If God Really Loved Me!

Many people have suffered the loss of a spouse or a child and in a moment of despair have cried out to God and said, “If you really loved me then why did you let my loved one die?” If God is all powerful, and if prayer really works, then why I am here at this tombstone morning the death of my loved one? This is such a difficult question and to be honest with you I don't have a good answer. However, I can tell you this; it is important that we confess to God how we really feel. He already knows it, of course, but we need to be honest with Him and ourselves and face our own need of healing. The real proof of God's love is the fact that he allowed His only begotten son to die on the cross so that we can be forgiven.

John 3:16 ESV For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. 

For those of us who have placed our faith in Jesus death is only the beginning, not the end. At the moment we close our eyes in this world and our heart beats it's last beat we will enter the kingdom of heaven and be in the presence of God. 

Luke 23:43 ESV And he said to him, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.

So how are we as Christians supposed to react when our spouse or child is terminally ill? Second Samuel chapter 12 says that King David prayed fervently for God to heal his son. David would not eat, he fasted and prayed day and night. The elders tried to get David up, they tried to get him to eat something but he refused, his life, all his thoughts and prayers were focused on his prayers for God to heal his son. He prayed non stop for seven days, but on the seventh day the child died. Because God did not answer David's prayers for his son to be healed, did that mean He didn't love David? No not at all! In a way the child was healed because at the moment his life ended, he entered into the kingdom of Heaven where is there is no more sickness.

Revelation 21:4 ESV He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.

The Bible tells us to be thankful to God for all things in first Thessalonians 5:18. It is not that we thank God that loved ones have been taken from us, but that our loved ones are in Heaven where pain and death will never touch them again. Be thankful that God is with us in our own grief. God is still in control, even when we do not understand all that happens in this life. I personally had two sons die. The first had genetic disorder, that at the time could not be cured. The second got his umbilical cord around his neck and was still born. My grief was nearly unbearable. If it had not been for the love and support of my wonderful Christian parents and siblings I am not sure I could have managed the grief. When you are in the midst of the deepest, darkest, despair you have ever felt because your spouse, your child or other loved one has died, remember the pain that Jesus endured for us on the cross. He suffered unlike anyone in all of history. I will never know in this life my my boys had to die but one day when I rejoin them in heaven, I will finally understand!

1 Corinthians 13:12 ESV For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.