If God is God, then Why . . .

We've heard it before . . . 

I don't believe in God because . . . I prayed to God, and He didn't answer.

Yes, He did. Maybe it wasn't the answer you wanted, but He answered. We don't always get what we want because what we want isn't always best, even if we think it is. In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus prayed, My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me (Matthew 26:39). Jesus did not want to go to the cross. He did not want to suffer. He prayed to God to not make Him do it.

Did God answer? Yes. Was it what Jesus asked for? No. Did that mean Jesus didn't believe in God anymore? Not hardly.

I don't believe in God because . . . my mother is sick, or my son died so young, or I want a baby so badly and God hasn't given me one, or . . .

People do get sick. People do die, some way too soon. Some cannot have children, no matter how badly they want them. None of this is new. These very issues are found in the Bible. David's young son died. Sarah and Abraham couldn't have children until they were quite old. Untold numbers of people in the Bible got sick; some recovered, others didn't.

Does that mean God doesn't exist? Did people in Biblical times deny His existence because life was, and is, hard? Sometimes, yes. Those that did died broken, hopeless, and lost. Those who looked to Him for strength and comfort found a peace that surpasses all understanding. The peace of those who believed in God proved His existence just as, ironically, did the brokenness of those who did not.

I don't believe in God because . . . a truly loving God wouldn't let bad things happen, He wouldn't let people suffer, He wouldn't let evil exist. 

You know what, that's true. A truly loving God won't let bad things happen anymore, He won't let people suffer, and He will not allow evil to exist. When the time is right, He will abolish all these things, which are the effects of sin. When that happens, when sin is taken completely away, there will be no suffering, sadness, or sickness.

So why does He wait? Because when He does that, whoever does not believe in Him will be lost forever. When sin is abolished, all those who are not forgiven of their sins through Jesus Christ have no opportunity to be saved. God does not wish for anyone to be lost, and thus He is patient. That means we suffer temporarily to have the opportunity for eternal rejoicing. It's really not such a bad deal.

The list goes on and on.

People have an endless litany of reasons why they don't believe in God, or accept God for who He is. They want solid and tangible answers to their doubts, irrefutable proof that God is and that He is who He says He is. The problem is, they refuse to accept what is right before them. They refuse to see the reality of God in that they have life, in the intricacy of Creation, in the truth of the Bible, in the very fact that they are mad at a God they deny exists.

What they really want is a god of their own making, a god who is what they want him to be. They do not want God of the Bible; they want the god of their choosing. A god who does their bidding, who runs the world as they see fit, who thinks and acts and speaks as they do. They don't want God. They want a god like them. In other words, they want to be their own god.

Acceptance of God requires that we denounce our false ideas of our own deity. To accept God for who He is means accepting ourselves for who we are, and some just can't go there. They cannot accept the truth about themselves, therefore they cannot accept the truth of God.

What is that truth? We are small, and He is big. We know nothing, He knows all. We don't have the foggiest idea how the universe works, He counts the hairs on our heads and clothes the lilies in the fields. He knows the names of the one hundred billion stars in each of the one hundred billion galaxies because He created each one. He knows the number of the grains of sand in all the seas. He is God, and we are not.

The problem is not with God. It is with us. We are flawed, not God. Our denial of that takes nothing away from reality and truth. We can disagree with a law or a truth all we want, but our refusal to accept what is real and true changes not a thing. Let's say that you decided to deny that gravity exists, then went and jumped off a building. Would your denial of what is change what would happen? Not in the least.

So it is with God. Accept Him or deny Him, it won't change who He is in the slightest.

God is big enough to handle our questions.

Everyone questions God, and has questions about God. If we didn't, we'd never sin, because if we accepted everything about God we'd accept that His way is always the best way and we'd never go against it. But all sin (Romans 3:23). God is big enough to handle that. God had an answer for that before the founding of the world.

Jesus. Jesus is that answer.

God is made neither bigger nor smaller by our faith or our doubts. The essence of who God is remains unchanged from before we existed, and will remain unchanged for all of eternity. God knows what questions you have, and how you will answer them, and yet He lets you choose. He's big enough to let everyone make their own choice, to believe or disbelieve according to their own will. A smaller god would force people to follow him, deny freewill, implant faith as the default program everyone operated on.

My God is not a small God. He's big. Big enough for any why question I, or you, may have.

Why?

If God is God, then why . . . ? I don't know. I can't know. Neither can you. His ways are not our ways, His understanding is not our understanding. The answer comes down to a matter of faith. You trust Him, or you don't.

Faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see (Hebrews 11:1). Faith does not have all the answers. By definition, faith has questions, blank spots, unknowns. That is what is meant by what we do not see. What we do not see are the questions to which we have no answers. We are either certain of those things, trust God to take care of what we do not see (faith), or we are not.

We will never, in this life, answer every Why, no matter if we believe in God or not. Will denying God bring back your loved one? Will contesting Him give you a child? Will refusing His will heal you? Will your questions be answered because you say there is no God?

No. Because God is the answer. The answer to the question of If God is God, then why . . . is because God is God. Because He knows. Because He does. Because He is and we are not.

Because God is God, and there is no other.

That is why.