The month of May is always an interesting month for my family. If you know me or my family you'll know that on May 18th, 2008 my sister Chris died in a car accident. It seems that whenever may comes around I end up sharing that story with a lot of people. But the part I never share with people is the lie that I began to believe. You see the year before that my cousin died on Christmas eve, and the year after my sister died my Grandmother died. As the years went on I would enter relationships with girls and then break up with them or never quite break things off until there was this pseudo-relationship that caused more harm than a clean break.
Needless to say, throughout the next couple of years I began to believe a lie that "If I cared about someone, I would eventually lose them." Now to some extent that's true because if you haven't noticed the human death rate is 100%. I know there's a couple Christians who are saying, "Well what about Jesus," and to you I would rebuttal, "Shut up." Unfortunately I began to really cling on to this lie and throughout countless relationships, and friendships I began to just constantly worry and be consumed with fear.
Now I'd love to say, "and that's when it all changed..." The truth is, I still struggle with that concept. While I haven't fully overcome that fear, I will say that Christ has been teaching me to trust in his unfailing love. A friend of mine showed me Psalm 84:11 which says, "For the Lord God is sun and shield; The Lord bestows favor and honor, no good thing does he withhold to those who walk uprightly." (ESV) When I read this it struck me that if something isn't good he will withhold it. This is sticky because of course we know that tragedies happen all the time. Does that mean you are evil, or you did something bad? No not necessarily, it means that we live in a thing called LIFE. God allows bad things to happen because of the effects of the fallen world we live in. I don't want to get to deep into that because that is a blog in itself. But for now I hope that answer can suffice. What I will say is that God is not going to give you something that is harmful to you or will cause you misery and grief. We can read Matthew 7:11, "If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask."
I could blog for hours about this but I want to summarize and bring a little order to what I'm saying.
Whatever you are going through, no matter what this summer brings, no matter how much you fear or worry, you have to know that God loves you so much! Think about the situation you face and ask yourself, "If God loves me and wants to bless me and take care of me, then what am I worried about?" Keep loving Jesus, keep your eyes on him. No matter what you face, when we take ahold of the concept that God has good in store for us it really changes the situation. In the end, you can't lose. God will work even the worst of situations out for your good and for his glory!
Romans 8:28, "And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose."
Father of bread, giver of wine,
wet my worried heart with the appetite of heaven,
satisfy my soul, with the banquets of celestial joy.
Origin of life, lover of peace,
Turn my eyes upon you,
And bath me in the confidence of your faithfulness.
Friend of sinner, hope in horror,
let not my soul be troubled and grieved,
For you keep not good from me.
-The Albatross
