Satisfied Saturday-sadness and joy

Here we are-it’s Saturday again!  Let’s put on those “thankful hats!”  That’s what Satisfied Saturdays are all about.  What can you praise God for today?

This is hard, though because as I write this, I’m thinking about some joyful moments that happened at school this week, but I’m also sitting here saddened as I listen to the news about another shooting at a mall.  It just seems so wrong-to keep hearing over and over again about people being hurt by acts of violence in our world.

I don’t know if you’ve seen that e-card floating around Facebook today-it makes a joke about how we don’t worry senselessly-we worry because we know all the bad things that can really happen.

It seems to resonate with me today and other days as I hear, over and over again, about all the bad things in our world. How do we keep living and moving in the wake of more bad news?

It’s so easy to worry when my mind is filled with the brokenness all around me.  So, I step back and I pray for those involved.  I don’t really know what to pray except for comfort and healing and for God to make His presence known.  I’m thankful that God tells us that He’s sent the Holy Spirit to be our intercessor.  So, even when I don’t know what to pray, He hears my groans and my wordless prayers.

I’m thankful that He knows me inside and out. I’m thankful that He knows those families that are now unexpectedly mourning.   I’m thankful that He has the world in His hands.  I don’t always get it.

I don’t understand why bad things happen.  I can somehow trust, though, that He is bigger than all this.  He has a plan that is much greater than anything I can imagine.  (At least that’s what a friend told me the day before he died of a heart related incident).  I had a hard time believing it at that time.  I sometimes still have a hard time believing it, but looking back over my life I’ve seen it to be true.

This world is full of brokenness because of our sin.  It’s messy and yucky and confusing and sad, but God has conquered that brokenness.  He sent His Son to die for me, for my sins.  It’s still broken right now (full of violence and mourning and tears), but He is making us new.  He is redeeming His creation.

Today I’m sad as we’ve come face to face with that brokenness once again today.   I’m sad for those involved in the tragedy today.  I look forward to the day when Christ comes back and when the new heaven and the new earth are revealed.  I long for that day. My hope comes from looking towards that eternal day-from having that eternal perspective-from knowing in my heart of hearts that God is bigger.