I learned last night that several of our friends are suffering with a faimly in their church who lost a very young child in an accident yesterday. There is nothing quite like the death of a child, especially a tragic, unexpected death, to back us into a corner and bring out the question of “why” in our hearts!
This morning I was lead to Phillip Yancy’s book, Disappointment With God. It’s an honest look at the reality of my own accusatory questions. This kind of unfairness certainly brings it out in me. This kind of suffering makes me think that somehow God could do a better job of running His world. While there are no easy answers, there is some good perspective. Yancy quotes a hurting individual who had gained this perspective saying, “I have learned to see beyond the physical reality in this world to the spiritual reality. We tend to think ‘Life should be fair because God is fair.’ But God is not life. And if I confuse God with the physical reality of life, then I set myself up for a crashing disappointment.” Yancy observes a statement by Dr. Paul Brand to the question, “Where is God when it hurts?” Dr. Brand replied, “He is in you, the hurting one, not in it, the thing that hurts.” It’s a reality check for me.
We have this hope as an anchor
‘Cause we believe that everything
God promised us is true, so …So we can cry with hope
And say goodbye with hopeWe wait with hope
And we ache with hope
We hold on with hope
We let go with hope