My eyes can't believe the heartbreaking pictures I'm seeing of the apartment collapse in Surfside, Florida. The 'after' pictures of devastation - pancaked floors and mountains of rubble – are impossible to reconcile with the 'before' pictures of the beachfront condo. The twisted rebar and dangling sheetrock strips away all illusions of safety in things made by man.
It's not the first time our illusions have come crashing down and it won't be the last. Yet, we continue to see things as we want them to be, rather than how they really are. And each time, we are left flailing and grasping for air.
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I'm in the middle of the book of Job. (God's timing, huh? 😬) I usually speedread through this particular book. I mean, who wants to read about a guy covered in sores who is trying to convince his friends that he's innocent after everything but his nagging wife has been taken away? But I'll be danged if the Spirit didn't decide to flat out wreck me with these scriptures, showing me how delusional our illusions have become.
We typically view the story of Job as a complex lesson in suffering, which isn't entirely wrong... suffering is indeed complex. We are escorted into a world of suffering the second we leave the womb. Suffering is inevitable, no one escapes. But in God's plans, suffering is a means to an end. The overt lesson of Job is not about suffering... it's about SOVEREIGNTY.
I get it. I understand why Job and his helpful friends spent days questioning God's purpose. I might even know *ahem* someone who has indignantly demanded answers from Heaven for perceived injustices. That same *ahem* person may also be guilty of arrogantly offering suggestions for running the universe to The Very One Who Put The Stars In Place.
In our humanity, we cry out for a rational understanding of an Omnipotent God. It's hard to reconcile the Creator of hummingbirds with the same God who allows incomprehensible suffering to innocent people. But He is the same. We are told so in the very first chapter of Job. Not one thing happens on this planet that God has not allowed. We serve a sovereign God.
It is in our suffering that we are most likely to forget His Sovereignty. In our brokenness and despair, we need to be reminded that His ways are not our ways... His thoughts are not our thoughts (Isaiah 55:8).
All we can know is what He wants us to know.
Read that again. It's a difficult concept to those searching for eternal meaning in a broken and finite world.
We would rather trust in the things we can see. Things like 12-story buildings. Politicians. A 24-Hour News Cycle.
God couldn't be trying harder to show us how far from Heaven our trust is misplaced. In fact, His Word tells us that we can only be certain of things we DON'T SEE (Hebrews 11:1). It is our faith that makes the unseen things real. And sometimes, when it looks as though things are falling apart... that same faith ensures that everything will eventually fall together.
And though my human knowledge and reasoning are pitifully inadequate, this I know for sure... that “the same Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead is living me” (Romans 8:11). That same Spirit convicts me to trust beyond human reasoning that all things WILL work together for GOOD, because I love Him. (Romans 8:28)
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We may never understand why bad things happen to good people, at least not on this side of heaven. But we can be certain that God will meet those good people in the midst of their suffering, just as He did with Job.
Maybe we're asking the wrong question in the first place. When bad things happen, instead of asking “Why?” perhaps our first question should be, “How?”
How will God use our brokenness for His glory?
