My brother, my sister, stop looking for cause and effects when it comes to your walk with Jesus. Most of the time, children never get tired of asking ‘why?’ However, when an adult asks ‘why?’, this question often produces a bitter taste because children’s ‘why’ is only out of curioustity or the desire to know about everything while adults wonder about suffering. When evertyhting is going well in our lives, we rarely ask ‘why?’. But once things don’t work as planned, we start noticing that the world runs by a system of cause and effect. However, there are some effects for which we cannot find a clear cause, and some causes that don’t lead to the expected effects.
My friend, when we look at the tfirst wo chapters of the book of Job for example, he had enough wealth and a family to have a very happy life, and for a while, he certainly had a happy life. Then he experienced a loss and pain that can be shocking and unbearable to us. To those of us who are so quick to ask ‘why?’ at the smallest misfortune, Job’s faithfulness seems incredible or hard to understand because we live in an age of ‘instant’ everything that has caused us to lose the ability to wait. We expect to learn patience instantly; we think we can become spiritually mature as quick as we can read a whole chapter of the Bible… sadly, in our hurry, we mostly miss the main part of our walk with Christ. Worse, at the top of our list, relief from pain or suffering is all we want, an instant cure for every unwanted situation.
Let’s learn today that there is not necessairily a cause and effect linked to everything we are going through.Yet, we tend to suffer consequences for our bad decisions and actions. If God does not always give us answers, at least we should humble ourselves to learn like Job that no matter what is happening, we must trust God, even in spite of unanswered questions. It is the best solution, the best remedy, the best outcome, for it is better to know God than to know answers anyway. Knowing an answer to your ‘why?’ will not necessairly give you peace. However getting closer to Jesus will give you peace and the joy that comes with salvation. When you read the story of Job to the end that is what we actually learn: God never gave Job an answer to what he was going through but lead Job to understand that He (God) only wanted Job to know Him: the God who never abandons those He love, the God who can restore those He loves for “The Lord is full of compassion and mercy” (James 5:11). Stay blessed in Jesus’ name.