. . . which is why I’m always hesitant to answer the door!
You don’t need to look hard these days to see misery around you. People suffer from ailments, from loss, from bad choices, from a series of unfortunate events.
I understand that all things are relative but from the surface it appears that some people are more blessed or more protected or more sheltered from the storm than others.
Questions I struggle with:
Why does this person suffer and that person does not?
Why does one person skate through life and one person seem to always fall through the ice?
Why do entire nations suffer from malnutrition and aids and unjust mortality rates?
Why does trouble touch down here and there, like a tornado, randomly afflicting portions of the population?
Answers I’ve found which explain all this: None.
I’ve heard (and sorry to say repeated) the party line answers relating to God’s will or the consequences of a fallen world. Those seem to be things people without time spent in the fire say.
I’m suspicious of those who insist there is an answer that makes sense. How can the answer make sense when everything that formed the question in the first place doesn’t make sense?
5 Responses to “Misery Loves Company . . .”
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February 15th, 2007 at 12:22 pm
Great questions! Those of us who aren’t preachers hope youwill have the answers to these. It reminds me that preacherssometimes struggle with these same questions.
February 15th, 2007 at 2:10 pm
Here’s my take: Some things just happen.
February 15th, 2007 at 10:53 pm
Billy Graham’s comments at the service for the victims of the Oklahoma City Bombing:
"Somebody asked me, "Why did this have to happen." My answer, we just don’t know."
February 16th, 2007 at 8:48 am
A recent bumper sticker I saw:
Suck is life
I find myself going again and again to these verses when faced with inexplicable circumstances like 18 year olds wiho kill people in public malls:
Romans 11:33
Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! 34 “Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?†35 “Who has ever given to God, that God should repay him?†36 For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever! Amen.
Peace.
February 16th, 2007 at 5:07 pm
Well, Porter Wagonner’s answer to that was to "break out the bottle." But I doubt you were thinking of his song by the same title as this post when you wrote this up. Come to think of it, I doubt any of the guitars you own are capable of producing any Porter Wagonner songs, at least not intentionally.This is one of those truly eternal questions. Why do these things happen? The only way I’ve been able to deal with it is to consider what I can do to ease the misery of those with whom I’m in contact. Not that I’m very good - or consistent - at it. Since we can’t get our minds around the scale of this I guess we can only address on our level & our scale.Thanks for the thoughts on this.