Where Is God When Tragedy Occurs?

He is there at the party, when hilarity rings out,

He is there, also, when we are shrinking in doubt,

When tragedy emanates and a dark cloud forms,

God is there, in the midst of those storms.

He is there when life is quiet, even as we are bored,

He’s there as he promised, our cherished Divine Lord.

When modes of life stop and we can only but cringe,

God’s still there and as we rely he becomes our hinge.

“Where’s God in this tragedy?” we may well enquire,

God knows us intently, our most intimate desire,

Whatever we can know, we can know this,

God is here and our suffering he’ll never dismiss.

***

It is immature though understandable for us to say, “How could you allow this to happen, God?” It’s immature because we all know how this broken world works. There are few, if any, guarantees. It’s understandable because we will grieve losses in this life. We must, or we become less and less of our true selves.

God is there in the midst of each our lives.

God is here, even as my fingers press the keys on this keyboard. The Lord is inspiring these words as I try not to think.

When a tragedy occurs, like the sudden death of a loved one, we are so shocked as to hardly reckon it possible that we could ever feel this way. We are blindsided by a sense for emotion that is incomprehensible. Where is God in this?

When we wonder where life is headed, when something has occurred that shifts the entire axis that our world turns on, we can be forgiven for being polarised in numbness.

Stopped and unable to move, God is there, in the very midst of it. But we must know it by telling ourselves, by opening our mouth, and by communicating with our Lord who hates it when we suffer. We bellow or utter angry words or mumblings; God understands it all.

Our Lord is in the midst of the suffering with us. He will never despise a broken and contrite heart (Psalm 51:16-17). Of all entities for support, God is the one there still with us, as Jesus was with the woman caught in adultery (John 8), when all others have left.

Peace in tragedy comes as we accept the mystery of loss known through all humankind. It is what it is. Acceptance is to be the goal of our transition.

© 2014 S. J. Wickham.