When Things Go Wrong

Have you ever had a bunch of stuff go wrong, all at the same time, and wondered why God let it happen? When things go wrong, you may even get angry at God.

When Things Go Wrong…

Like for instance, my grandma was diagnosed with leukemia in February. We decided to make the trip to see her over spring break, but then they cut her life expectancy down from 4 months to two weeks, so my family altered our plans. I left that weekend and drove the 10 hours from Texas to Iowa to see her. I arrived late Saturday night and was going to see her Sunday morning, but she passed away around 3am. I never got to love on her before she passed away.

The following week was spring break and my family was going to meet me in Iowa, only our car broke down on the way. They were only in Oklahoma and had to turn around and go home. All our vacation plans fell to pieces. I was stranded in Iowa without my family and I was at a loss.

I felt so strongly about going to see my grandmother, and I wasn’t even able to. My family wasn’t there to help me grieve. And I found myself questioning God.

The Bible Says…

Romans 8:28 says that we know that for those who love God, all things work together for good… only I couldn’t see it. I couldn’t see how my grandma dying before I got to see her could be for good. I didn’t understand how my family being kept away from me could be for good.

Have you ever been there?

It’s hard to trust when everything is so uncertain.

Philippians 4:7 says that the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. But I didn’t have that. Not even close. I prayed for it, but it never came. I was anxious and upset.

Trust Isn’t Always Our Default Setting

I was talking to a friend about it and she told me the reason the Bible says to trust God so many times is because He knows it isn’t always easy. He knows trust isn’t always our default setting. That was something I needed to hear.

God knows trust isn't always our default setting… Click To Tweet

I feel like one of my spiritual gifts is the gift of faith, so I was all twisted up, not just because of everything that was going wrong but because I wasn’t handling it well. Only God never expected me to.

He knows human beings have emotions because He created them.

The Suffering of Job

One of my favorite books of the Bible is the book of Job. If you’re familiar with it, you might be surprised by that. In the beginning, it says that Job had a blessed life. He lived a life that was pleasing to God. He was blessed with health, wealth, and happiness. He had a great family and lots of property, and he took time everyday to make sacrifices to God because he knew all his blessings came from God.

And God took the time to point out how awesome Job was to Satan. Like thanks God? Right?

Then God allowed Satan to take it all away.

He starts with Job’s children and all his possessions. Job loses them all in one fateful day.

But Job still worshiped God.

Then, Satan strips Job of his good health. Job is grieving and in pain, but he still refuses to curse God. However, he does question why he is alive at all. He’s depressed. Who wouldn’t be, right?

So his “Friends” show up.

They try to tell him that everything that’s going wrong is his own fault. Even though we know it wasn’t.

Job tries to tell his friends how blameless he is, but that doesn’t get him anywhere. And finally God Himself steps in.

And Job praises God saying that before this tragedy, he knew about God, but because of it, he now knows God personally. And then he prays for his friends to be forgiven. And God restores Job’s health wealth and happiness.

But what I love most about the book of Job is that it’s the story of how God is in control and we can trust Him, even when things aren’t going the way we hoped or planned.

Related Post: When Life Gives You Lemons

Nothing Surprises God…

Nothing surprises God.

He wasn’t surprised that my grandma died before I got to see her. He knew my family wouldn’t make it on the day we planned. And He wasn’t surprised that I didn’t handle it well. He knows me better than I know myself and He knows when I’m going to need a little more grace to get through things.

And He is always right there with me.

And He’s with you, too.

No matter what you’re facing right now, it didn’t catch God by surprise. And neither did your reaction to it.

It’s okay when we get shaken by the things that happen to us. It’s even okay to ask God, why? However, no matter what we are walking through, we can know God is with us and He is good. He can be the One we come back to to get our feet back on solid ground.

That’s why it’s important to build a solid foundation for our faith. So when that the storms of life come (Because they will), we can stand firm on Jesus and what we know to be true. Even when we are shaken by life, we can trust the foundation we have built in Jesus to keep us from getting completely washed away.

But life will shake us.

Things Will Go Wrong…

John 16:33 promises us that in this world we will have trouble. It’s not a question of whether or not life will shake us, it’s a matter of when. When will it shake us next.

That’s encouraging, right?

But when life shakes us, we don’t have to get swept away by the current. We can know God is in control, even when we’re not.

So whether you are shaken by a death in the family, plans falling apart, or just the every day junk that’s in our lives, know that God is with you, and no matter how shaken you are, He’s not shaken at all. He hasn’t been caught off guard and He already knows how the situation will play out.

God’s got this, even when we don’t.

When we trust in Jesus, we can still get shaken by life. We might not always feel that peace that surpasses understanding, but we can always know Who is in control.

Join the Conversation

When things go wrong in your life, do you handle it well or do you start to question God? Does your faith have a strong foundation that can weather the storms of life?

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