June 6: Of the Struggle, Between Despair and Hope

1 Kings 1:1-53

Act 4:1-37

Psalm 124:1-8

Proverbs 16:24

   "Indeed Herod and Pontius Pilate met together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, Whom You anointed.  They did what Your power and will had decided beforehand should happen." - Acts 4:27-28

They laid George Floyd to rest today.  I don't know them, but can only assume his family must still be in the agonizing pain of cruel, unexpected, criminal loss.  Most people will know who George is; fewer will know David Patrick Underwood, a federal law enforcement officer who was shot during the protests in Oakland.  His family is getting to know the pain of loss four days after Mr Floyd's.  Who else?  There's Calvin Horton, killed by a shop owner whose store Mr Horton was reportedly trying to loot, and Barry Perkins, a protester run over by a Fedex truck whose driver was fleeing looters.  The list is long.  

I imagine the families of the deceased will, at some point, ask why.  Why, as the verse put it, the fates conspired against their loved one.  They might read the passage above, and might come to one of three interpretations.

The first, a contradiction of the passage, that God was absent.  He wasn't around, which is why this happened.  That, as Martha said in John 11:21, "if you had been here, my brother would not have died."  I don't think that's what the passage says.   And that leads to despair, at the senselessness of it all.

The second, an interpretation of the passage, that God was present - and He was responsible.  That God caused their loved one's death, and caused all the pain that came with it.  I don't think that's what the passage says, either.  And that too leads to despair, at the purposeful cruelty of it all.  

The third, an interpretation of the passage, in the context of its subject - the Lord Jesus, and what He went through - that God was present, and as He permitted - FOR HIS PURPOSES -  the agony that came to Jesus, and that led to His triumph over the grave and the atonement for our sins, He too permits - FOR HIS PURPOSES - our loved ones' passing and the tide of pain that follows.  And if His purposes for Jesus's suffering were good, then so too will HIs purposes for us, and for our loved ones who have passed.  This is what I think the passage says.  And it leads to hope, at the loving purpose of it all.  

In the rip tide of pain, it isn't easy to lift one's head above the water and see, much less swim towards this third interpretation.  The temptation to blame, to lash out, to perpetuate a cycle of pain is great.  I pray, not just for Mr. Floyd's family, but for everyone his death has touched with pain of death, injury and loss, that they - that we, all, decide to see these losses through the certainty of a loving God's plan.  It may not take the pain away, but it may make it easier to bear.