You’d expect bitterness to overwhelm the hearts of Amanda Blackburn’s family, after she was reportedly brutally sexually assaulted and murdered.
Instead, it appears the peace of God is speaking through the family of pastors, as everyone from Blackburn’s husband and father to her brother and sister is calling upon the name of the Lord to aid them in their grief.
“‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay,’ says the Lord,” says Pastor Phil Byars, Blackburn’s father. “It’s not ours to take into our hands vengeance upon anyone who does evil to us or our children. But it hurts and it’s painful. So we’re asking God to help us with those feelings.”
He told WTHR he knows God will vindicate Blackburn if the family leans on Him.
“I know that God brings justice through government. God brings justice. He will bring upon these men what He wills,” Byars says. “That’s not for us to worry about and to think about and to fixate on. We just need to turn it over to Him and we’ll take care of it.”
The elder Byars isn’t the only one counting on his faith to sustain him.
In an interview with WISHTV, Blackburn’s brother James Byars spoke about how prayer is what’s getting the family through the difficult time.
“(We’re) just holding on to the truth that we have a God who loves us and whose ways are above our ways, and we don’t understand His plan all the time,” the younger Byars says.
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