The Miracle of Delays

Last night my daughter and I went shopping.  It was a very enjoyable time together.  As she was driving me home, a deer finished crossing the road.  She calmly said, "Well, hello deer!"  I said, "Thank You, Lord."  The deer had crossed on the steep hill right at a curve, so that if it had still been in the middle of the road, we would have seen it as we hit it.  Instead, we saw its hind feet kick up in the air just as it hit the ditch on our side.  I was able to see its rear end and the white under its tail through my window.  I couldn't help but think how God may very likely have intervened on our behalf by delaying us just a bit so that we did not hit it.  We had found 3 of the four shoebox sized containers my daughter needed, so had to go back to the front of the store to get a fourth.  I told her to go ahead and get one while I stayed with the cart.  A couple of seconds after she left, I saw a fourth one down the next aisle on a shelf and went and got it.  I wondered at the time why I hadn't seen it before so she wouldn't have had to go back.  It would have saved us time if I had just looked ahead.  When I saw the deer I felt wonder at the thought that perhaps THIS was why we had to be delayed.  At the time it had seemed frustrating, but looking back it seems miraculous. 

What if God has held back 99.9% of the evil that would have happened in our lives by causing or allowing delays, mishaps, arguments, etc. that seem so frustrating to us?  What if He hadn't allowed those things to happen and we hit a deer on our way home instead?  Which is worse - being later than you wanted, or hitting a deer and possibly dying in the process?

Perhaps we need to learn to be grateful for the minor frustrating occurrences in my life, for they may be the very things protecting us from disaster.

But, we wonder, why does God allow disasters in the first place?  God allows disaster first and foremost because human beings choose to make them happen.  It is humans that rape, murder, steal, etc., not God.   We have free choice and have chosen unwisely. Also, however, because we actually would be completely unfeeling without it.  If nothing ever went wrong there would be no need for hope and therefore we would not see a need for God.  This is really the crux of the issue.  We do not want to have to believe in and trust God.  We want to believe in and trust ourselves.  If we can get rid of the need for God, we are free to do as we please.  However, then we are right back to where we started, because what we want to do is sin without punishment - thus the reason we want to not believe in God.  But then things become disastrous again and we start seeking answers and come back to, "Why doesn't God?'  What a vicious cycle we place ourselves in!

"Suppose we rated all pain (and suffering) on a scale of one to ten, with ten representing the worst and most intense pain, and one describing the unpleasant, but quite tolerable.  Say, 'engulfed in flames' got a ten rating while a 'mild sunburn' received a one.  If God eliminated level ten pain, then level nine pain would become the worst.  God could reduce the worst suffering to level three, but then level three  now the worst, would seem unbearable......." pg. 330 If God Is Good. 
We tend to change our views according to what is allowed.  No matter what God does or doesn't do, our desire to be our own god will always make us criticize Him.

CS Lewis wrote, "Imagine a set of people all living in the same building.  Half of them think it is a hotel, the other half think it is a prison.  The half that think it is a hotel might regard it as quite intolerable. and those who thought it a prison might decide that it was  really surprisingly comfortable."

Those who have learned to trust Jesus realize they deserve imprisonment and death.  They also know our physical bodies are imprisoned more or less on this earth, so it doesn't seem so bad.  They recognize that it could be much worse, so are grateful that it isn't.  They also know the day is coming when they will be free from the effects of sin and death and look forward to that day with great joy.

Those who trust in self and believe this world to be the end all have difficulty seeing the beauty of God's original creation, because they tend to only see the devastation that has occurred instead and wonder why their hotel is so uncomfortable!!  

"I (Jesus)  will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven."  Matthew 16:19 

The keys are sitting there in His palm waiting for us to reach out and accept them.  When we do, our circumstances here may not change, but our view of them will and our situation in eternity is changed completely forever!!