Regular readers will be dismayed to learn that one of our most faithful and valued combox posters, Rebeccat, is having a very rough go of it at the moment, her husband having lost his job. From her blog:
Although our situation is terrible and could potentially get much worse, I’ve handled situations just as bad or worse without diving into the sort of despair and bitterness which I have been struggling with for the last few weeks. I have found myself questioning the very existence of God as well as His faithfulness and His good heart. Which, given all that He has seen me through before and my well established relationship with Him is ridiculous. I think that part of what has thrown me so off balance this time is precisely that I’ve been down this road so many times before, I’ve shown my faithfulness, I’ve trusted in God in the middle of an evil place. So why am I finding myself back on this road again? Haven’t I already gone over this ground and been found faithful? There’s really nothing to be gained by going back over all of this again - can’t we move on now?
Scoot on over to her blog and see if you can help with your prayers or maybe even with something else.
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I have had little affinity with Rebeccat on this blog but I will keep her and her family in her prays. I give her my condolences regarding her situation and I will also give her something else.
I think that part of what has thrown me so off balance this time is precisely that I’ve been down this road so many times before, I’ve shown my faithfulness, I’ve trusted in God in the middle of an evil place. So why am I finding myself back on this road again? Haven’t I already gone over this ground and been found faithful? There’s really nothing to be gained by going back over all of this again - can’t we move on now?
In the years during which I struggled, and my family struggled along with me, to find secure employment as a teacher, trusting in God in the face of trials and disappointments became almost routine. And then, two years ago, when what we thought was our last chance for security collapsed on us, these exact thoughts haunted us both. I poured out my heart and soul, and eventually our endurance was rewarded, but man: those were some of hardest, darkest moments of my life. Truly, sometimes the path God has laid out of us is obscure.
Rebbecat has our prayers, not just that God will, in His time, give them the comfort (and sustenance!) they need, but that she and her loved ones will be strong until that day.
Too often we forget that God isn't doing the bad stuff to us. The Devil is. If God always protected us from the bad things that went on, we'd "serve" Him simply out of selfish wants.
On the other hand, we're promised that we will not suffer more than we can endure, and that God will provide a means of escape. And it isn't necessarily a means of escaping the situation, but a means of escaping our mindset about what's going on.
I sat and cried in federal district court one day. It was the day of our bankruptcy hearing. I lost my home, my credit, my security, and my mother, all in one day. She died that morning, unexpectedly. We found her at her home on our way to court. I had lost my father a decade before, also unexpectedly. I was betrayed by family, who had turned our kindness against us by defaulting on their mortgage - signed by us, and then within a month, finding myself and my wife BOTH out of work by Christmas.
For me, the "escape" was that the sun rose and set, and time marched on, forcing me to move on with life. And, the experience left me far less fearful of failure, allowing both my wife and I to take some prudent risk (we never did before) and that gave us a lot of both financial and personal success.
No, that experience was not good. It did not bring happiness to us. But God used that dark hour of my life to demonstrate that He was weeping right alongside me. My wife and I became 'churched' again and took our children with us. We became active in leadership. Years later, I realized that even though I had lived on my own for a long time, I had never let go of my parents as a form of security. I was forced to let go of that, and in return, I turned to Him as security.
Even though horrible happens in this world due to sin, God will still work in our lives and make good things happen, no matter what. When the horrors of life and the struggles of trying to get past those things that are out of our control seem to overwhelm us, God then tries to teach us that it is not He who did this to us, but that He is then the only means of putting peace in our hearts in the middle of the storm of wrongness going on around us and in our lives.
It wasn't until that point in my life that I actually understood that what I needed most was not to be bankrupt and homeless, but to have calm while it was happening. I could not possibly have known what the future was to bring. That wasn't the point. The point was that I needed to stop being focused on the bad things, and start looking forward, to not let the storm around me disturb me.
I have not fully learned that lesson, to be sure, but I have been amazed at how much I have changed, in my response to what was to be certain disaster. There have been disasters since then, and now instead of staring at the dark abyss, I tend to look up and ask "Tell me where to look", instead.
Anonymous poster,
C'mon - out of decency and respect for Rebeccat, I don't think this is the thread for snark, even if it is not directed at Rebecca. I certainly wouldn't appreciate my personal hell being used to score points against Rod.
Rebecca, my prayers and hope your family and friends and God (who is sometimes found in unexpected places) will reach out to you and your husband and sustain you in this trial.
I pray that God blesses you, Rebeccat. Just try to remember, God loves you no matter how hard things are---you don't need to take the measure of your luck as being a measure of His care; His care is always the same, that is, infinite.
God bless!
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