When Life Isn’t Fair

Job 1:20-22
At this, Job got up and tore his robe and shaved his head. Then he fell to the ground in worship and said:

“Naked I came from my mother’s womb,
and naked I will depart.
The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away;
may the name of the Lord be praised.”
In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing.

When Life Isn’t Fair

There are times in life, when life doesn’t seem fair. It doesn’t seem just and our natural minded inclination is to hold God responsible and blame Him. After all, He is God. If He is in control then why couldn’t He have changed it or prevented it?
Why??? is often our question and our cry. We may not get some of those answers and closure until we get to the other side. What we do know is that God gave man a dominion and authority that he turned over to Satan by Adam when he and Eve sinned. That authority then made Satan the prince and power of the air. That sin and darkness has affected every one of us from the beginning of time. Those consequences have impact on the just and unjust alike.
We can blame mankind, global warming, overpopulation and even God for a lot of our problems, but at the root of it all, it is a sin issue that can only be resolved by the blood Jesus shed for each one of us. Jesus came as the Son of God into a sin-sick earth; leaving His position and humbling Himself, He took on the form of a servant in the likeness of man to show mankind what the love and salvation of God looked like. He lived and walked among all the darkness and depravity of man. He felt the full weight and furry of man’s injustice when He was unmercifully beaten and nailed to a cross. Was that fair? Was that just? Why didn’t God stop that? It was His only begotten Son?
Sometimes the things that work and affect our lives have a greater purpose than just an immediate solution or deliverance from their evil and ill affects. Sometimes, we, like Jesus, are faced with persecutions, trials, losses, calamities of various kinds, so that we learn and exercise our faith in Him alone that is above all these things.
Are we always going to understand them? No.
Understanding isn’t always the most important thing, but faith and trust in our heavenly Father is. God wouldn’t have sent His only Son to die for us, if He didn’t have a higher purpose for those that believe upon Him. Jesus was the ambassador and representative of God in the earth. He lived, walked out and showed us what that looked like in word and deed. Through His death, burial, resurrection and asscention Jesus passes His example and His Spirit into us, as His body of believer, ‘for as He is, so are we in this world.’
What we must understand is that it is not always the immediate results that are important or that define the victory, it is the process of what we walk through and what we learn to faithful and obedient in. Hebrews 5:8 says, “Even though Jesus was God’s Son, he learned obedience from the things he suffered.” If we are to be like Him, should we think that for us there should be some kind of shortcut. The lives of the early disciple and apostle was filled with much persectution, trial and sufferings, but Peters says in 1 Peter 4:12-13, “Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice inasmuch as you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed.” Paul tells us in Romans 8 that ‘if so be that we suffer with Christ, we shall also be glorified with Him.’
There are many forms of suffering in this world, but God knows that this suffering can do a deeper work in us than all of the greatest blessings and benefits. God loves to bless His children, but even more, He desires for us to grow up in His image, likeness and character.
Hold fast your faith and when you don’t understand His hand, then trust His heart.
“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.” Romans 8:28-30

Blessings,
#kent