I heard a
story about a girl from a poor family that had an alcoholic and abusive father.
The mother died when this girl was eight, and two years later the father
abandoned the two children. Shortly after the two kids were sent to a foster
home, the brother died. And on top of
all that, earlier at the age of three, the girl was having vision problems
which eventually became worse in spite of multiple surgeries trying to save her
sight. Her vision became so bad that they had to send her to the school for the
blind. I remember asking myself, what kind of God would let this happen to an
innocent girl?
I read another story of a black eight year-old girl, also from a poor
family, who was molested and raped by her mother’s boyfriend, which psychologically
traumatized the girl who became mute? Years later when she was 17, she became a
single mother and had to work as an exotic dancer to make ends meet. What kind
of karma could she have gotten as a little girl to deserve all this?
It happens so often. At one
time I was an optimist, but life has battered me down enough times to temper
this optimism down a bit. I try to balance being an optimist with being a
realist, but sometimes I find myself being quite pessimistic. People are in accidents, people get ill,
people die, people are abused. Good
people. Innocent people. And the more that I live and see what Life
can do to people and what it already has done, the more I question. Sometimes I question the notion that God
cares. Sometimes I even question the
notion of God.
As I question and struggle I think, if I am honest, I find myself
at least a little disappointed with God.
Ever find yourself there? I think
almost all of us do at times! And in our
pain and confusion we cry out! “Why?” we
ask, “Where are you God?” we demand!
When we are in this place, we are in good company. Since the dawn of time people have been frustrated and confused by God. Even the most dynamic and faithful of God’s
people have had their moments. David,
for example, in a moment of despair cried out to God: “Be merciful to me Lord, for I am faithful; O
Lord, heal me, for my bones are in agony, my soul is in anguish. How long, O Lord, how long? Job, a man of great faith was driven to say,
“know that God has wronged me and drawn his net around me. Though I cry, “I’ve been wronged” I get no
response; though I call for help there is no justice.”
It seems almost inevitable.
There will be times when faith is shaken and battered by what happens to
us, or around us. It is not really a
question that moments like that will come.
The big questions seems to be, what do we do when such times come? How do we respond when life caves in, and God
seems unfair, or silent?
We can be pretty creative in trying to deal with this reality. I Goggled “bad things and good people” and
found a whole series of sites that used a very interesting approach to deal
with this problem. Here is a sample from
one of those sites. “Technically
speaking there are no good people. The Bible says in Romans 3:12,
“All have turned aside. Together they have become useless. There is none
who does good. There is not even one.” The reason there are none
who are good is because God alone is truly good… God is the standard of
righteousness, and all of us have fallen short of that standard (Rom. 3:23).
Therefore, there really aren't any good people and bad things to happen to
them. OK, I’m sorry, that doesn’t help
me.
Others try to make sense out of what has happened. They decide that God must have had a reason
for allowing this thing to have occurred.
This is the causal question, the question of “why?” And it is a powerful and important
question.
But I would like to suggest that to begin by focusing on the
causal question may be to make a profound mistake. For the “why” question is often
unanswerable. Sometimes we simply will
not be able to make sense of the things that happen to us or around us. In fact scripture warns us that it will be
this way. “My thoughts are not your
thoughts, neither are your ways my ways” declares the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so
are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts.”
Chances are we will never understand. So if we begin our efforts to deal with our
struggles by trying to answer the question of “why” we will never get beyond
the question. And getting stuck on the
question we will get stuck in our disappointment, our confusion and despair. And, we will be frozen.
I think this suggests we need a different starting point. Let us look at the case of Job. Now Job has all kinds of complaints and
questions. “Why, Why, Why, Why….. Its
not fair!” Are his questions really
answered? Ever? No!
Job is never given a reason for all that has happened. His losses are staggering. 7000 sheep, 3000 camels, 5000 oxen, 500
donkeys, servants, 7 sons, 3 daughters, his health… but no one ever tells Job
why it all happens.
