Psalm 22.30-31
Posterity will serve him; future generations will be told about the Lord. They will proclaim his righteousness, declaring to a people yet unborn: He has done it!

Tim Keller suggested, on the CNN Belief Blog, that answers to the question, “Why me?” are generally inadequate. He wrote that people usually say one of four things:

  1. “I guess this proves that there is no God.” – which is inadequate because “suffering does not go away if you abandon belief in God.”
  2. “While there is a God, he’s not completely in control of everything.” – which is inadequate because “that kind of God doesn’t really fit our definition of ‘God’”
  3. “God saves some people and lets others die because he favors and rewards good people.” – which is inadequate because “the Bible forcefully rejects” this idea.
  4. “God knows what he’s doing, so be quiet and trust him” – which is inadequate because “it is cold and because the Bible gives us more with which to face the terrors of life.”

“God did not create a world with death and evil in it. It is the result of humankind turning away from him,” Keller reflected. “But God did not abandon us. Only Christianity of all the world’s major religions teaches that God came to Earth in Jesus Christ and became subject to suffering and death himself, dying on the cross to take the punishment our sins deserved, so that someday he can return to Earth to end all suffering without ending us.”

Where do we find this? Psalm 22. On the cross, Jesus quoted it: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Yet neither the Psalm nor Jesus ended with abandonment. When Jesus made atonement, as Psalm 22 foreshadowed, the Father raised him up.

Prayer
Lord, We may not know the reason that you allow evil and suffering to continue, but at least we know that the reason is not that you do not love us. In Gethsemane, Jesus chose to suffer for us and, on the cross, he atoned for our sins so that we need not suffer eternally. Therefore, we proclaim your righteousness in our generation and to a people yet unborn, that he has done it. Amen.

Today’s Readings
Leviticus 18 (Listen – 3:46)
Psalms 22 (Listen – 3:49)