“Sometimes the comfort of God comes to us dirty, showing up when we least expect it. I have often found God mixed into what many consider their greatest disappointments in life.”- Matt Bays
As Matt Bays begins Chapter 8 (“Love Sifting- The Comfort of God”) of Finding God in the Ruins, he notes that, from the day we are born, we measure pain and love. At times it feels like the sifted sands of pain outweigh the sifted sands of love. Until we come to the end of ourselves, we fail to realize that grace is all around us for the taking.
Perhaps, as author Robert Farrar Capon writes in The Romance of the Word: One Man’s Love Affair with Theology, we shouldn’t be so anxious to make the problem of evil go away:
” If God seems to be in no hurry to make the problem of evil go away, maybe we shouldn’t be either. Maybe our compulsion to wash God’s hands for him is a service he doesn’t appreciate. Maybe . . . evil is where we meet God (italics in the original).”
And when we meet God and the sands of love sift through us, healing begins to wash over us. We experience copathy- compassion and empathy. Pastor Bays observes those who truly love us are great at subtraction:
“I’ve often heard that a burden shared is divided by two. But there are moments, in the company of those who care, when it feels like a huge minus sign has replaced the division sign and our burdens aren’t being divided at all; they’re being subtracted. And subtraction is always better tan division because when things are subtracted, they disappear altogether.”
Today’s question: How have you found the comfort of God mixed into the greatest disappointments of your life? Please share.
Tomorrow’s blog: “The words me too”