This is God’s answer to his complaints. . . “Where were you when I laid the foundations
of the earth? Tell me if you
understand. Who marked off its
dimensions? Surely you know. On what were its footings set, or who laid
its cornerstone, while the morning stars sang together and all the angels
shouted for joy?”
The passage goes on and on, but you get the point. What is God saying? Look not at the event. Look not at the causal question. Look – at me!
Who am I? What have I done? What am I like? What can I do? Look at me, and believe, and trust, and keep
living.
The same dynamic was present in the upper room at the last
supper. This was not the romantic,
wonderful time we often try to make it.
It was dark, ominous, confusing.
We have Jesus talking about betrayal, defeat, and yes, death. And the disciples are bewildered and
frightened. All their hopes and
expectations have begun to crumble beneath the harsh realities of rejection and
betrayal. Their very souls are
screaming… This is wrong! This is not
fair! This can’t be!
How does Jesus respond to their dilemma? Does he offer another explanation of the ways
of God? Another theological dissertation
on the implications of the cross? An apologetic? A reminder that there “are no good people?” No, he simply says, “trust in God, trust also
in me” Wow!
Trust in Me. Remember, who
I am, what I am like, what I have done, what I have promised. Look at me, put yourselves in my hands, and
keep moving! And you and I will go
through it all, the good the bad, the ugly….. together.
Ann Lamont, in one of her books, talks about a time when she was
having a Job moment, a moment of confusion, frustration, and hopelessness. She said to a friend, “I want to know what to
do!” He answered, “left foot, right foot, left foot,
breath. We breathe, we eat. We remember
that God is present whenever people suffer.
God is here with us when we’re miserable.” “But” she said, look at the suffering, it
seems like people are abandoned by God.
How do we not lose our minds?”
The friend replied, “you take care of the suffering.”
In short, you keep living, and loving, and caring, and
helping. You keep going with God. As the story unfolds Ann goes to a store that
day, and in an odd twist of luck, wins a ham.
A huge ham. She hates ham.. but
she decided to be positive, so she acted excited and loaded a huge ham into her
cart, and headed into the parking lot.
She said to herself “If God is giving me a ham, I’d be crazy not to
receive it. Maybe it is the ham of God,
who takes away the sins of the world.”
In the parking lot she ran her cart into a car, an old rusty
wreck. She then noticed that an old
friend was at the wheel. It was a woman
that she had known for years, who had gotten sober with her, and had a child at
the same time she did. Ann said to the
woman, “Hey,” how are you, it’s my birthday.”
The woman responded, “Happy Birthday” and then started crying. After a moment she said, “I don’t have money
for gas, or food. I have never asked for help from a friend
since I got sober, but I’m asking you.” “No
the woman said, “I don’t want a handout.
I just need gas” Ann
responded. It’s not a handout, it’s my
birthday present. And she thrust money
into the woman’s hand. And then she
said, “Hey, do you and your kids like ham?”
And when Ann gave the ham to her the woman cried again, for a different
reason.
Ann did not let the fear, the anger, the disappointment, the
frustration win. She trusted God. She
trusted, and kept loving God, and with God’s help kept moving, kept loving,
kept caring for others… and she touched another life. . . she became a healer.
It works that way. I have
always loved the words of Paul. “All
things work together for good for those who love God.” Not all things are good. But out of whatever happens, God begins to
draw forth, something new, fresh, good.
There is more evidence. Remember
the stories of the two girls I used at the beginning of this talk? The orphan
girl that was becoming blind did not lose her vision completely, and she
eventually became the valedictorian of her class. Eventually Anne Sullivan became a tutor and mentor for the blind, and her life experiences helped her to
connect to this one particularly difficult blind, deaf, and mute student named Helen Keller.
The mute girl that became a single mother is not a mute anymore
and eventually moved on into theater, music, and poetry. Her words have been
credited to heal and inspire many generations of people. She has been nominated
for the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award. She has been on two
presidential committees and even read one of her own poems for a presidential
inauguration. Maya Anglou touched many people’s lives.
When we go with God, gifts, graceful surprises emerge, even when
everything is going wrong.
