That phrase.
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| Photo: Esther Havens ~ Antoinette & Aidan post earthquake |
We’ve all received it personally gift wrapped, by well-meaning friends, caring loved ones, and kind strangers. It usually comes delivered with the most beautiful of intentions; a buffer of hope raised in the face of the unimaginably painful things we sometimes experience in this life.
It’s a close, desperate lifeline thrown out to us when all other words fail:
Everything happens for a reason.
I’ve never had a tremendous amount of peace with the sentiment. I think it gives the terrible stuff too much power, too much poetry; as if there must be nobility and purpose within the brutal devastation we may find ourselves sitting in. In our profound distress, this idea forces us to run down dark, twisted rabbit trails, looking for the specific part of The Greater Plan that this suffering all fits into.
To read the rest of John's Post, GO HERE.
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**postscript
In my faith journey I have struggled a lot to make sense of the day to day suffering in the country I reside. It absolutely pains me to hear "everything happens for a reason" as a response to my struggle to categorize and try to understand the experiences of those we know in Haiti. The journey is ongoing. The understanding may never come. We continue to chase after God and try (sometimes successfully) to remain faithful in the muck and confusion of it all.
This post of John's gets 10 stars from us. Please read it.
