Monday Morning Musing
I have some birthday reflections to share as I prepare for my balding & gray-bearded future (someday, not today), but I wanted to link to a friend’s post on age-old question about “Why do bad things happen to good people?” I appreciate Eddy’s mind and the thoughts that he has added to this topic. Among several points, he puts forward that:
God is sovereign and is in control and has power over evil. Such a conclusion does not require God to exercise “total control of everything everybody does.” It just means that all events—including evil, pain and suffering—are within God’s [authority].
In responding, I added a few thoughts gained from my own experience with suffering, that
What suffering raises is our desire for explanations, though even a proper explanation doesn’t satisfy. Even Jesus cried out our cry for explanation on the cross, “Why have you forsaken me?,” even though the cross was a declaration of Christ’s victory over evil & innocent suffering. Even Jesus, in Isaiah’s prophecy, is described as someone “familiar with suffering.” It isn’t the escape from or elimination of suffering that reveals God’s power, but God’s familiarity with and presence in the midst of suffering & powerlessness that speaks to God’s power & true character.
Even in writing this, I battle against my deep desire for a life that is fully explained. I’ve often viewed eternity as the time when every explanation will be given. But I don’t intend to offer any of this as an easy explanation of my suffering or anyone else’s suffering. Rather, as I replied in Eddy’s post, what makes most sense to me, in the absence of easy explanations, is
As I’ve experienced it - with only a fraction of what Job suffered - part of the redemption of God’s presence in the midst of suffering has been what Job has modeled to me –> that is, greater authenticity with God and the refining work, not of redemption of sin, but from refined love of God & from God that is not defeated nor drained by suffering, but shown more true & more powerful.