By Evangelist John BJ Hall
The age old question is, “Why do bad things happen to good people?” Jewish Rabbi Harold S. Kushner wrote a book with the title of “When Bad Things Happen to Good People.” The problem is that when we ask that question it is usually used as an accusation against God. “Well if God is so good …” “Would a good God allow … to happen?”
Throughout my life and ministry I have experienced many bad things. I have had great losses and disappointments. I’ve seen babies die in the arms of inconsolable mothers and fathers I have lost precious grandparents, and parents. I saw own my son at deaths door, when the nurses could be heard whispering in the all that he was dying. Only to see the gracious hand of God give him back to us in an instant. I watched my father, a servant of the Most High God, lay in the hospital bed suffering just before he slipped away from us to walk on Heaven’s shore. My mother-in-law, a good woman and great grandmother, suffered so much before she passed away. Dialysis, diabetes, and a broken leg ended her life.
Hebrews 5:8 (NASB) Says of our Lord, “Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered.” There has never been one so good as the perfect and Holy Son of God. Yet through His suffering He learned, firsthand, compassion for our suffering.
Many years ago I worked for the nations then fastest growing chain of discount retail stores. I was only 20 years old and bi-vocational pastor of a small church in northeastern Oklahoma. One day one of my fellow workers came and asked me to meet her in the employee lounge during my break. We sat at the table as she wept. Her son had died the previous Sunday night in a fiery car crash. She asked, “Where was God when my son died at only 19 years of age?”
All I knew to say at the time was, “He was the same place He was when His Only Son died on the cross.” We sat and talked and cried together for about 15 minutes. Somehow that encounter blessed her, because she came to me about a month later and said it was a real blessing.
Jesus suffered in all ways as we suffer. One of the early church martyrs said, “I can bear it all, for Jesus suffered, and He suffers in me now; He sympathizes with me, and this makes me strong." Remember brother and sister that Jesus strengthens you as you follow His steps.
Several years ago I heard a Christian song that said something like this, “I can go through the valley because I know He is waiting for me on the other side.” That is wrong. The truth is, I can go through the valley because He takes each step with me.
I’ve Walked the Valley
I’ve walked the Valley many times.
I’ve questioned everything I knew.
I’ve asked the Lord to give me signs
To show His way is really true.
I need to know He takes each step.
He’s not just one who’s gone before.
That He is there to give me help
Until I reach the other shore.
I’ve learned as through the vale I go
This One who has gone before me
Is walking near my way to show.
For His light of hope I can see.
Now on God’s Son I can depend
He’ll always meet my every need.
He said His Spirit He would send
My hungry soul that He would feed.
Each day I live, He gives a touch
To bring assurance in my soul.
Fears from my mind to daily brush
So I can know I’ve been made whole.
© Copyright 2001 by Passages Ministries. All rights reserved.
For permission to use this poem contact Passages Ministries.