By now you can figure that Tuesday night is the evening I take the Living the Question course. Evil and Suffering was tonight's hot topic. They are not one for tiptoeing through the tulips.
God and Satan. Good and Evil. Black and White. Either/Or. You/me. One side or the other. The premise was put before us. What if good and evil reside in me?
To fan the flames, if I my blessed to have children, is a barren woman cursed. If my prayer is answered but yours is not, am I preferred. What exactly is a blessing? You get the point - more questions than answers. In fact I am beginning to think there are no answers.
I sat with a dear, dear friend during her last hours of life. I picked up her Bible to read her some of the hi-lited scriptures. Passages that were so near and dear to her. Ones we quoted and memorized and recited through chemo and radiation. Her favorite was in Jeremiah.
"For I know the thoughts and plans that I have for you, says the Lord, thoughts and plans for welfare and peace and not for evil, to give you hope in your final outcome"
I suddenly realized that the very words we prayed so fervently were answered. That these very words were so true. His plans were for her welfare and peace, not evil, in the eternal and greater sense. He had given her the greatest Hope in the final outcome. I felt more at peace reading them in light of her death than I ever did in her struggle.
I realized there were tears coursing down my face. What was the true blessing? What was the true Hope? But in Him.
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