Ramblings of a Constipated Mind

It's me again. Same as usual. You know me, always questioning. I guess I think too much. Some people say I shouldn't question You or Your will, shouldn't try to understand. But is that not part of my duty as Your servant? To try and understand everything that is You, even if in the end I never will?

I don't understand You. I don't understand, and it kills me. There are things about You that will never make sense, that just don't add up logically. I guess that's part of what makes you You. And I guess I'm not supposed to understand You. It's probably better that I don't. But damn, sometimes I really wish I did. There will always be questions. I think it's entirely possible that I will never be truly content with You, for as long as I'm alive. In You, perhaps, I hope so. With You, who's to say? Is that even a good thing, to be content with You? Or is it not also okay to be discontent, to have to think things through, to not have all the answers. I'd much rather be like C.S. Lewis than someone who didn't acknowledge the questions, the problems, the issues brought up by having someone like You running the show. The centurion may have been more faithful, but Job was more human, and I find I relate more to him. In the same situation, Job would have recognized your healing power, but he also would have asked why his servant was sick in the first place.

And such is the issue I find myself struggling with these days: the problem of pain. The problem of suffering. Or, as I tend to think of it, The Job Syndrome. Until now, I thought I had the answers. I thought that I understood how a loving God and suffering could go hand-in-hand. But there's a reason theologians have been debating it for centuries; there are certain things that happen that just don't make any sense. You made a good world, God, but you sure didn't make it stick to the rules of logic.

Logically speaking, if two people come to you with the same question, with sincere hearts, you give them the same answer. But You don't. The answer You gave her was far different from the one You gave me. Was one of us wrong in our approach? Was I not sincere enough? Or were you lying to one of us, plain and simple?

Logically speaking, if you allow two people to connect in the way we connected, then it is meant for something bigger. If a long-distance relationship survives for two years, it's because there's something there. And if it ends, it's not one-sided. If this was so important, if this, at least for a time, was something that You wanted, how could you not let us both in on what You were thinking? How could You not have the decency to clarify your will to both of us? Are you really so sadistic as to delight in watching us stumble about in confusion and pain?

I cannot accept that. I cannot accept that this is Your will. Some people believe You are a God of history, that You directly cause every event, big and small, that plays out on this little planet of yours. Everything is predestined. By that logic, you caused the Holocaust. You caused September 11. You caused the Crusades, the Inquisition, and every act of genocide that has occurred throughout history. You caused my friend to get lost in addiction. You caused every divorce that has ever occurred. You caused every act of child molestation. Every act of pain has been a direct result of You. If that is true, and those acts of suffering are in Your will, then this one must be as well.

But I can't believe that You would be that cruel. If that is who You are, it would be preferable to spend an eternity apart from You than with You. For You are no different from me. No, in fact, if that is the case, then You are worse than me, and the world would be a better place if I was God.

I can only conclude that this is not Your will. That we have in this case, as happens every day, stepped away from Your will. Your will is the ideal. Your will is what we should aim for, not where we are at. Your will is the salvation of all, the eradication of suffering. Your will is that everyone be happy, and for genocide, death and breakups never to occur. You don't make the world turn, you pick up the pieces when it turns the wrong way. You try to make do with what we've made it, and put together something resembling Your original design. You are flexible.

I don't know what you're going to make out of these pieces. If only You would let me in on it! Then I might know who I am, where I'm from, and where I'm supposed to go. But you won't. And I guess I can live with that. I'd ask You for peace, but I'm not sure if I want it. As Tyler Durden put it,"Let me never be content. Let me never be complete. Let the chips fall where they may."

I don't know where this is going. I don't know what I'm supposed to do. What can I do? In suffering, all I can do is grab onto the One who gave me the ability to suffer. It's a paradox. Lord give me the strength to not let go, even when the answers are a long time coming.

Quotes of Da Moment:
"I have not lost faith in God. I have moments of anger and protest. Sometimes I've been closer to him for that reason."
--Elie Wiesel

"Deep unspeakable suffering may well be called a baptism, a regeneration, the initiation into a new state."
--George Eliot

"Most things break, including hearts. The lessons of life amount not to wisdom, but to scar tissue and callus."
--Wallace Stegner

"God will look to every soul like its first love because He is its first love."
--C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain