Cassie Bernall

“I just try not to contradict myself, to get rid of the hypocrisy and just live for Christ,” she said.

She was one of many victims in a high school shooting in Littleton, Colorado. But I feel Cassie’s story is a bit different. Cassie can be considered a modern day martyr. Many witnesses testify that the murderer asked her just moments before she died, if she believed in God. Witnesses state she hesitated and replied, “Yes, I believe in God, and you need to follow His path.” The gunman shot her immediately in a way that put her instantly with God. This young girl’s faith in God cost her the earthly life she had lived for 17 years. However, it gave her the reward of eternal life!

Cassie’s father related to People magazine, “There was a reason Cassie died, and that was because she loved the Lord. This is what Cassie was being prepared for. This was her mission.”

On the night of her death, Cassie’s brother Chris found a poem she had written two days before the massacre. It read:

… Now I have given up everything else

I have found it to be the only way

To really know Christ and to experience

The mighty power that brought

Him back to life again, and to find

Out what it means to suffer and to

Die with him. So, whatever it takes

I will be one who lives in the fresh

Newness of life of those who are

Alive from the dead …

Cassie Bernall (November 6, 1981 – April 20, 1999)