Do you have a hard time understanding what God is doing?

Jesus allowed His close friends to go through this suffering and mourning for Lazarus for a greater purpose, a lesson of faith that would resound into eternity. We all go through sorrows and hardships; we may never see the light at the end of the tunnel. However, His Light is always with us, illuminating our path, molding, making, shaping, filling, and using us, if we allow ourselves to learn from it rather than fuss and fret. That as a person in Christ, we will be led from a simplistic belief to a deep-seated conviction of trust that will lead to a transformed life.

Who and what Jesus did was not happenstance; it was purposeful and calculated before humanity began. There are no miscalculations or accidents in God’s happenings or workings in His mission or His working in our lives (Rom. 12:1-2). This passage in John 11:1-19 sets up a series of circumstances that climax Jesus’ ministry, power, and purpose. This would be the final showcase of the One True Messiah with an incredible, counterfeit-proof, impossible to duplicate event, the rising of Lazarus from the dead. This gives a verification and validation that Jesus is the Christ, and yet, it will also be used as ammunition against Him and will set the religious leaders on a warpath of rage that will take our Lord’s life so we can have life.

We all can have a hard time understanding what God is doing. It may seem that He does not care or listen to our plight and plea. This will cause a crisis of faith, a moment of distress. This is OK as long as it does not create a life and attitude of distress, because that would mean we failed the test of faith—that we failed to learn, grow, and trust in our Lord. At some time, we all have been hurt and disillusioned—by our church, a loved one, a coworker, a circumstance, and/or life as a whole. I am going through this now. I find myself without a flock to pastor, trying to cool off my burned feathers (so to speak) from my last pastorate. My point is, we need one another and we need the church even though it’s people hurt us because, like a piece of coal taken from the fireplace, it will only burn for a few minutes by itself and be very dim, but in the fireplace, next to many other pieces of coal, it can burn bright. Our focus needs to be on Christ—not on His dysfunctional people or on the world, So, my point is this: let’s keep committed and let’s focus better so we all can be better together!

Questions to Ponder

1. Have you ever had a crisis of faith, a moment of distress? What happened? What did God do? What did you learn? How are you now?

2. Have you ever felt at times that God seems not to care? Have you ever cried out to God for help, and received no response? How did you feel? What did you learn?

3. How do you feel that God does not always answer our requests in the timing and manner we would like?

4. What can you do to be a person who pledges and commits completely what we would call “surrender to the Lordship of Christ,” not just an emotional or indifferent endeavor?

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