
I came to know today that yesterday, Mr. Sajjid Williams a Pakistani Christian working for a relief and development agency in Peshawar has been murdered. Unknown gunmen opened fire as he was leaving his place of work and left him dead on the street. The news has shocked me to say the least. Sajjid was a strong believer and extremely active in ministry in his area. He leaves behind a wife and an 18 month old daughter.
All this happened just moments before a suicide bomber (a teenager) blows himself up, killing twelve people worshiping in a Shiite Mosque in the same city of Peshawar. These are times of great turmoil in our country, enflamed by the war against terrorists in North Waziristan and political unrest in the country. The current rate of suicide bombings in our country is at least one every two weeks.
As I though about this great tragedy in utter grief wondering why God had allowed such a thing to happen, a strange thought struck me: Why had the death of this one believer in Christ (whom I personally knew) filled me with more grief and sorrow than the death of the twelve unbelievers in the mosque, or the 20 policeman killed in similar incident in Lahore a few days ago, or the 130 people killed in Karachi on 27 December (a suicide bomber blows himself up in an pre-election rally) or the dozens of people killed in the violence following the assassination of our former prime minister? I thought to myself: shouldn’t we as Christians be more concerned about the death of thousands of people dying around us every minute, who never knew Christ (and will spend eternity in hell) rather than the death of a believer goes to rest at His father’s House?
I don’t think Jesus wept for Lazarus at that graveyard in Bethany. I think he wept for all the other people in graves there. I think he cried, out of compassion for all those souls lost to sin. And Jesus Wept. As one writer puts it, Jesus wept as he saw what sin had done to man, what sin was doing to man and what sin would do to man, all in an instant.
I ask myself, Do I weep for the lost souls out there? Am I concerned about them or do I pray for them? Or am I just concerned about my brothers and sisters in Christ. Does it strike me that Jesus died for all humanity? That He had every human being, dead or alive, in his mind as he hung on that cross, and was willing to pay for each one of them with His own blood? Does it require a bomb blast to get my attention, to get me on my knees? To be burdened with love and compassion for these people?
I was Just wondering….