33 days.
That's how long Ella lived in this world.
I saw her last night.
So small and so pink, lying motionless in a tiny wooden box.
I hadn't seen or talked to John, probably since high school.
We played soccer together as kids and went to school for 3 years together.
We did a little hanging out back then, but he was better friends with Lee.
Lee's wife, Darlene, sent me a message on Tuesday to tell me about Ella.
It appears that after a week, John and his wife, Mira, noticed that something was wrong.
She had a rare disease, that just a few short weeks later, claimed her young, fragile life.
What do you say to someone that is going through that?
That's what I was asking myself as I was driving to the funeral home.
I realized that it probably doesn't really matter what I say.
Today, I also realize that I needed to go see her for myself, just as much as I needed to show love and support to John and his family.
You see, the whole way home, I tried to reason with God...that He somehow made a mistake.
That led me to question some of my foundational beliefs in God.
If God is perfect and holy and good, and God created everything, where did evil come from? The Scriptures say that nothing evil comes from God, so it wasn't making sense to me.
I couldn't let it go. I searched through different passages and commentaries until I found John McArthur's words: "When God created angels and God created humans, he gave them intelligence. He gave them reason, and he gave them choice.And there is a sequence. I put those words in that order for a purpose. Intelligence gave them the ability to understand things. Reason gave them the ability to process that understanding toward behavior. And choice gave them the freedom to determine that behavior. Intelligence, reason, and choice. Bottom line: With what they knew, and with the ability they had to process that information, they would be brought to a choice. And whether angels or men, they would have the choice either to obey God or not to obey God."
I had heard this before, but what I read next brought me back.
"Evil is not a created thing. Evil is not a substance. Evil is not an entity. Evil is not a being. Evil is not a force. Evil is not some floating spirit. Evil is a lack of moral perfection. God created absolute perfection. Wherever a lack of that exists, sin exists. And that cannot exist in the nature of God or in anything that God makes. Evil comes into existence when God's creatures fall short of the standard of moral perfection."
Thank you, Lord, for Ella's life; for her parents, John and Mira; and for her Creator.
Give them peace during this extremely difficult time.
And, thank you, for your patience with your kids.
Especially me.
Ella Marie Bynum
Born: February 14, 2011
Died: March 19, 2011
No comments:
Post a Comment