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We all look for answers when tragedy invades our world. We usually cry out to God asking why.
C.S. Lewis in "A Grief Observed" wrote:
"Meanwhile, where is God? This is one of the most disquieting symptoms. When you are happy, so happy that you have no sense of needing Him, if you turn to Him then with praise, you will be welcomed with open arms.
But go to Him when your need is desperate, when all other help is vain and what do you find? A door slammed in your face, and a sound of bolting and double bolting on the inside. After that, silence.
You may as well turn away."
I have found that to be true in my own times of grief.
However, I have also noticed after each tragedy in my life,
God has become closer than ever to me. What a mystery!
How can this be? I'm not sure if I can answer that.
I do know God wants us to trust Him in our fears and pain,
even when we do not "feel" like it. Jesus
(who was fully man and fully God) questioned His Father when his pain was more than He could bear.
"Why has thou forsaken me?"
I can say with assurance Jesus knows the fear of being abandoned and He
understands when we question Him.
Therefore, we can question God - it's
all right to question Him. And if that's where you are right now, then
I pray some of my own observations and conclusions will not only encourage you, but will give you the
grace to bear your sorrow with discernment.
When my mother was
murdered I started looking for answers and I agonized for years before I found peace of mind. My quest for understanding was a difficult journey and so will yours be. Each one of us are unique and individualistic with our own personality, life experiences, and beliefs. Because of this, your pain and confusion will not be the same as mine. Nor can anyone else truthfully lay claim to know exactly what you are going through. No one else on the face of the earth knows specifically what you are experiencing because not one of us are exactly alike.
However, let me quickly add, the reasons why we suffer
remains the same.
It does help us to know someone else who has experienced similar pain. It gives us a sense of,
'not being so alone in our grief'...
Therefore, your journey for understanding may not end here and may even become more troublesome because my answers are not glib, off the cuff, Bible versed conclusions. They are based upon years of pain, depression, fears, anger and most importantly, my understanding of God's wonderful love affair with us. That being said, I can now try to reach you where you are - with what I pray is a bit of hope in a world of hate.
First of all, we somehow get to thinking life should be fair and we deserve to live a nice, quiet life full of peace and comfort. Where did we get that idea? The toughest thing in this world to accept is the fact that bad things happen to us, and for as long as we live bad things will continue to happen to us. Once we fully understand that concept then, and only then, can we accept other truths about adversity in our lives.
Where is God when bad things happen? Someone once said He is in the same place He was when His only son was being crucified. I believe that, but let me add one more thing; when we suffer, God is as close to us as a whispered prayer.
You may say you
don't feel like God hears your prayers. Well, that brings me to another concept we
have about God hearing and helping us. So often we rely on our feelings for our
spiritual well being. We don't feel like God is near so He must not be. Where do
we get that idea? If we based our decisions on our feelings for everything in
our life we would become an emotional cripple. Think about it: I don't feel like
going to work today. I don't feel like fixing dinner for my family. I don't feel
like doing laundry. I don't feel like working out this problem.
Depend on your
feelings?
No, I think not.
Then why do we trust our feelings when it comes to God?
Look to His word and trust it - nothing more; nothing less.
God wants us to freely choose to love Him, even when our choosing to love Him involves great suffering and fear. It's easy to love Him when our life is good or when we still have hope.
But what about when hope is gone
and life is nothing but pain and despair?
If then, we choose to love Him, we are the most pleasing to God and the most perplexing to Satan and to this world.
Look at the book of Job.
Can we say, in our deepest darkest pain what Job said?
"Even though He slay me, yet will I trust Him".
Now, the question of "why my loved one" begs to be answered.
I stood at my mother's graveside and wondered why. She was a good woman. She was a great mother. She was a faithful friend.
However, she was not a Christian and that was my greatest fear and sorrow. How could God allow her to be killed before she became a Christian?
Now I would never see her again!
I knew she would not be in heaven with me.
I thought about how much I loved her and if God loved her only half as much as I did, then how could He bear to see her die without knowing Him?
I have found
there are questions we ask that will never be answered to our satisfaction this
side of heaven. I say that because I know the answers I give may not satisfy your heart.
It may, indeed, cause you greater pain.
Before
God made the world He knew everything that was going to happen. He also knew the only way for man's redemption lay in God becoming a man and dying a horrible death on the cross. Now, I don't know about you, but I don't think I would have chosen to do that. I may have, for my loved ones, but certainly not for my enemies!
Yet, before we became Christians we were enemies of God -
and yet, He still loved us.
He gives every man the chance to accept His plan of salvation. The choice to believe is man's responsibility. God's Holy Spirit draws us to Himself, and then the choice is ours. God will even give us the strength and the courage to accept his salvation. However, each individual must choose for himself to believe,
or to turn away from God.
If God forced His love upon us,
we would be nothing more than puppets.
God did all he could to see my mother would be in heaven with me. He died a lonely, horrific death on the cross just for her. Jesus would have died for her even if she had been the only person to ever accept His plan of salvation. If my mother didn't choose Christ as her savior it was because she didn't want to. Now, that's a hard thing to say and even harder to accept, but it's the truth.
What about innocence? Why do those who deserve to die live, and others who seem to have a bright, happy future ahead of them die?
We live in a sinful world. Every time we sin we are choosing to live in a sinful world. Sin causes death and destruction. Sin hurts the innocent and causes man to rebel against God in ways that are sick and depraved. God wanted us to have a world full of hope and free from sin and death but man chose otherwise.
God gave us a free will and with that comes the choice to do evil. If you decide to kill me, God will not take away your freedom of choice. My two brothers were murdered because someone took up a gun and shot them to death. My youngest brother, Skip, was more like my own son because he came to live with my husband and I after our mother was killed. My other brother, Morris, was just a year older than me. He was a happy, generous individual with a heart for those who are downtrodden.
Why did they have to die?
We can not see the whole picture. We don't know the future.
God does and will take all the bad things and turn them around for our good and His glory (if we allow Him to).
Corrrie ten Boom (author of The Hiding Place) said,
"However deep the pit, God's love is deeper still."
I have found that to be true.
The emphasis on our sorrow should be on looking to the future for what God can make of apparent tragedy.
Because of my experience of losing a mother forever, I have become a strong and fearless
proclaimer of God's grace. I do not fear ridicule, persecution, nor even loss of family for my witness. I do not fear
it because I never want others to have to stand over a loved ones grave wondering where he will spend eternity. I would never have become a crusader for Christ had it not been for my mother's murder. More than likely, I would have been a
non-committed church attendee.
Now, my persuasion for you to trust God when all seems black and lonely is full of love and compassion for where you are. I do understand the despair and searing pain. God does also, believe this even though you can not feel it. God will turn around your tragedy for good. He did for me and for millions of others who have suffered more than I can ever imagine. Trusting God in spite of our feelings is the key to peace of mind. I not only believe this, I have proved it to be true over and over.
Thank you, Father God, for loving me even when I am loveless. Thank you for forgiving me when I deserve it not. Thank you for allowing me the pure joy of knowing your love when I don't love others as I should. Thank you for my life and for the abundant blessing of friends, family, and for those dearest to my heart. I don't deserve anything from you and yet you love me, even me.
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Are you here and in deep grief over a loss? 
