Where was God when…?
“Where was God when…?”
There are a thousand heart-breaking ways to finish that question.
“Where was God when he died?” “Where was God when she left me?” “Where was God when the cancer came back?” “Where was God when I lost everything?”
No matter how someone finishes that sentence, it all comes from the same place. A place of loss. A loss that hurts so bad that we can’t see or feel much of anything or anyone else.
A loss that hits us so hard that it blocks out everything else. And leaves us feeling like it will always be this way.
It’s inescapable. Losses that hit us that hard happen to all of us.
Which is not to downplay how much it hurts. But only to say that you and I have this in common with everyone. No matter who we are, no matter who they are.
Because it is universal, you would think that we’d be better at handling it. But we’re not.
One of the things that we do that makes it harder than it has to be?
“Either-or” thinking about the things that hurt us the most.
We never say this out loud (because if we did, we would realize how ridiculous it sounds). But on an unspoken level, we act as if the fact that something really bad happens, it somehow wipes out all the good.
That if something hurts bad enough to make us cry out from the heart, “Where was God when…,” then things will never be good again. That no one loves us. That God has abandoned us (if He was even there to begin with).
When I was growing up, I looked up to my grandfather. He was my hero. He died after a year-long battle with cancer, when I was 10.
I kept it together during the visitation and the funeral. And even the lunch afterwards. But later, after everyone left, I fell apart. I remember crying and crying. Like I was never going to stop.
My mom just held me close the whole time. Half the time, I didn’t even know she was there. But that didn’t stop her from holding me close.
I thought about that as I said goodbye to my mom last week. At her funeral on Skye.
Without saying a word, she showed me how it really works.
It’s not an “either-or.” It’s not heartbreak or love.
It’s a “both-and.” It’s heartbreak and love.
“Where is God when…?”
Right here. Holding you close the whole time.
Even when you can’t feel a thing. Even when you don’t know He’s there. That won’t stop God from holding you close.
Today’s Readings
