“Sir,” Gideon replied, “if the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us? And where are all the miracles our ancestors told us about? Didn’t they say, ‘The Lord brought us up out of Egypt’? But now the Lord has abandoned us and handed us over to the Midianites.”
Judges 6:13, NLT*
Gideon was bitter that God has abandoned the people and given them into the hands of Midian.
Yes, God did that. But Gideon didn’t see – or think to ask – why. When the people cried out to God in despair, He sent a prophet to remind them why they were experiencing this oppression. Perhaps Gideon didn’t hear that message, but now he was talking with the Angel of the Lord.
Gideon’s own father had an altar to idols. Did Gideon realize this was wrong before God told him to destroy it? He knew about God from history and tradition, but likely thought as many do today that those days were gone, that God had changed or maybe faded.
It sounds like he blamed God for the trouble and didn’t see it was sin that had caused the separation. God hadn’t moved. The people had.
We see the same tendency today, sometimes in ourselves, and often in the world around us. There’s no easy answer about why God allows pain, and suffering is not always a consequence of our sin. Sometimes it’s because of someone else’s sinful choices, and sometimes it’s just life with no apparent reason.
Whatever the cause, when we’re hurting we can trust the God who promised to never leave us. We can press into Him, asking Him to reveal anything that we may have allowed to come between us and to restore us to Himself. We can trust Him to forgive us if needed, and to carry and sustain us. He loves us and will be with us.
Father, forgive us when we doubt Your goodness, and when we blame You for any distance we’ve allowed to grow between us. Whatever trouble comes our way, help us use it as a motivator to rely more on You. Help us to cling to the truth of Your promise to never leave us, and help us to not give any foothold to the enemy of our souls. We belong to You and You will not abandon us. Help us to stand on Your truth.
∞
“Never Alone” from Barlow Girl talks about those times when we can’t seem to find God.
*New Living Translation (NLT) Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.