Have you wondered where God was in the middle of a painful situation? Or asked yourself why a good and loving God would allow so much hurt in the world? I’ve wrestled with those same questions!
As a teenager, I’d get mad at God after a breakup. As a young professional, I’d be frustrated when I got passed up for a promotion. My heart was broken as my wife miscarried twice when we were in our early thirties. In my late forties I lost my house, with five kids at home.
If you haven’t been living under a rock, you’d know the whole world is in pain.
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God Created Us Because He Loves Us
I’m a parent. I’m a parent of five adult children, two son-in-laws, a daughter-in-law and my first grandchild is coming soon. I had never experienced so much love than the moment our first daughter came into the world. She came from the love of her mom and I.
On a much bigger scale, our God is a good Father. He made us because He wanted to love us (John 3:16-17, John 15:9-17)!
As the father of my kids, I know part of growing up is making a few bad decisions and getting hurt. I’ve seen them get hurt by the words and actions of other people. When my daughters were young, I wished I could lock them in the house where they were safe and under my full protection.
But that isn’t love, that’s imprisonment. Love is the best intentions with an allowance for those we love to choose to be loved back.
It’s hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that God doesn’t sin or lie, He is perfect, good, and faithful. The Apostle Paul writes in Hebrews that “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” (Hebrews 13:8)
Believe it or not, God is not just ‘the big man playing chess with our lives.’ He doesn’t enjoy it when we encounter difficulties! God knows we are going to hurt. All of us will experience sickness, problems and eventually, we will die (oh, that was harsh. Take a deep breath - the good news is coming).
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So, where is God when I’m hurting?
When You’re Hurting, God is with You
The simple answer is, He is there with you. Sounds nice, but really?
Here is the mind blowing truth: God wants to go through our problems with us!
He wants to reform our character and make us more like Him (please read all of Philippians 2). He wants us to be less self-centered and to love others better.
I’m not sure about you, but when I’m going through something tough, I really start talking to God and looking for Him in the situation. Although He doesn’t cause difficulties, He does use the difficulties in our life to make us fit for heaven.
When You’re Hurting, God is still working for Good
God is always working for good. The Bible confirms this by telling us that God will always work all things together for good for those who love Him and are called according to His plan (Romans 8:28) and we are all called to a divine plan.
We might never understand the purposes for everything that happens to us. But, we can trust that our loving Father knows what's best for us and will make it all good in the end.
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When You’re Hurting, Think about Heaven
It's all about eternity in heaven. We will be there much longer than we are here! This is just the beginning of a wonderful relationship with adventures and awesome experiences. We can never even imagine how great our future is.
Trust God! Lean into Him by reading your Bible, praying throughout the day, and joining a community of Christians to help get through hard times. And then, help others make it through difficult situations.
God is always there for us and will walk with us through anything.
