As a pastoral counselor, people often come into my office wrestling with the most painful and
difficult questions of their lives. One of the most prevalent questions is the “Why?” question.
Why did this happen? Why does evil exist? If God is good, why doesn’t He keep bad things
from happening? The temptation is to offer some simple solution to a tremendously complex
problem which becomes incredibly demeaning.
The majority of the work that happens to be able to process these things comes in the form of
the story we tell ourselves about it. Most of us would like to have a foundation that says “Life
shouldn’t be like this and evil should not be able to run rampant.”
The Bible does offer us this promise found in John 16:33. Unfortunately, this promise doesn’t
often make it into the books about the promises of God so we may not be as familiar with it.
John 16:33 says “…And everything I’ve taught you is so that the peace which is in me will be
in you and will give you great confidence as you rest in me. For in this unbelieving world you
will experience trouble and sorrows, but you must be courageous, for I have conquered the
world.” So our “baseline” for reality is “experiencing trouble and sorrows.”
When we struggle with this part of reality, we begin to ask the wrong questions, just like the
disciples did when they brought a blind man to Jesus in John 9 and asked whose sin caused
this blindness-his parents’ or his? And Jesus responded, “neither!” The disciples went to a
place that is easy to go-blame! Whose fault is it? We are still doing the same today! Must be
the gun manufactures, must be bad parenting, must be the government, etc, etc! When in
reality, we have lost the ability or at least the freedom to embrace sadness. To give ourselves
the ability to mourn, to weep with those who weep, to allow the Holy Spirit to actually be the
“Comforter” and comfort us. It is only through our ability to unite in sadness that we will be
able to come together to fight these types of injustices. Without it we are only left with trying to
assign blame.
We are all going to experience grief and loss in our lifetime. The difference is that we “do not
grieve as do the rest who have no hope.” (1 Thes. 4:13) Please notice that it does not say that
we do not grieve. The Bible amazingly records 2 specific instances where Jesus himself wept!
Not got teary eyed, but wept…read ugly cry. He, the one who knew that big picture, still
allowed himself to feel the depth of loss.
So that leads us to this. What is the hope that makes the difference? How do we sing praises
in the midst of the pain? It is the knowledge that He wants to be in it with us. At the very heart
of glorifying, is just being happy to be with someone. A smile when you walk in the room.
Nothing feels more welcoming and connecting. So, can we in the hurt, through the tears,
amidst the angst, can we hold on to the belief the He is happy to be with us and we can be
happy to be with Him?