Yesterday, I had a long conversation with myself about Faith in God's Plan. Yesterday, something happened that God could have seen coming, probably wouldn't have wanted to happen, could have prevented, but let happen anyway, and I angrily wondered why? Why does He let bad things happen? Why does He let people make such stupid, painful mistakes? And this wasn't an intentional, "I'm going to ruin everybody's lives because I'm evil" moment. It was an accidental, "I thought I was doing the right thing" moment. Like I said: Stupid. Let's please move on.
Yesterday, I was angry at God for knowing that that was going to happen, and not preventing it, even though I was sure He could have. And I reasoned that one of several things must have been true. Either:
God doesn't exist,
He didn't see that coming,
He wasn't able to stop it,
He didn't care (about my feelings, Mom's, or the dog),
Or He was, for some good reason, okay with all of that happening.
God doesn't exist.
He does. End of argument.
God didn't see that coming.
He's Omniscient. Try again.
He wasn't able to stop it.
He's Omnipotent. Try again.
He didn't care.
This one, I was willing to consider for a few seconds. With all the bad things that God lets happen all over the world, how am I supposed to still believe that God cares about His children and creations? But let's put some Eternal Perspective into this.
When we die, what happens to us? Where do we go when we die? And for this hypothetical situation, let's assume that the people who are being killed are totally innocent and didn't deserve to die. Where do they go? To heaven. When good people die, whether it was murder, an accident, illness, or whatever, they are ultimately transported to a place that's a billion times better than here. Death is not the worst thing that could happen to an innocent person. Not by a long shot.
But there are fates worse than death. There are situations that cause untold pain and suffering without resulting in death. Here, it's helpful to consider the duration of eternity. Let's say, hypothetically, that a person spends ten straight years suffering the worst pain imaginable. And let's that instead of Eternity lasting forever, that person's existence only lasts about a million years. Compare 10 years to 1,000,000 years, and you'll discover that that person's decade of ultimate agony only amounts to 0.001 percent of his life. Granted, it was probably the worst 0.001 percent of his life, but after spending 1,000 years in the afterlife he truly deserves, he might just get over the 10 years of suffering that he didn't.
God is, for some reason, okay with allowing bad things to happen.
So, death and pain may not be as bad as we think it is, but it's still painful, and any amount of pain hurts. So why would God let it happen? People have been trying to answer that question for centuries. The only suitable answer I can think of at the moment (and I'm out of time for blogging, so this'll have to do): Sometimes a small amount of pain is necessary to prevent a greater amount of pain, or to bring about greater happiness. It sometimes hurts to get a shot, but if the vaccine prevents you from later getting a terrible disease, maybe the shot was worth it. If we can't get to a glorious Eternity without going through Hell on Earth first, I guess that's what has to happen. When it's all over, I'm sure most of us will agree that it was worth it, even though it was really painful at times.
In the heat of the moment, my faith in God was shaken pretty badly, but I just have to trust that it'll all work out in the end. "All that is unfair about life can be made right through the Atonement of Jesus Christ." (Preach My Gospel, 52) I need to trust God, and trust that His plan will have a happy ending for everyone and everything that deserves one, and that, compared to that happy ending, all the pain that this life produces will seem like it was just a blink of an eye. I really, really hope that's true.
2 comments:
Profound and thoughtful. I think you have greater faith than you realize. I know that you help strengthen mine.
I often wonder about all the pain and suffering in the world. I marvel that Christ has endured it all. I know that knowing about pain and suffering hurts me and I wonder how does God bear it and why does He let it happen? There must be something about His eternal perspective that makes all the difference. Hard to see from here.
We stumble along and try our best, we mess up or things just don't go the way we thought. We do what we can to make it better. We live with the rest. and move on.
I’m sorry to hear that something happened that shook your faith in God badly. But I want you to know that your faith is stronger than you think. Consider the conversation that you had with yourself about it. You confronted negative arguments and you fought them. That’s exactly what you have to do, and doing it on paper is the most effective way because then you can see it and get your mind and heart around it better, rather than having some nebulous shadowy thing floating around. Make the demons tangible and then smite them with the sword of truth. And you have to keep doing that. It’s hard right at that moment, but if you hang on it is easier.
We don’t know everything, but we know God does care about His children.
Consider praying for endurance and faith as often as you feel shaken.
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