We may have doubts about many things, but one of our certainties should be God’s character. If we think He is capricious and uncaring, we will turn away from Him, but if we know He is benevolent and merciful,
we will approach Him with joy.
But how do we discover His character? What do we use as a measure of His attributes? All too often it is our own narrow experience. We pray, nothing happens. We love and our loved one is taken. We ask for a job and our neighbor finds work. We try to obey God and our atheist friend gets promoted and is given a corner office.
This is not the way to find out what God is like. When we read the Bible we discover that He often is doing the unexpected, waiting a long while before intervening, and even allowing His people to be defeated. Jesus Himself exhibited a lot of “tough love” with His disciples, calling them “little faiths,” asking them to believe without seeing, and in one case, even allowing a disciple He loved to die (John 11).
So if we’re still surprised by the rough and tumble of life, we are not paying attention. It’s a fallen world. Murphy’s Law is in full force. If, after walking with God for years, we still have hard thoughts about Him, and doubt His care for us, it’s time to reevaluate where we got our ideas about Him.
If we wonder if God loves us, we need look in only one place, and that is the Cross. “By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us. . .” “In this the love of God was made manifest, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live in him.” “There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.” 1 John 3:16; 4:10; John 10:53; 3:16
In eternity, our scuffles with life, our bruises in relationships, our suffering, and even our deepest disappointments will appear as nothing. Anticipating that day will lighten our load and brighten our eyes.
Aloof? Uncaring? Distant? God’s not like that.
“For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.”
Romans 8:18