I spent Sunday School at a different church yesterday, and we talked about struggling when we don’t know what’s going to happen. Sometimes we have difficulties and pains in our lives, and while we know God is good, we don’t always know why God lets painful things happen. We also don’t always know why God doesn’t answer our prayers the way we think He should.
Then this came up: Sometimes we struggle with our trials because God isn’t doing with them what we expected. We’re so sure we know what a good God would do in a situation, but often what we think God would do is just what we would do if we could control things.
We humans can only see our little tiny windows of life experience amidst the vastness of all existence. God can see everything through time all at once and knows how it needs to fit together. We might not always feel like what God has allowed is good or can be made good, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t or can’t be. Our current difficulties may be here to prepare us for something in the future. There are times we may never know in this life what a certain pain, difficulty, or trial was for, but we can know that God knows what it was for, and when we participate in God’s will and plan for us, our pains, difficulties, and trials will never be wasted.
See also James 1:2-4 & 12; Romans 5:3-5.
Related:
God’s Idea and My Worries
Fear, Worry, and Trust
Trusting God with Others
Trials and Testing for a Little While
Expecting the Unexpected
If God Is Good, Then Why Is There Evil?