Tonight in the weekly Bible study I attend along with certain other people, we studied Amos chapter four. The following verse was included in the study.
Amos 4:10:
" 'I sent plagues among you as I did to Egypt. I killed your young men with the sword, along with your captured horses. I filled your nostrils with the stench of your camps, yet you have not returned to me,' declares the Lord."
This (along with a few other verses) led to a discussion I found rather interesting. It started with the general agreement that God was killing certain people in order to get the attention of others. The discussion pretty much continued with whether or not God still took the lives of some people to grab the attention of others. It seemed that the response to this was that He does. Given the recent situation that my family has gone through, this quite naturally grabbed my attention.
The possibility that God may have taken the lives of my sister, my cousin, and two other people I knew in order to grab the attention of certain people has more than once entered my mind. Normally, I try not to think about it simply because this train of thought is painful. It causes the selfish side of my personality to become enraged at God. This rage then seeps into my relationships with the people around me. I remember the amount of anger that I expressed over this last summer and during part of the fall semester. I don't want to do that again.
Unfortunately, when my thoughts wander again to this possibility, the anger towards God does return. I can't help this. What's worse (for my mood, anyway) is that I know that I'll never know why He took my sister and the others so early in their lives. I know that He had a reason for it, and I know that I would probably never be able to comprehend it. It brings to mind a short passage from the play Shadowlands:
"God knows. Yes, God knows. I don't doubt that. God knows. But does God care?
...
We're the creatures. We're the rats in the cosmic laboratory. I've no doubt the great experiment is for our own good, eventually, but that still makes God the vivisectionist."
It describes how I start to feel every time these thoughts surface in my mind. I can't stand these feelings. They hurt.
Posted by Randy at February 28, 2004 12:50 AM | TrackBack