Why God, why?

I received a private message today from a stranger, a woman who saw my pro-life work. She shared a horribly sad story of her life, and asked me, "For you who believe so strongly in life, can you tell me WHY?"

I hadn't known for sure what to blog about today, but my answer to her was the best I felt I could do with such a difficult question. (Particularly since this morning I go out to the sidewalks of the abortion mill to plead for life over abortion.) Feel free to comment, in case she reads this blog, with other words of comfort and understanding. Join me in prayer for her and her devastating circumstances. I pasted my response below:

First, my heart breaks for you and the terrible struggles you and your family has endured. I am moved to tears, and if I were God, I would remove all pain from the world. Your question is the one that keeps so many people (including me for years and years) from believing in God, or trusting that He is good. Believe me, I do not have all the answers, or maybe even any. But here is what I do believe. Life is precious. Whether it is for a short time or a long time, whether in struggle or in ease, the intrinsic value of life doesn't change. God is the creator of Life, and of all His creation, humankind alone is made in His image. Humans hold a special place in His creation, and have a sacred value above all other life. The Creator alone has the right to take back what He has given

I also believe that the life he has given us is spent but a brief time on earth. Our ultimate home is with Him, and we were created to spend all eternity with Him. However, if our only choice was to be with Him, we would be little more than robots.

Yet incredible as it seems, He created us for fellowship with Him. Thus He had to allow us the possibility to leave, and reject Him or we would not really be making a choice for Him. Sin thus entered the world when we exercised our right to reject God.

Now pain is similar, in my estimation. If all we ever received from God's hand was blessing, no matter what we did or believed, God is no longer loved for being the Creator, but instead used as the Cosmic Santa Claus. Our love would be contingent on what goodies we receive at His hand.

I don't think that is what He wanted of us either. He wanted us to trust Him through good and bad, and not because of what He gives us, but because of who He is, the Creator.

It is so easy to trust when all is well. It is a true test of trust when all is terribly wrong.

If we are able to keep an eternal perspective, keep our eyes on Jesus even when our life is crumbling around us, we have chosen not to love God for all He has given, but for all that He is: the one who formed the universe and all that is in it. I believe we suffer on earth to remind us earth is not our home.

We would not long for heaven or eternity, if everything was perfect here on earth without God.

When everything else is stripped away, we have a choice. Be bitter and abandon any hope that God is good or that God exists....OR...rejoice in what beauty and joy and good memories and thoughts we can find (and they are always there, though often buried beneath the pain) and cling to God all the more tightly.

I choose to cling to God

And I applaud you for overcoming your compelling reasons to abort, and to choose life instead. The pain of watching your children suffer is nothing like the pain of knowing you killed them by your own hand. The womb where God placed the child should be the safest place on earth, but it is one of the most dangerous now for the unborn.

 

May God comfort you in the midst of the pain with the assurance of His eternal presence. I do believe that He will not abandon you if you do not abandon Him. God is not immune, nor a stranger to suffering. He sent His own Son to be crucified, to die the most horrific death possible to take on Himself the penalty for sin that we deserved. That is how I know God loves me, even when it doesn't feel like it.

1 Peter 4:12-19

Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ's sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. But let none of you suffer as a murderer or a thief or an evildoer or as a meddler. Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name. ...

Revelation 21:4 

He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

John 16:33 

I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”