Mar 11, 2010
It’s important to be truly unhappy about some things God does (or doesn’t do).
Example: At Christmas, when we sing, “Bless all the dear children in thy tender care,” God answers, “No.”
Be sad about that.
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would you think about expounding on this more in your other blog..?
thank you.
My fleshy, little finite mind can be sad about a sad circumstance involving a dear child in His care. However, that same fleshy, little finite mind has no idea whether God has truly answered “No”, because I have no idea (and no way to even HAVE an idea) of the blessings being bestowed on that same child in ways I cannot imagine.
Thousands of children starve to death each day. It’s hard to imagine how that could be a blessing. Notice none of us has a desire for that “blessing” and will do almost anything to avoid it.
I don’t think “desire” is necessarily correlated with blessing.
the point is that in and of itself, starving to death is bad. God certainly uses bad things for good blessings (Romans 8:28, Gen 50:20) but the things He uses aren’t necessarily good things.
To say everything that God uses is good is like saying evil doesn’t exist.
Your thoughts here remind me of this post from the CI bloggers trip to Kenya – http://www.bradruggles.com/2010/03/08/a-father-to-the-fatherless/. Perhaps more accurately of thoughts prompted in my head/heart by that post…
Yeah, I’m with AA; I’m gonna need a bit more ‘splainin’ on this one to understand more fully.
me too
isn’t there a difference between being sad about a circumstance in our fallen world, and attributing that circumstance to God’s action (or inaction)? We ask him to fix all sorts of specific and global problems. It’s because the problems exist that we ask for assistance. We don’t ask for things, and he creates problems to represent his denial. i too have been moved by the CI blogger trip to kenya. i think those bloggers and sponsors around the world become God’s yes for those children. So yes, we should be unhappy so that it prompts us to discover how god will act through us. but to be unhappy with circumstance just to blame him? that’s not useful to anyone, especially god. is that what you were getting at?
Yeah, this is more like what I was thinking when I read it.
You can be joyful and unhappy at the same time, happiness depends on happenings and joyfulness depends on hope in the Lord Jesus Christ. Happiness is based on the external, whereas joyfulness is based on the internal condition of your heart (new nature in Christ).
This is a hard truth we should face. Thanks, Abraham.
Maybe the prayer that we pray is what should change. Maybe it should be “bless all the dear children in they tender care, but not my will but yours be done.”
I like the next line of the song too. “And fit them for Heaven to live with you there.” God’s fitting us for heaven most often involves great suffering on our part.
Not to be a “big fat jerk who points out something other than your point”, but…
“in your tender care”, vs “with your tender care”…
I suppose he does bless all children who are “in his care”, but you’re saying something different, which I should be and am unhappy about.
Remember when we had that conversation in my porch at the Pipe and Tile asking the question “is it ever ok to be angry?”, I find your logic and thought here to be on those lines.
Should we be angry that rape happens? Or child sacrifice? What’s the difference between anger and unhappiness, other than the obvious that the bible points out it’s nearly impossible to be angry and not sinning.
Come on Phil, you’re not fat.
God’s idea of a “blessing” and our idea of a “blessing” sometimes don’t match, and that can be really sad. Is that what you’re saying?
I’m guessing that Abraham is saying that sometimes a child is not blessed by God under any definition.
In response to the people who felt that even in bad things children can possibly be blessed (or anyone else) and those who disagreed:
The bad things that happen are not necessarily the blessing, but perhaps the Lord is able to bless them even in the midst of their suffering. People who are severely persecuted and tortured will often say that they are blessed.
Right after the line that says, “bless all the children,” the song says “take us to heaven”–I always thought the being taken to heaven was the blessing.
We talked about something like this in my fourth grade class last week–that God sometimes answers our prayers, No. The example we discussed was Paul praying for the Lord to take away his thorn in the flesh. Instead God said, “My grace is sufficient for you.” So even when he says No, he blesses us with his grace?
But your whole point was about suffering making us sad, and I don’t disagree with that.
If we’re truly unhappy about some things God does or doesn’t do, then I have a hard time not being angry with God.
I think It’s important to remember that man brought sin, and everything related to it, into the world, not God. Could He take it all away right now? Yes and one day He will. But right now we are paying the piper.
I wonder if the author’s intention was children (kids) or children of God. There is a big difference. I think it’s impossible to be a child of God and not be blessed. Every earthly thing can be striped away and we are still blessed because He chose us and He loves us, He saved us and gave us the promise of eternal celebration in His presence.
Blessing does not equal stuff.