Like most of the world, I watched in horror this week as another city was targeted by terrorism. It’s becoming sickeningly familiar to watch these events unfold but this one, based in my home country, seemed far more personal. I felt burdened for the people of London and the U.K as a whole and it was hard to pull myself out of that hole.
Events like this can really shake us, which I suppose is the whole point of the act in the first place. It causes us to question our safety and that of our children, our family, and friends. It makes us feel afraid, vulnerable, helpless. The once confident sentiment, ‘surely that wouldn’t happen here?’ is becomingly increasingly more doubtful as attacks spread throughout Europe and the world.
We look at the evil in the world and wonder how things could get to this point where human beings demonstrate such hatred towards one another? We ask ourselves why our children have to grow up in a world such as this? Divided. Hurting. Lost. The question I’ve been asking myself in the days since the attack is this: When the world around us seems so broken and full of darkness, how do we reclaim joy?
There’s no easy answer but I think there’s a few things we have to keep in mind. First and foremost, I think it is okay to take time to mourn. We can’t simply put aside our feelings and our emotions and feign joy. The bible again and again permits a time of mourning. To acknowledge and validate the sadness we are feeling. For example, we are told there “is a time to weep and a time to laugh” (Ecclesiastes 3:4), and to “rejoice with those who rejoice and to mourn with those who mourn” (Romans 12:15). Jesus himself wept when he went to visit one of his close friends who had passed away. It is okay to allow ourselves to feel; we were given emotions for a reason. However we have to make sure that these feelings of grief and pain don’t overwhelm us, drag us under, and cause us to doubt God and His goodness to us. In her awesome book ‘Fight Back with Joy’ (see link below), Margaret Feinberg reminds us of a verse from Psalm 30 that ‘weeping may stay for the night, but joy comes with the morning’.
What joy then can we find in the midst of such terrible events? It may seem like a cliched response but as Christian believers we can find comfort and joy in the fact that God is still on the throne. Even when the world doesn’t seem to make sense any more, when the evil in the our midst seems too much to fight against, when everything that once was perfect is now chaotic and broken, we are reminded that God is still sovereign. Nothing that happens here on earth is too big for God to handle. In John 16:33, he reminds us that though this world will bring us many troubles, He has not just overcome the troubles, He has overcome the world. He is not surprised by the depth of the human condition. He is never caught off guard or taken aback by what we are capable of. He sees it all and still He reigns. Constant. Unchanging. Unshakeable. A solid rock onto which we can cling. Our shelter from the storm.
It’s normal to want to rail against Him, to get mad and ask why He doesn’t step in and put a stop to it all. To remove the pain, the tragedy, the suffering. These are things our human minds cannot comprehend. However we are human beings, not robots, and we must therefore suffer the negative (as well as the positive) consequences of the free will He has bestowed upon us. It may not seem fair, it may not seem just, but God is just and His way is perfect. Judgement will come in the end, the the world will be made right and there will be no more pain or sorrow or tears. Our experience in this life will seem like a wisp of smoke compared to the great expanse of eternity. It seems difficult to comprehend when there is so much evil and hurt happening in front of our eyes, yet we are told to hold on to this eternal perspective. It enables us to rejoice in the hope that is yet to come.
I also firmly believe God is not just a passive observer of world events. He works in and through people’s hearts, words, actions and situations to make Himself known in the darkest of times. As Christians too we are called to be light in the darkness, to love one another unselfishly and in doing so, point people towards Him. In the aftermath of the terrorist attack, London tube stations were displaying messages of hope to the hundreds of commuters trying to carry on their normal routine. These two in particular seem very fitting.
“Bad things do happen in the world … but out of those situations always arise stories of ordinary people doing extraordinary things.’
“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.'”
It’s comforting that God doesn’t just abandon us when the going gets tough but uses people for good in the worst situations imaginable. Heroic tales of bravery and courage often go hand in hand with tragedy. We are called to be His hands and feet in the world , even when it seems like we aren’t making a difference. We might feel like we are facing a rising tide yet it only takes a little bit of light to overcome the darkness of night.
So how can we rejoice today? By finding hope in the fact that God is still good. That He is still present. And that He will use work in and through the very darkest of situations to bring light to a broken world. I hope you can glimpse some of that joy today.
*I have been referencing this book a ton throughout my recent blog posts so It feels only right to share the link with you! 🙂
