Fellow Student Prays for School Shooter – ‘Touch His Heart, Jesus’

This week, a shooting at a Mansfield Timberview High School outside Dallas left four injured. The suspect, 18-year-old Timothy Simpkins, turned himself in to authorities hours after the incident. 

Later in the day, students and faculty held a prayer service at Cornerstone Baptist Church to remember the victims and begin the process of healing. Several students spoke, including Ashlyn Henson. Henson prayed for peace and for the heart of Simpkins.

Watch the prayer for grace and peace below: 

“I want to pray for the shooter, Lord God “That you’d touch his mind. Touch his heart, Jesus. That you allow him to see his wrong. That you allow him to feel that remorse and that pain he caused. And that he fixes himself in your eyes, Lord God.”

What We Know About Timothy Simpkins

The fight began with an argument in a classroom that led to Simpkins drawing a firearm and firing in the classroom injuring two fellow students and a teacher.

One student is in critical attention. Simpkins faces three counts of aggravated assault.

He drove away from the school to evade police before turning himself in with the help of his family. 

A classroom brawl was the catalyst for the incident.

Simpkins’ family is claiming the 18 year old was simply responding to a severe case of bullying: 

“This is a situation where Timothy was being bullied,”

Does Bullying Justify Bringing A Gun To School?

His family posted on Facebook saying: “Recently he was ambushed by a group of young males outside of school, stripped of his clothing in front of a crowd of onlookers, and robbed of his money and possessions.”

A spokesperson for the Simpkins family had this to say: 

“The decision he made, taking the gun, we’re not justifying that,” she added. “That was not right. But he was trying to protect himself. And so we hope that the police department does the investigation properly. There are going to be independent investigations that are going to be done as well so we can get to the bottom of really what happened.

The post also said that Simpkins’ own father was brutally murdered. “And this fact definitely heightened Timothy’s fear for his life — not to mention that the young men responsible for beating and harassing him recently made threats to kill him. So you see, my son was terrified and believed he would be murdered just like his father.”

As a victim of bullying, I understand what it is like to feel angry and hopeless. I’ve been at a point where I felt the only way to stand up for myself was resorting to violence.

I’m thankful that I allowed myself to breathe and think things out before I started throwing punches. I never ever considered bringing a gun to seriously hurt someone.

Violence is a fake solution to a real problem. You cannot heal through violence.

I too am praying for Timothy. I’m praying he can heal whatever it is that caused him to do this.

Share your thoughts in the comments below.