Why

My daughter has learned the word that every parent dreads, "why." She has started asking me why after everything I tell her. It's not as cute as it looks to outsiders. I think I'm going to hurt the kid that taught her that word.

I remember once hearing someone say that religion and science should complement one another because it is the job of science to tell us how everything happened, but it is the job of religion to tell us why it all happened. I think there is a lot of truth in this, because I find that much of my job as a pastor is trying to explain the "why" to people. Why they lost loved ones. Why there is pain in the world. Why God wants them to love each other. Just why.

The problem is, that for every why I can answer there are about ten thousand I can't. When I was a new believer they told me that all the answers were in the bible if I'd just look hard enough. Now that I'm older I know that's a load of crap. Anyone who would tell you that hasn't read their bible well enough. I believe it has all the answers that God feels we need for now, but as you read it you find it's full of people that didn't always understand the "whys" either.

As I was reading The Psalms for today's sermon, I realized that even if you don't know the reasons why, sometimes it's just enough to know that there is a reason. I think I've learned this in my own life. I'm not really a person that labels everything that happens in life as God's Will, but I believe that there are reasons for certain things in my life. I believe there is a reason why we planted the church where we did even if I don't know what it is. I believe there is a reason why I work where I do for now, even if I'm not sure why. I even believe there is a reason for the pain that comes into peoples' lives, even if I don't have any answers for them.

Just like my daughter, sometimes we have to be okay with not having our whys answered, but rather just trust that our father knows what he's doing even when it doesn't look like it.