He Makes All Things Beautiful

 I've been reading through the Bible this year using a reading guide through an online app that includes a short daily podcast that goes over the reading from the day. I've really enjoyed it. While I don't always agree with the conclusions that are expressed, overall I have found that most days the podcast helps me find purpose and value in texts that would otherwise seem irrelevant for me today. However in the last few days, I have had to read chapters (yes multiple chapters) of almost pure geneology. Verse after verse listing off names of people- most of whom I won't hear about anywhere else in the Bible and a large portion of them whose names I can't read (with way too many vowels!). 

I have to be honest. When I sat down for the podcast after my sixth straight chapter of geneologies, I really wondered what great insight the speaker was going to find for me. I just couldn't see it. And then the speaker explained why the geneologies were so important- not to me, but to their original audience. From that explanation, the speaker showed how those lists showed God's great love for Israel and His desire to restore her. I'd just read several books (pretty much all of them up to this point) where Israel had proved to be more faithful in their faithlessness than in following God and here we are with God doing all that is necessary to restore them. I have to admit that by the end of the podcast, I had tears in my eyes. God's love is that amazing. His faithfulness is perfect and complete.

 And I thought there wasn't much to be found in this list of names.

But isn't that how God often works? He can take anything and make it something beautiful. Whether your facing another  repetitive, tedious task or you're in the midst of something painful- physically, emotionally or mentally, God can take it and turn those moments into something beautiful.

All or nothing

 "The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” Job 1:21b

This verse has been playing on repeat in my mind lately.

I've struggled with it internally for as long as I can remember. You see in my head, I know it to be true. God has the ultimate say; He is in control of all things. Every last thing is a gift from Him, and at the end, none of it will come with me. Other translations say, "The Lord gives and the Lord takes away." Past, present or future- this holds true. I know this in my head.

But my heart and my will rebel because deep down I've never been comfortable with the second half of that phrase. "The Lord takes away." I mean- I like to think that I have some control over my life- that I make the decisions for my life. Whole-heartedly believing in this verse means letting go of that "right" and recognizing the One who is really in control, even if He takes away something I'm not ready to give up. 

Ugh.... my heart squeezes a bit to even write that last line. 

Yes, I've struggled with the idea that God takes away for a long time- mostly because I've been afraid. But these last few weeks as this verse has rolled around in my head, I started to focus on the first half of that statement. "The Lord gives." It's such a simple statement, and sadly it's one I've taken for granted far, far too often.  The list of all that I have been given is immense....and undeserved. And that is what has made me pause lately. I've been given so much and yet it's also something I have never questioned, doubted or troubled myself over. Those words don't bother me- I'm good with God giving.

But if I try to accept the first statement, "The Lord gives" while refusing to accept the second half, "and the Lord takes away," what am I saying about who God is? I am turning Him into nothing more than one of those token candy dispensers- at my command, tightly boxed-in and limited.

Is that the God I want to serve?
Is that the type of God I want to be in control of my life, this country, our world and all that is created? No. What a poor god I would make of Him.
No if I want a powerful, almightly, all-knowing God of truth, grace and justice, I have to let Him be all of who He is and that includes the God who gives and takes away. 

And that makes me squirm a bit- because it does mean giving up all control, all authority of my life to God, but I also know as hard as it is, it is also the only answer. Things in this life may hurt me or leave me with questions and no answers, but I would be more hurt without Him. I would be completely lost and desperately grasping for anything that looked like an answer without Him- because He is my answer.

"The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away.

Blessed be the name of the Lord!"

I pray that when the time comes that I must face my fear that I will not get lost in the taking away but will rest in the name of the Lord.