Why has God abandoned me?
Where is my happy ending?
Why has God abandoned me?
Why has God abandoned me? Where is my happy ending? Most of us have asked those questions at one time or another. After talking about drug addiction last week, and the happy ending that we experienced in that situation, I feel compelled to take a look at the other side. Let me say emphatically that I have not always had happy endings. My mother passed away from cancer at age 51. There were many, many, many prayers that were prayed for her healing by very many people, including her pastor and evangelists with healing ministries, as well as numerous friends and family members. Still, God in His omniscience had a different plan. My many years of praying for the salvation of David’s father, and doing everything I knew to do to be obedient to God’s plan, seemingly made no difference. And sometimes, in spite of your doing everything you can to help someone, it still ends with tragedy. Does this mean that God is not good, or that He somehow forgot about us?
No, not at all. Jesus told us that in this world we will have tribulation. (John 16:33) When the apostle Paul was converted on the road to Damascus, God sent someone to tell him about all the things he would suffer. (Acts 9:16) What??? Who wants to accept that kind of calling? How do we reconcile God’s goodness with all the bad things that happen? That is a question that has been around for ages, and I do not even pretend to have the answer. But I do believe that the Bible gives us insight into why God’s ways can sometimes seem so very foreign and hard to understand. From the moment we are born, we learn to react to the world around us. Don’t touch that, it’s hot. Don’t run out into the street in front of cars. Stay away from dangerous creatures. Be careful when handling sharp objects. Don’t jump off of high places. Don’t get in deep water if you cannot swim. And the list just continues to grow throughout our lives. We are taught how to live in the world in which we exist. But the problem comes in because we are not so thoroughly taught and conditioned to live in God’s world. After all, how can we be? We cannot see it or touch it. We really know very little about it. So when events happen that are orchestrated for God’s eternal kingdom, too many times we are left hurt and confused.
We begin teaching our children as soon as they are born.
But God has told us that this world is not our home. Hebrews 11:13, 16 says, “These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.” It’s too easy for us to forget that we are exiles – resident foreigners here on earth. We have no permanent address here. God is preparing a better place for us. This planet that we have been so acclimated to is only our home for a very short while. We were actually created to live in a completely different environment with completely different priorities. It turns out that all these things that we can see and touch are not even the things that are most important.
As parents, we begin teaching our children as soon as they are born. We talk to them and smile at them. In a few short months we begin encouraging them to walk – holding their hands and picking them up when they fall. Then as the “terrible twos” come upon us, we figure out that these little angels sometimes have to be taught unpleasant lessons. We start implementing loving discipline – not because we hate our children, but because we love them and want them to grow up to be responsible and happy adults. We know that will not happen without our input. When they are extremely young, their very survival itself depends on us. Then as they learn more about responding to this world, we start to teach them different and more complex lessons about being successful in this world that we live in.
Children cannot be birthed and abandoned.
I believe one reason God has required this process is so all, even those who are not parents, can see that children cannot be birthed and abandoned. I believe God has chosen to give us an illustration of how it is for us when we are “birthed” into His kingdom. He begins immediately training us to live in His kingdom for eternity. He is accomplishing things in us, and in those around us, that we cannot begin to understand.
God is a very loving father and we have myriad reassurances of God’s love and care for us. Quite possibly one of the strongest of these is in Romans 5: 7-8: “For one will scarcely die for a righteous person – though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die – but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” God’s willingness to send Jesus from heaven to be tortured and crucified solely to save us from our sins is the supreme act of love. I don’t know about you, but I d0n’t think I could love anyone enough to allow one of my children to be brutally tortured and executed. When you might be tempted to question God’s love and care for you, remember the price he paid for you. God is always working for your eternal benefit no matter how it looks in the middle of the night. God is always good, all the time, but you are being trained for a place completely different to this one. You are being prepared for eternity!
GUARD RAIL: Remember that this world is not your home.
Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.
Hebrews 11:16b (ESV)