Retreat Blog Series 4: When things don't make sense

I took a little break from the Women's Retreat Blog Series over Easter, but I'm not finished yet. I seriously went home from that retreat with so much to think about. This topic is another big one...

One of Sandy Cooper's sessions was on seeking God during hard times. She shared the story of her own loss of her son. And as she was talking about her experience and the struggle with her faith in God during that time, I kept thinking back to a conversation with a friend about the senseless murder of a young girl that had been in the news recently. My friend had made the comment that she just couldn't understand why God would let something like that happen. 

I was struggling with it too. Where I struggled, was in the brutality of it. I found myself asking God that if the little girl had to die, why couldn't it have been a quick, clean death? Why did she have to suffer at the hands of her abductors first? Why does God allow us to get so lost that it takes such terrible grief to create change? 

There is no answer for me. 

I kept thinking about this verse:

Jeremiah 29:11-13 (NIV), "'For I know the plans I have you', declares the Lord, 'plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart'."

Having to suffer unthinkable things at the hands of another seems like such a contradiction to that verse. Even if good does come out of it, how can suffering - possibly to the point of death - be called a hope and a future? 

To use a quote from Sandy's seminar, "It is an incorrect view of Scripture to say that we will always comprehend what God is doing and how our suffering and disappointment fit into His plan. Sooner or later, most of us will come to a point where it appears that God has lost control - or interest - in the affairs of people. It is only an illusion, but one with dangerous implications for spiritual and mental health. Interestingly enough, pain and suffering do not cause the greatest damage. Confusion is the factor that shreds one's faith." (Dr. James Dobson, When God Doesn't Make Sense). 

What we need to have when we don't understand suffering, is an eternal perspective. My suffering here on earth doesn't just affect me here and now, it has consequences outside of this place and time. My hope and my future doesn't end here. In fact, it just begins. My hope and my future is in my eternity.

Sandy went on to talk about what faith really is when you are going through something really terrible. Faith isn't when you believe God and then get what you prayed for. Faith is trusting and believing God even when you don't get what you've prayed for. In other words, it's trusting and believing God even when you don't understand why something has happened or is happening. It's trusting God that there is a purpose to the suffering. That there will be healing from the suffering. It's trusting God that even suffering is for my (eternal) best interest. 

Trusting that God is still in control even if we can't see it. 

I believe that there is no way we can possibly know all that will happen as a result of that little girl's death. I'm sure that voicing any of the possibilities would sound hollow to her grieving family members. What I do feel deep down though, is that there is a heaven and that little girl is there. She is there waiting for her parents. And God will throw such a party when they are reunited. This life is so temporary. That little girl's suffering, while horrendous, was temporary. She's now in an eternity of love and peace. One day God will wipe away all of our tears and take away all the pain we have suffered on this earth (Rev 21:3-4). If I find myself picturing my daughter in that little girl's shoes ever again and wondering how God could allow something like that to happen, it will be these thoughts that I will cling to.  

I was reminded at the retreat that it's okay to question God. It's even okay to get angry with Him. God doesn't get offended at our questions or our anger. But I also know that there are things going on in this world and in the next, that I can't even begin to comprehend.

Blog Retreat Series 1: He rewards those who earnestly seek Him
Blog Retreat Series 2: Are you wickedly busy?
Blog Retreat Series 3: Am I REALLY seeking God?

Intangible mission

Day 36 of The Purpose Driven Life, discusses reaching unbelievers as being the mission of a Christian.

Warren goes on to say that Jesus' second coming is tied to Christians completing this mission. i.e., making sure everyone God wants to hear the Good News has heard it. So if I want Jesus to come back sooner, I had better focus on fulfilling this mission.

I realized when I read that statement, that I don't want Jesus to come back yet. And that got me thinking that as a Christian, shouldn't I want that more than anything?

I know that I am too much of the world as opposed to in it. I like my life. It has it's struggles, but on the whole I enjoy it. I don't want to leave it yet. And it's because the idea of something greater, heaven, just is not a tangible thing to me. Maybe I haven't had the blessing of experiencing God on a significant level yet. Maybe I just don't know Jesus well enough.

This is yet another example that I have a lot of growing in my faith to do. A lot of learning.

It also leads me to a fear. Because I am so comfortable in my life and sometimes still love things, my kids, and my husband more than Jesus, Jesus will take those things away from me in order to make me grow. It is no secret that Jesus uses people and circumstances to reach us.

