Why God?!
I was asked, or the question was posed, about why God has let this disease that I’m dealing with, happen. Where is God now? Why does God let people die? Or get sick? Or lose loved ones?
Well, listen. Firstly, nowhere in the Bible does it talk about that God will save you from any heartache that will come your way. You are not immune to agonizing despair. Christ-follower, atheists, and agnostic alike. It’s not a matter of IF hardships, terror, disease, despair will come. it’s a matter that it WILL come. What the Bible DOES tell us, is that God will be there for us when we are faced with these challenges and grievances. He is there waiting. Right next to you. He hurts with you. Just like a parent who can’t protect his child from the world forever, when something happens to one of God’s children He despairs, with us.
This is sort of a tricky topic to discuss with a non-believer, because often, non-believers pose these questions, but have never read the good word. So, a lot of filler needs to happen, so the non-believer understands my viewpoint a bit more clearly….since they asked…
Understanding
I should also point out-I have not always been a believer. I was raised in church, kind of. Well, no. I went to youth group and Bible camps and to church on Sundays, usually against my will. (I never really liked it, to be honest). My mom usually took me; my dad staying behind (and I wanted to be where my dad was!). But church WAS a great time to get some drawings done! 😂 I will share my testimony another day. But I have felt these feelings and had these questions, “Where is God now?”, myself, as well. And I now understand why I asked those questions.
For one, I did not know what the Bible said about that topic. Nor did I turn to the Bible just to see for myself. Because I just knew that that was not going to be where my answer was. And, two, when you’re in the midst of the storm, yourself, and are a non-believer…the feelings of resentment, regret, anger, rage, blame, jealousy creep in. You are mad and hurt. You feel alone. Isolated. Deceived. And you do want to turn that anger out on someone. And who better? (even though you don’t believe in Him) GOD. You are now misplacing those negative feelings onto God. And form questions of “why me?” “Why him?” “Why her?” “Where were you God?!” Or…out of jealousy and misunderstanding, you take that unhealed anger out on a believer. The second something happens to a Christian, an unhealed non-believer takes that moment, to strike out against “their” God. Where’s your God at, now? Making the unbeliever feel justified. And a little better for the moment. Like they just won the “I told you so” game. Really…because I have now been on both sides of that fence…and hind sight IS 20/20…it’s because you’re jealous. Jealous of how your believer friend is seeming to handle her divorce with such grace and humility. And not ragingly slashing her husband’s tires with a knife (even though he may have deserved it). It’s how your coworker can talk about all the beauty all around him, even in the midst of a terminal cancer diagnosis. It’s how someone can lose a child and see the redemption in that precious life by helping other women through the process of losing children, themselves. Non believers want that spark, that light, the endurance, that faith. And that’s awesome! We should all want that! To have the spark! The light! The ability to endure! To run the long game!
I Want What You Have
When I get asked these questions from non-believers, it makes my souls ache. Why? Because I immediately think about all the hurt and pain they’re carrying around. Because they are not healed. They have not sought, or given, forgiveness. They are trapped by their own grief. Even if the trauma happened years ago…when someone asks me, “Where is your God now?”, I immediately feel, in my heart, that there is pain inside of them that they are still dealing with. Still holding on to. Still eating away at their soul. And if they consciously know it or not, they want what I have. They want to know that in the midst of the darkest storms, there is light. They want to know how a Christ follower can endure so much sadness and despair, and still see the lessons and blessings within all the darkness. Maybe even in the very eye of the storm, they can already see the good works happening all around them. All the beauty. All the blessings.
But for Christians and agnostics alike, this is not just something you just do. Forgiveness and acceptance of the disparity that is swirling all around, takes personal growth, spiritual evolution, an understanding of the greater good. It is a daily practice in prayer, meditation, self-introspection, gratefulness, and grace. And taking into account of all the other times Christ DID show up for you. For me, my testimony is a glaring example of all the times God was there for me…even when I wasn’t a believer!
Forgiveness
Finding an ability to forgive. Not just forgiving the wrong-doer himself, but forging the wrongdoer for YOURSELF. Didn’t Elsa sing, “Let it Go”? Let that sh*t go. Because you know what? A lot of the bad things we encounter in our lives, are completely OUT OF OUR CONTROL anyways. What we can control, is our emotions and how we CHOSE to look at life.
Free Will
So, I digress a bit. Getting back to actually answering the question “Why God?!” Well, When God created mankind, He gave him something very unique. Man received a free will, so that he could make his own choices according to his own free will.
The Fall occurred because man used his free will to listen to Satan. (Eating the apple) Nevertheless, the way of salvation was made by Jesus Christ with that same free will.
So…Why!?
So why does he let bad things happen? Why does he allow us to suffer? If, “supposedly”, he is the most powerful entity in the universe and beyond!Because we are sinners. And bad things will happen. Because we chose to eat that apple. Again, we all will suffer. The question I want to ask, is when that suffering comes…because it will…how are YOU prepared to deal with it?
If addressing this from a Christian point-of-view isn’t your thing, I understand! I get it! Let me use another example. How about a famous book? Don’t read? Well-it was also made into one of the most major films of all times. The Lord of the Rings.
LOTR Analogy
The Lord of the Rings kindled my imagination as a child, when I first read it. At a low point in the narrative, two central characters, Frodo and Sam, discuss where they are in the story. Sam recalls how he used to think that people in tales went looking for adventure because their lives were dull.
But, he reflects, “that’s not the way of it with the tales that really mattered.” Frodo enjoys the story Sam starts to tell about their own adventure. But then he stops his friend: “We’re going on a bit too fast. You and I, Sam, are still stuck in the worst places of the story,” and it is all too likely that some will say at this point ‘Shut the book now; we don’t want to read any more.’”
The hobbits do not know how their story will end. If it ended in this moment, it would be bleak and hopeless. But the story GOES ON. The author takes them through darkness and suffering and loss to a painful VICTORY, as Gollum bites the ring off Frodo’s hand. The story leaves Frodo scarred in body and mind. But it is a victory nonetheless, and one of which he and Sam hear songs sung and stories told. Finally, changed and matured, Frodo goes with the elves to their land across the sea. Tolkien’s work was sculpted by his Christian faith, and that was a faith not just in Jesus’s death but also in his resurrected life.
The journey of all the central characters is through darkness—even death—to new life. But tap them on the shoulder at the darkest moment, and none would know where they are in the story.
Hope
From an atheist perspective of pain and suffering…and even death…not only is there no hope of a better end to the story; there is no ultimate story. There is nothing but blind, pitiless indifference. From a Christian perspective, there is not only hope for a better end; there is intimacy now with the One whose resurrected hands still bear the scars of the nails that pinned him to his cross. Suffering is not an embarrassment to the Christian faith. It is the thread with which Christ’s name is stitched into our lives.