Here's an update from Jon & Jenny Rice, the XA leaders at VA Tech.


Friends,

Thank you so much for your outpouring of encouragement and all of your prayers. This has been an unbelievably difficult week for our community and our campus. Although thankfully none of our students were in Norris during the shooting, most of our students knew multiple people killed or wounded. One of our students personally knew 7 of the people murdered this past Monday. Another one of our students is an RA in East AJ; the RA that was murdered, Ryan Clark, was an RA in the same building in West AJ. Many of our students also lost professors and advisers. Some how, however, God has brought hope.

Monday night, we decided to gather together for prayer. Almost every one of our students showed up to the Chi Alpha house that night. As they came in, some crying, some with a blank stare on their faces, we gathered together to do the only thing we knew to do, to seek God. I told the students not to try and make sense of this senseless act of violence that night, but rather to give their emotions to God, and God showed up. We prayed for close to 2 hours that night. At the end of the prayer I realized that many of these students were not only emotionally drained, but hadn't eaten all day. I told the students that we not only needed to be in the presence of God, but also to be in the presence of one another as a community. I asked one of our small group leaders, who happened to work for the local Papa Johns to bring some food back to the house. His manager donated the pizzas free of charge for our grieving students. By the end of that night, the entire atmosphere of the house had changed. Whereas at the beginning the students wouldn't even make eye contact with one another, at the end they had something new....hope. By the end of that night, for the first time since the incident, we heard laughter, we saw smiles, we saw hope. It wasn't denial, we were still in mourning, but for the first time we saw a future beyond what happened that morning. The XA house didn't close this week. There were students at the house past midnight every night this week. Hanging out, talking, praying, sharing stories, and encouraging each other.
The house this week has been a safe place for students to deal with something that will define the rest of their existence. We have had multiple prayer meetings since where God has showed up every time. We have provided multiple meals everyday this week since Monday for the students so they didn't have to go back on campus. The students are so grateful for the overwhelming response of support by so many of the churches who have called and told of their prayer meetings, for those who have sent financial gifts, notes, words of encouragement, and all who have just asked what they can do. Thank you all for caring about our students and all the students at Virginia Tech. We are praying that God will use this event to reach out to many across the campus and this nation. Please pray for our students and our community to heal, and to come to know the Prince of Peace.

Jon and Jenny Rice