James 1:2-4 (NIV) says, "Consider it pure joy, my brothers [and sisters], whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything".

Warren himself writes that there are just some issues in life that will never be changed by any amount of Bible study or prayer. I am afraid that the only way for me to grow in faith will be to suffer the unthinkable: losing loved ones.

Warren ends day 36 by asking what keeps me from telling others the Good News. Well, my doubts often do. How do I sell something that I am not always convinced of myself? I fear being challenged on my beliefs because they are so shaky at times.

I posted about my faith difficulties recently. I now believe that God purposefully made me a doubtful person and he intentionally gave me faith as a struggle.  Maybe part of the reason is so that I can share this struggle with you. And to keep me continually searching for truth and answers so that in the process, I can come to know and love God more than the things of this world.

Is it receive and believe, or believe and receive?

Okay, so one of the fundamental things that I have struggled with since I was eight years old and first heard about God and Jesus, was the whole "receiving and believing" thing.  Everyone who knows anything about Christianity knows that at it's core is believing in the existence and resurrection of Jesus.

To become a Christian, all one has to do is pray to Jesus and say "I believe in you and I receive you".

I cannot tell you how many times I've prayed those words over the years and yet there are times when I still wonder if I've done it right. When I was little, I was told that praying those words only means something if you really accepted Jesus in your heart. But what does that mean, exactly? The issue that I have is this: wanting to believe that something is true isn't the same as believing it.

I have no problem believing there is a God. But how does one go from believing in a God, to believing that same God came to earth in the form of a person named Jesus, who was then murdered, but came back from the dead so that our souls could live forever? Why doesn't this belief or knowledge automatically translate for me like it seems to do for others?

If it hasn't become abundantly clear, one of my struggles as a Christian is faith. I have feared over the years that I was one of an unfortunate few whose heart God had hardened. Romans 9:21 discusses how a potter has the right to decide to use some lumps of clay to make a jar for decoration, and another to throw garbage into. What if I was one God had made to "throw garbage into"? Not a pleasant thought. But then Romans 9 goes on to say that even though God has the right to show his anger, He is patient and merciful. Thank goodness for that.

I have asked God why I should have so many doubts. Why couldn't I just believe and have faith?

Romans 10:17 (NLT) says "faith comes from hearing, that is, hearing the Good News about Christ". Ephesians 2:8 words it a little more specifically, "God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can't take credit for this; it is a gift from God". The "it" referred to in this passage, is faith.

It seems pretty clear then that faith is a gift from God. I can't manifest it myself. This makes me feel a little better but it has also meant that I've come to accept that faith is a struggle God has given me, and that I am just going to have to work through it. I take a lot of comfort from Hebrews 12:1-2 (NLT): "...let us run with endurance the race God has set before us. We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith." The perfecter of our faith. This implies that it okay to struggle with faith! This verse has made me realize that I truly am a work in progress - God is still working on me. I'm not a lost cause! He just isn't finished with me yet.

Most recently when I questioned God about my faith, the following words popped very clearly into my head: just keep asking.

Once again it would appear that God is trying hard to teach me the lesson of depending on Him instead of myself.

Testimony

It was my grandmother who first introduced me to Jesus. I was eight years old. She led me through a simple prayer to invite Jesus into my heart. At the time, I had no idea what this meant.

Although my mom would attend church sporadically in later years, my parents were not church-goers. My childhood could be a bit unstable. My father struggled with alcohol and gaps in employment. My mom battled chronic illness and depression her whole life.

It wasn't that my parents didn't love me. They did and I knew that. It was that they weren't always available. At times, I felt very alone.

My grandma starting taking my sister, brother and I to church with her. My grandparents attended a very charismatic Pentecostal church. The congregation was small and older. It was the kind of church where a lot of people shouted out during the sermons. Very legalistic, very fire and brimstone; a lot of passionate loudly preached sermons. In short, it scared the crap out of me.

I was told that if I didn't believe in Jesus with my whole heart, I would go to hell. I became so fearful that I didn't believe enough. I continue to struggle with this today.

As soon as my parents determined I was old enough to say so, I stopped attending church.

I had a very idealized version of what a family should be in my head and it wasn't what I had at home. So I started looking elsewhere. I found a nice picture of it through a friend of mine. She was mormon and had 8 brothers and sisters. They ate their meals together, they practiced things like family games night and family meetings. I was smitten and started spending more and more time with them.

