Thoughts

The events surrounding Dustin's accident have touched me in strange ways I was not expecting. On one hand, here is a tragic accident that happened to an acquaintance I have not spoken to for over ten years. On the other hand, I think about the similarities of place in life that I share with this college friend. We are both in full-time christian work, both of us married up in quality and substance and are better ministers of the Gospel for it. We are relatively close in age and both have three kids that we adore. At the risk of sounding self centered as I think through my own reaction to these events, it has caused me to think nonetheless.

How far are we really from this happening in our own lives? How many crazy little things could happen and set everything on its ear? As I sat in my home last night listening to the wind howl throughout the large oak tree outside I wondered about the possibility of a thousand other "freak accidents". It is truly enough to drive a man mad.

Into this madness, however, speaks a God of providence and compassion. Am I saying that God knocked Dustin off of that bike? Certainly not, although that has been what many hear when we speak of God's providence. What we mean is that, while God is not a perpetrator of evil, he is able to take the pain and confusion we experience by virtue of living in a world that is fallen, less than it was created to be. He is able to take those open wounds and touch us there, redeeming the brokenness into something more.

I have been amazed and encouraged as I have read through the responses and prayers posted to the Salters on the sites linked in my last post. It reminds me of why I have given my life to Christ's body, the church. This is what we are meant to be, a family walking together through a world that, though we seek its redemption and pray for its salvation, often seems intent only on destruction.

This has also reminded me of my own experience with the death of Christina and Elena, my two precious daughters. Again, I state that God is not the author of evil, and I can think of no greater evil or no greater evidence that brokenness exists than the death of a child. But in my own experience, now with four years of perspective, I can say that in many ways God has redeemed this incredibly painful event in the lives of my wife and myself. We have seen the hand of God's comfort in the actions of his body, the church. We have felt his embrace in the flesh and bone of real men and women who have been used by him to carry us when we did not have the strength to stand ourselves. God is in the business of stepping into the midsts of falleness and creating something that, while we would have never chosen it for ourselves, and something that causes us to ask deep questions that sometimes seem to have no answers, nonetheless it is something in the end brings us to a place of deep and awful beauty.

This is my prayer for the Salters, that they would know the comfort of God, and be kept in his hand and sustained by his body, regardless of the outcome. May the God who defies definition be glorified.