Today would be my little sister's 43 birthday, except that she is forever frozen in time at the age of 18 and a half. Do you think that people are ageless in Heaven? What would that look like, exactly? Do you think everyone looks about 25 in Heaven? Or are they eternally preserved as they appeared at the moment of death? That would seem inconvenient to an infant, or disappointing for someone in their 90's...or their 40's for that matter.
My sister died in a car wreck on November 9, 1991. She's now been in Heaven longer than she was on earth.
I'm feeling pensive this afternoon, though it's not so much due to the date of my sister's birth or the consequence of her death. I've been thinking of other unanswerable questions. Mostly, I'm feeling just a bit frustrated with the unfairness of life.
Why is there drug abuse? Why are violent predators allowed to draw breath? Why are beautiful infants given to profoundly negligent parents? Why are some people discarded while others are pampered? Why is it that God allows some people to endure such unimaginable circumstances?
I have a young friend whose life has been one instance of abuse followed fast by another. The neglect and evil foisted upon her has continued from the cradle unabated. I have been loved and treasured my whole life, while this lady has never known such security.
I feel so powerless in the face of these problems. It baffles me to consider that the God of Infinite Power has seemingly done so little to put all these wrongs to right. Has He no magic wand with which to transform the world?!
Transformation is precisely what He offers, yet so few avail themselves of it. Transformation, Forgiveness, Healing, Abundant Life. The galling part, at least to me, is that He makes these wonders available to the Abuser as well as to the Victim. The Rapists, Murderers, and Drug dealers are offered the very same Love and Newness of life as are the children, the discarded, the forgotten. This seems every bit as unfair to me as is the sin committed by the monsters...Until I consider my own unbalanced sense of Justice.
I see the consequences of sin in the lives of those I love. I want to punish those who have made them to suffer so. I want to hate.
God extends the offer of Jesus to each and every one. It is terribly unfair. The convoluted part is my belief that I deserve blessing while They deserve judgement. The truth is that I deserve Judgement and they deserve judgement. Jesus stepped up and took mine for me. That's the only reason I am not going to burn in Hell as I deserve.
See, God sees this wicked horror that mankind perpetrates upon one another. He hates it. But He loves these people like I love my own children (felons though they be!) He wants them all to be restored, even the really really bad ones.
I think I don't understand a God that can be so cruel as to allow abuse to continue. Then I realize that it isn't the cruelty I can't understand (that really comes very easily to me). What I can't understand is the Love. I can't understand a God who loves an abuser so much that He would make forgiveness so freely available.
I can't understand.
I guess I don't really have to understand it. It is so, whether I understand it or no. I, too, am the recipient of His Unfair, enormous Love. I'm really glad of that, after all.
My heart should still break for the mistreatment of people, I think. There is so much evil in this world.
And, I guess I should rejoice that God is God and I am not. I'd be blasting people willy-nilly with my magic wand.
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