An extremely sad thing happened in our extended family. One man had the stunningly horrific experience of discovering two of his very young grandsons he deeply loved, die within 3 months of each other. That is devastating enough! He was directly or indirectly involved in both deaths. The subsequent pain resulting from these deaths has been overwhelming. The natural result of the shock is to point fingers and place blame. Try to imagine either losing your child or being the one who was associated with each death. How is a person supposed to deal with the pain, especially with the initial steps in the grieving process?
Where does God fit into that real-life scenario? Since we are believers in Christ, our minds tell us we can’t blame Him. Yet, in the recesses of our finite minds, we at least wonder if God was negligent in watching over these children. As Jesus’ close friends, Mary and Martha separately accused Jesus, saying, if you would have been here, my brother (Lazarus) would not have died. Or, if we don’t blame God, do we reluctantly blame the deaths on the negligence of a grandfather who deeply loved his children and grandchildren?
Let’s face it. Knowing God is who the Bible describes Him to be, He could have prevented it from happening, as He has done in so many other situations. No earthly human knows the full reason for all the tragedies or very unfortunate events that happen to us, our friends or to people we read about in the news.
The ironic thing is most of us have loved our pets. We watch our daughter’s dog (Biscuit). She wants to eat when we eat and seems to want to please. However, there is absolutely no way for Biscuit, or any other pet, to understand what we are thinking. God loves us and we love God. We understand He died for us, although we do not have the capacity to know all there is to know about that very important truth. We can understand, from what the Bible says, that God is love and comes to live within us. However, there is so much we cannot comprehend about all that is involved in that piece. Since He lives within us and He is love, how is it we don’t always shine out His love? We have a tough time understanding all that goes into that one aspect. I could write far more about that, but the fact is, we are finite, and He is infinite. Just as there is a chasm between what we and our pet can comprehend, there is an even wider chasm between what God’s creation can comprehend about its creator.
So why is it we become so emotionally charged when we don’t understand what God, in His great wisdom (enough to create and maintain the universe) plans and allows to happen? Our pet has enough sense to be content to not understand what we think or plan, so why can’t we accept we are not God and cannot know all He knows or does with us? Are we so egotistical that we won’t believe or trust God when He doesn’t tell us everything—even though our mind or emotions don’t have the capacity to grasp what He could tell us?
Try to imagine with me how different life might be if we didn’t think we had to understand the whys of everything that goes on in our life? Do you imagine we might be more content, at peace or rest, and happier just living within our given circumstances? I’ve been trying to get off my high horse and release my felt need to control the world around me. I’ve been learning in my retirement, I have more gratitude, more peace, more patience and more love as I take my hands off the steering wheel of my life. My goal is to mature to the level where I can face a tragedy and, after regaining my equilibrium, I can get on with living a grateful, joyful and peaceful life.