Why Me, Lord?

People of all ages, young and old, are moved by the problem of suffering. It was true in Biblical time and is true today. Jesus was a "man of sorrows and well acquainted with grief". It was true of Him, but also in some ways true of each thinking, feeling, loving human being at various points in life.

I remember just a short time back when I had received prayer for my back condition, that afterwards when asked, "do you feel like your back is healed; do you feel better now?" I replied with honesty, "I feel worse, none better, but I still believe God will heal." A lady replied to me, "There must be something in your life that's not right." It hurts to have such judgment brought upon you. I had already questioned God by saying many times, "Why, God, why? Why do bad things happen to good people?" I imagine this is one of the most asked questions and has been even on the lips of Biblical heroes. Gideon exclaiming, "If the Lord is with us, why then has this befallen us?" Elijah saying, "O Lord, my God, have you brought calamity even to the widow with whom I am dwelling by slaying her son?" Habakkuk's questioning Almighty, "Why do you look silently on as faithless, wicked men devour the righteous?" Job, sitting in the ash heap, children killed, wife nagging, prosperity turned into poverty, body covered with boils, crying out, "God, why are you doing this to me?" Jesus on the cross crying out, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"

So you see, when we find ourselves overcome with tragedy and suffering so that the question forms on our lips, we are found in the best of company. It's one thing to be a faithless man or woman and try to understand tragedies of man, but when you're a Christian and have a balance of God who is both all powerful and all loving, we often ask this question, "If God is a loving father, how can He allow terrible things to befall His children."

Many have suffered. Some suffering comes from sin which is a responsible act of the will, by choice, one chooses wrong, knowing it to be wrong. This suffering is due to the fact that every person is a free moral agent.

Some suffering is what we might call ignorance of foolishness or rebellion. Several years ago (about 1968), I remember on prom night in Southern Illinois (Murphysboro), some young graduates were in a pick-up truck drinking alcohol, speeding on a winding road, and "partying". A young man in the back of the truck fell out and was killed instantly. Many of the people of that community attempted to lay the blame for such a needless accident upon God. They said, "It was God's will. I don't know why God did it, but we're not to question God and must accept what God sends."

That's pure baloney, and worse, it is pure blasphemy. It wasn't God's will that that boy go out with a group that illegally bought liquor and then got drunk. It wasn't God's will that the driver of the truck should speed and drive recklessly on a country road that was winding. It was the result of ignorance and rebellion; but it was not the will of God.

I knew a man who was dying of lung cancer. Doctors said no hope. He smoked cigarettes for twenty years (about three packs a day). As he lit up another, he said to me, "I don't know why God is doing this to me. I'm still a young man. I have a wife and kids. I just don't know why God would do this." I wanted to be kind, so I kept my mouth shut; but as I look back, I should have said to him, "Don't blame God when we reap the consequences of our ignorance, foolishness and rebellion." Maybe some of you are going to suffer for these reasons.

Some suffering is due to the laws of nature. Someone falls from a window or a tree and is killed. It's the law of gravity. We grieve, but the reason is clear and yet the laws of nature are necessary, and we could not live without them in operation.

Sin, ignorance, foolishness, rebellion, and the laws of nature account for the majority of the world's sufferings. These could have been avoided if mankind were willing and would chose to live responsibly and by God's precepts.

But the rest of the world's suffering gives us the most problems. It's hard to explain how a little child, healthy and happy comes up with spinal meningitis and dies. A brain tumor strikes down a young mother. The forces of nature are unleashed and thousands are killed by a flood or a lava flow from a volcano. Crops fail and little children die of starvation. These are the hard ones. We may say these are forces set free in the world, a force perhaps of evil that is at war with God, that seeks to destroy what is good and vital and worthwhile. This "evil" is beyond the control of mere mortal men. That's what gives us the most trouble, cancer, famine, pestilence, tornadoes and floods. All of those evils which slay our loved ones, and we can do nothing.

Now, there is one more source of human suffering. It is linked to these others, because of the relationship, by love, in which we are woven together. When a loved one is suffering or perhaps dies, we also suffer due to our love of them which has brought us joy, pleasure, and companionship. The very thing that makes life worth living are also the source of mankind's worst agonies.

We know that until Christ, Himself returns in His Glory, we shall be heir to tragedy and suffering, and that it is even intensified, because we care about and love each other. In such realities, we must ask a more important question, "How can I live victoriously in spite of tragedy that is part of my life?" I believe there are three keys that may be of benefit to us all.

First, realize each of us has the power to choose how suffering will affect us. Will it defeat us or will it make us victorious? As I was on the Mexico trip many, many times, I was asked how are you doing? How do you feel? Are you OK? A constant reminder that I have a problem. I don't know what to do about it, but I intend to live the best I can and do what I can. A man that was dying of cancer stated, "The most important thing that I have learned is that, until I die, I am alive. I can choose how I view these days. I am not dying with cancer; I am living with cancer, and I choose to live these days to their fullest."

Let me remind you of the country lawyer who ran for legislature and was defeated. He went into business and failed. He was left in debt for years because of it. He feel in love with a girl, but before it could blossom, the girl died. Finally, he was elected to Congress, but he could not please the people, so he failed to be re-elected. He tried for a public appointment, and failed. He ran for the U.S. Senate, and lost. He ran for Vice President, and again lost. Finally, he became President only to have half the states to withdraw and cause a civil war. He led his people through those war years and toward a united nation, but was killed by an assassin's bullet which kept him from seeing his hopes and prayers fulfilled. What a tragic life, but if one man in America shows forth the triumph of the human spirit, Abraham Lincoln is that man.

Second, you can be victorious over tragedy if you remember that life is a gift. We need to view life, our own and our loved ones, as gifts. Gifts we never deserved in the first place but was placed in our midst by the "Gifter." Even when they are gone, we can live a life of gratitude rather than resentment. All days come from the same Source!

The third and final key is that you remember, you're not alone. Jesus promised us, "I will never leave you nor forsake you." "lo, I am with you always." Paul reminds us, "Greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world." "Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus."

A story I read one time spoke of a little boy looking at a picture of Jesus and the Cross, and he was very angry at the terrible cruelty. He closed the book and said, "If God had been there, it wouldn't have happened!"

Strange isn't it that God was there at the most terrible act of cruelty ever subjected to anyone. He was there, and because He was there, life was created out of death. From the greatest tragedy comes the greatest blessing.