It wasn't long before they started inviting me to their young women's group and church on Sunday's. Since I was attending for social reasons, this did little for the fearful, confused idea of God I had in my head. Nevertheless, I am convinced that my friendship with this girl and her family kept me out of trouble. Highschool was an incredibly lonely time. I could have gone in any direction.

One day I was completing an exercise for the young women's class that involved looking up passages in the book of Mormon. As much as I loved the friends I had, as I was doing the exercise I realized that I had no connection to what I was reading. More than that, I didn't believe what I was reading. So I stopped attending.

Shortly after that I went to University and became a student of science. Whatever poorly conceived notions of God and Jesus I had in my head became even more muddled. Out of the fear I picked up attending my grandma's church, I had continued to pray to God every night before I went to sleep. But that was the extent of my relationship. And that was where I was at when I met the man who would later become my husband.

The two of us moved to northern Alberta for the job opportunities and I started working shift work in a chemical lab. I became instant friends with a very lively, outgoing co-worker. Night-shifts could be long, and we started having conversations about God and church. She ended up inviting me to her Baptist church. I went, and enjoyed it! Instead of being yelled at for over an hour, we primarily sang  songs! It was there that I met her mom, who happened to run a women's small group. My own mom and sister were very sick at this point, and I found myself really struggling so when I was invited to attend the small group I went.

I found myself interested and excited about what I was learning. And sharing my troubles with other women who had their own battles, was immensely therapeutic.  But I didn't know what it meant for my boyfriend who was not a Christian, so I broke things off.

That was a really difficult time. He couldn't understand why we couldn't be together when we loved each other and shared the same goals. Truthfully, I didn't really understand either. But I had picked up the notion that if I wanted to be a true Christian, I couldn't marry a non-Christian.

A couple of months later, his parents invited me over to celebrate a birthday and as we were sitting outside I felt myself struggling with the feelings I had not only for my ex-boyfriend, but also for his family. In my head, I suddenly heard the words, "Lucy - here is the family I have for you". I'm not kidding. As the girl who had longed to feel some family ties, I didn't need to think twice about getting back together with my boyfriend. As for the Christian-non-Christian thing, I figured that would work out some way or another. We got married shortly after.

We then found ourselves transferred to Southern Alberta for work and not long after we moved down, we got pregnant with our daughter. We didn't know a lot of people, and we certainly didn't know anyone else having babies. I was terrified. The same friend who invited me to church with her, had moved to the same city the year before and once again invited me to her church. My husband and I both liked this church!

When I was six months pregnant, we were sitting in the congregation and a couple roughly our age sat down next to us. The woman looked to be about as pregnant as I was. This led to a conversation. Turned out they led a couple's small group. My husband and I started going.

I can't tell you how much this saved me. I was ridiculously insecure about becoming a parent and felt totally alone in it. And now here was this girl who was going through the same thing. Not only that, but she knew what it was like to have a critically ill mother. In fact, on the day of her mother's funeral, my mother passed away.

This event could have devastated me. It devastated my dad and my sister. Three years later, and they are still not coping well. Instead, I felt myself surrounded my an incredible amount of sympathy and support. The peace that exceeds understanding talked about in Philippians 4:7? I experienced that peace after my mother died.

Not long after that we became pregnant with our son and my husband lost his job. For perhaps only the second time in my life, I trusted God to work out the details. We needed to sell our house and fast! In a flooded housing market our house sold in 36 hours. One day later my son was born. Two weeks after that we found ourselves relocated back to northern Alberta (just not quite as far north as last time). A couple of years later and we have settled into a new life, a new church and recently new small groups.

My husband and I still have a lot of growing to do in our relationship with God. "Not worrying", is not a concept associated with me. I still struggle with deep insecurities.  Trusting God is something I have to work on every day. But if my story has taught me anything, it's that God doesn't leave us alone. You can interpret this story any number of ways, but they way I see it is that God could have let me walk away. Instead he used people to draw me back. Again and again. God knows that I am vulnerable to loneliness and feelings of despair. Circumstances that could easily leave me feeling alone and defeated, instead were buffeted by the right people at the right time.

You will have ins and outs with your relationship with God. But God never leaves you.

Philippians 4:6-7

Don't worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. Then you will experience God's peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.