WHY?

This is sometimes seen as a taboo question with Christians.  Some are even afraid to ask God this very fundamental query.  They believe they are questioning God’s wisdom.

Maybe in your thoughts you asked:

Why did that happen to me?

But the true question, the one you tried to bury was:

Why (God) did you allow that to happen to me?

I don’t believe “Why?” is a bad question when asked from a place of pain, whether emotional or physical.  Sometimes the pain we experience in life takes us to a point where we can barely breathe and if we are people of faith, we turn to our Father because many times He is all that’s left.

This is the place where He meets us as a loving Father.  This is when we can look up to Him and ask that question.  Because the “why” doesn’t come out of questioning God’s wisdom.  It comes from seeking His answer to whatever is causing us pain.  Most of us have been through very tender moments when we felt isolated and alone.  It is in these moments when we crawl away to lick our wounds that we can hear His voice seeking us out if we listen.  He hears our groans no matter where we are.

If you are a parent or caregiver, and you make your child angry because you punished him for something he did, he may point to you and say “Why?” in anger.  This reaction frustrates you and makes you angry because perhaps you punished him so he would know not to stick a paperclip in an electrical socket.  Your punishment was to save his life.

But if this same child loses his pet, and he comes to you in tears asking “Why?” then you, as a caring and loving parent will embrace him and explain to him what he needs to know in a way he understands so that you can bring him back to a place of healing and joy.

In both cases, the question was asked.  But in the last example it was the state of the child’s heart that softened the heart of the parent.

Our Father knows we will not understand all of His ways.  But He loves us despite our questions, especially when they are asked out of the need for comfort and wisdom.  This does not mean we will always appreciate the answer we get. But if we listen we will get an answer nonetheless.

We are not to ask out of arrogance or ignorance of our position compared to God’s. And we should never question God’s wisdom or His actions in an attempt to hold Him accountable to man’s expectations.  But questions that come from the humility of pain, the human condition, brokenness, or a true and honest need to be comforted can and should be brought before the Father especially through our tears of anguish.

It is in these intimate moments with the Father that we really begin to understand His desire for a relationship with us and His power to turn our mourning into dancing.