Every morning that I get up early is a struggle, so I often check my phone to get my brain moving and alert.
But last Friday I found a message that I really wasn’t expecting. It was from my best friend whom I love with all my heart.
“My mom just died.”
That’s what I woke up to. I couldn’t believe it. My heart sank and I started to cry and immediately the questions started flooding into my head. When tragedy hits, the first one always seems to be, “Why?” Why is this happening? What is it that has caused this? Uhm hello God, I thought you were in control! I thought we could rely on you! I was just praying my thanks to you the day before yesterday for the health of this woman I loved who is now gone!
Growing up when difficult things happened, that’s what I always heard. “I just don’t understand why those things happen,” people would say. “It just doesn’t make sense.”
Moving towards the Race, I’m thinking about tragedy. And I mean the sort of tragedy that I sometimes like to pretend doesn’t exist. I know right now it seems really exciting. A lot of people seem to think the Race is a sort of vacation I’m super stoked about. Don’t get me wrong it’s not that I don’t want to go. I’m eager to see what the Lord has in store, but there are going to be so many days, weeks, and months of me asking, “why?” Why is this child sick, God? Why are you allowing these people to suffer?
I think that as believers there has to be a point in which we just say, “okay.” For some reason I want to be in control of everything. What can I do to fix this? But being able to just be okay with not understanding everything is something that I’ve come to see as beautiful. Not only does it strengthen our faith, but it brings glory to the Lord. We don’t need to understand everything. Did God not breathe life into our bodies and paint the stars in the sky? Who are we to question his creation?
“Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind and said: Dress for action like a man; I will question you, and you make it known to me. Will you even put me in the wrong? Will you condemn me that you may be in the right? Have you an arm like God, and can you thunder with a voice like his?” -Job 40: 7-9
I don’t know if God plans for people to get sick. I don’t know if he plans for poverty, or missing children. But how humbling is it to say, “This isn’t for me to know.”
“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are you ways my ways, declares the Lord.” -Isaiah 55:8
I’m going to choose instead to focus on what I do know, for the Lord in His goodness has provided us with His living, breathing word. And here is what I know.
The Lord is the Everlasting God. He adopts us, and lets us call him “Abba, Father.” All of creation declares His glory; this is His alone. He gives strength to the weak, and in our weakness, He is strong. In our separation from Him, He provides us with an unfailing love. He is graceful, and I mean a grace that is so powerful it can bring light to the darkest areas of our lives.
He is creator.
He is love.
He is.
But why?…
I don’t understand!
And that’s okay.
Because He does.
-Jenna
