Earlier this week I received a private message from a worried mom asking for advice on what to say to her faith-doubting teenage daughter. Her child is going through the process of confirmation and is rightfully thinking very seriously about whether she truly believes. The first issue she’s having is easy to diagnose because she was adopted and has a sense of abandonment lingering in her soul. Added to that is a very common to all people stumbling block that separates humans from their creator – “Why is the world so cruel?”
There is an easy standard answer to that – GOD GAVE US FREE WILL.
It’s really that simple as to why this world can be such a harsh desolate place. As a creation we were given free will to choose our destiny. We (humans) were brought into a perfect creation directly in His presence, but were given free will to choose what was forbidden if that’s what we wanted. You know the rest of the story. Why are we this way that we can never be satisfied with the perfection of God? That’s something that is part of the mystery that belongs only to the Lord, but our free will is not a mystery. We consistently choose against God. All of us.
Hence the need of the Lamb of God on the cross, and the risen Christ that has reconciled us back to the Father. “See, I am doing a new thing,” God says to us. “You choose the world over me, but I love you so deeply I have created a new path to bring you home.” This is what her daughter will be choosing to confirm her faith or not – Does she believe Jesus has done this for her?
The way this world is right now? This is not new, we are just the ones temporarily living here at the moment. This is how it’s always been. Greed, jealousy, envy, thirst for power…they rage over the earth killing, raping, and oppressing, and that is NOT our Lord’s doing, it’s the doing of our free will. The will of God is that we live perfectly in love and peace with Him. It is our will that we don’t find that good enough. James talked about this a few thousand years ago in James 4: 1-10…
“What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.
You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world means enmity against God? Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. Or do you think Scripture says without reason that he jealously longs for the spirit he has caused to dwell in us? But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says:
‘God opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble.’
Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God, and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.”
James is speaking to our free will. It was no different when he spoke that than it is right now, and his words apply directly to now as they did then. Do we choose God or do we choose the world? It’s that simple.
There does not exist an actual Christian that has not had that moment when they grieve, mourn and wail. When their laughter turns to mourning, and their joy to gloom. When the Spirit came to me that’s exactly what happened. My salvation – my breaking from the world and choosing God – was a process of breaking me down and relinquishing my free will so that I may LIVE. That process climaxed at well over 5000 feet elevation on a mountain summit in North Carolina. Left completely breathless and broken on that summit, I finally submitted to the authority of God. I had run from him for 4 plus decades and it ended that day.
What happened to me? The Lord then lifted me up. As promised. Here I am today.
Why is the world so cruel? It’s us. It’s you. It’s me. It’s the daughter of my friend. WE are why the world is so cruel, and that world is no friend of ours that have been rescued.
Our job? Those ransomed by the cross and resurrection? Is to bring more with us. The world is not going to change until Jesus returns. Until then…
Turn your light on and get busy. A cruel world is in desperation for His grace and hope. Have a beautiful Sunday 🙂
Gary
Second Place is for Winners... 