Life's Not Fair, Who Said it Would Be?

Today is just one of those days that am overwhelmed in circumstance. "Michael Jackson dies at age 50" is pouring out of every media source I see, touch, and hear. I can't say I am grieving the death of Michael Jackson... let's just say this announcement comes in a moment in time when I'm carrying all kinds of heavy questions that I just don't have answers too.

"Why do bad things happen to good people?" "Why am I being nudged out of a relationship?" "Is my husband doing okay?" "When will our economy turn a corner?" "Did I do the right thing and make the right decisions at work today?" "Am I using the teachable moments to train my kids?"

I will spare you the endless list, but pose the question to you, "What is heavy on YOUR mind?" The world is filled with bad stuff, so what do we do to stay positive and protect ourselves from buying into it? As I type these words, I am thinking of three very close friends who are in the process of closing their businesses and countless other friends looking for jobs. The economy has broken them and they are waiving the white flag of defeat. My heart is so heavy for each and every one of them, and as their friend, I am absolutely helpless to fix their businesses, lives, families, and the community at-large. What I can do and I AM doing is praying and not "just" praying. I'm turning it over to a sovereign God who I believe has a big audacious plan that is incomprehensible to our limited human imagination and even in the depths of this pit, He is there.

If I am burdened so heavily by circumstances that I have no control over, why would I even attempt to get in His way? Jesus, thank God for Jesus, who came to this earth and sacrificed everything. Jesus existed to set an example for us and then died to prove he could conquer death, not for his own benefit, but mine, ours! His whole life was a masterful work of God so that through his death and resurrection, eternal life could come to this world of lost hopeless sinners.

So life is not fair, and if anyone could make the claim, it would be Jesus himself. I'm not going to carry the weight of the world on my shoulders and I'm not going to buy into the bad stuff that is overwhelming me today. I'm going to put my trust in a very big God, a God so big that even death couldn't hold him. I will rest in His promises that shout out "hope" in the book of life (the bible) and I will "Live Out Loud" by praying for the hurting, discouraged victims that this world is choking. Today, I chose to put my faith in God's plan and know that He sees the bigger picture, has a bigger plan, God himself is in control, not me.