I want life to come easily.
One night I even wrote a song about it entitled, “Won’t it Come Easily” as I meowed myself to sleep like a cat licking my wounds, wishing life’s difficulties and love and job came with the giant Staples Easy Button.
News flash: No Easy Buttons can be found in the reality aisle of life.
A few examples of facing life’s difficulties:
- Working with colleagues who don’t think, work, agree, or act like you do
- Overcoming sickness and family complications
- Enduring insults, difficulties, and hardships
- Pushing through life’s difficulties in lonely and uncertain seasons of singleness
Have you ever wondered what a Staples Hard Button might look like? I can imagine it covered in thorns. I can imagine Satan had access to it when he approached God’s throne asking for permission to harass Job. At the end of the dialogue, Satan pushed the Hard Button, and God allowed it!
Pause Button. What’s that about?
After Job’s first round of turmoil, God proclaimed that Job, a man with integrity, would not deny His (God’s) name. Indeed, Job did not: “In all this, Job did not sin by blaming God.” (Job 1:22 NLT)
Later in Matthew, when Jesus contradicts accusations of him teaming with Beelzebub, He does so by first pointing out how illogical it is that the Father of light would team up with evil. After mentioning the unpardonable sin, He continues by saying that “anyone who speaks against the Son of man can be forgiven.” (Matt. 12:32) NLT
Job was considered a man of integrity because he did not speak against God even with the presence of life turbulence. He did not call God evil; and what God calls Himself in Mark 10:18, “no one is good except God alone” means that God is not the operator of the Hard Button. God did not introduce evil and sin into the world–Satan did. God is the giver of Life. Believing this is essential to recognize He is good and the rewarder of those who diligently seek Him (Hebrews 11:6)
When we shake our fists at God in seasons of drought and deep desire, we are acknowledging life’s difficulties as the author of evil in pantomime. When we fall silent and stop praying, in our hearts perhaps we are proclaiming, “God you are doing this to me!” If we doubt His love for us when He calls Himself love, if we say He commits evil when He says that He is the Author of only good, we show a wavering faith.
But God forgives and restores us when we falter and blame Him for being the sole proprietor of the pain in our lives and the world.
In the midst of life’s difficulties, we must remember to acknowledge God as He calls Himself: good.
Even when the Hard Button is pushed down, God is not only good, He is good TO US. He loves each of us individually, personally and intimately. Believing this fundamental truth will carry us through life’s difficulties.
