Where do you go when your world doesn’t make sense?
Lately my world doesn’t make any sense. After surviving 2014 (see post on the Unexpected) I could not imagine another “unexpected” crashing into my family like a train on January 24th. My sweet precious 10-year-old niece was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL).
Cancer does not make sense. Childhood cancer really doesn’t make sense. I don’t get it. I don’t get why it happens and why there is no 100% cure. I don’t get the despair that tries to settle over your heart at night and wakes you up in the morning with vice-like grip of worry.
Is your world making any sense right now? What is your “unexpected”? I know each one of us have season of life when life does not want to cooperate – unexpected doctor reports, mid-life crisis, failed friendships, family pressures, emotional issues… where do you go to help make sense of it all?
My world really doesn’t make any sense right now.
Thankfully, I do know where to go…
I go to my Promise.
There is an old revival song that talks about “the Promise” walking down the dusty rode. The song is taken from Luke 8:40-56, the story of a father, Jairus, who begs Jesus to come heal his 12 year old daughter.
In Jesus style, he heals others on his way to Jairus’ home.
In Jesus style, he dismisses everyone from the home who didn’t believe.
In Jesus style, he speaks to sickness and disease to be gone.
In Jesus style, the girl wakes up, healed and restored.
Jesus style is power.
Jesus style is for the “unexpected” times in life.
My mind can’t help but to imagine what the mother went through. Did she stand outside waiting for her husband’s return? Did her heart skip a beat when she saw Jesus walking down a dusty road to her home? The Promise was coming. The Promise would heal her girl.
I go to my community.
I have no idea how people go through life without community. For years my husband and I have hosted small groups in our home. We have connected with so many people over the years and had the privilege of walking through life together – pregnancies, marriages, bad doctor reports, failed jobs, new jobs, you name it – we have probably prayed for it. When Stephen and I found ourselves as recipients of needing help, it allowed us to see community through a whole new lens. It was beautiful. It was meaningful. It was the meshing together of lifelong friendships. It was faith in action.
I pray you have faith in the one who is “the Promise” and your own community. So when your world doesn’t make sense, this is the first place you turn to for comfort, direction, wisdom and help.
Peace and grace,
Reflection:
Luke 8:50 But Jesus, on hearing this, answered him, Do not be seized with alarm or struck with fear; simply believe [in Me as able to do this], and she shall be made well. (Living)
Ecclesiastes 9:11-12 – I have seen something else under the sun: The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned; but time and chance happen to them all. 12 Moreover, no one knows when their hour will come: As fish are caught in a cruel net, or birds are taken in a snare, so people are trapped by evil times that fall unexpectedly upon them. (NIV)