How many aged, teary eyed souls have I peered into with heavy questions of why? Why do bad things happen to good people? Why did my wife of almost 50 years die on the operating table? Why am I stricken with cancer eating rapidly away at my body? Then there are the silent whys. The heavy laden looks that seem to engulf their whole being. A cloud of heaviness feels the space between and you just know that soul has seen great sorrow. The anguish of the unanswered whys and sleepless nights leave you bereft of life.
How do you respond? How do I respond? In those immediate moments there often seems to be no words or explanations to comfort the weary soul. But in that despair I call to mind there is a kind of doubt that goes to God and there is a kind of doubt that goes away from God. Oh how easier the latter is, but how my heart desperately needs the former.
Is God still God? Yes! Yes He is and His ways are good, acceptable, and perfect (Rom 12:2). His love and comfort is overflowing and the only rest that satisfies a broken soul (Matt 11:28-29, 2 Cor 1:3-4). In my anguish and piled up questions of whys I must tether my heart to this truth (John 17:17). God is still God and there is purpose in the sorrow (Rom 8:18, Rev 21:4).
How do I know this? Because His Word says there is? Do I always see it in my current view? No! But God calls me to walk by faith not by sight. I don’t need to know the whys as much as I know the Who. Psalm 34:18 says “The LORD is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.”
My heart grieves with and prays for you. Prays for the ones filled with dark clouds. Clouds of the loss of a loved one, the longing of a spouse and children, the hope for healing, the wish for a place of shelter, the yearning for freedom from sin that is so crippling, and the desire to be known and loved.
Bring it to Him friend. Bring those whys and all the heaviness that comes with it to God. It is not for you to carry.
2 Corinthians 4
The Light of the Gospel
1 Therefore, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart.
2 But we have renounced disgraceful, underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God's word, but by the open statement of the truth we would commend ourselves to everyone's conscience in the sight of God.
3 And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing.
4 In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.
5 For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake.
6 For God, who said, "Let light shine out of darkness," has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
Treasure in Jars of Clay
7 But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.
8 We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair;
9 persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed;
10 always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies.
11 For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh.
12 So death is at work in us, but life in you.
13 Since we have the same spirit of faith according to what has been written, "I believed, and so I spoke," we also believe, and so we also speak,
14 knowing that he who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and bring us with you into his presence.
15 For it is all for your sake, so that as grace extends to more and more people it may increase thanksgiving, to the glory of God.
16 So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.
17 For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison,
18 as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.
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