Moving From “Why?” to “I Accept”

Do you stop to think about maturing? I don’t mean getting an invitation to join AARP (which came in the mail the week before my 50th birthday, harumph!). I am talking about the growing up part of maturing.

We spend the better part of our childhood and adolescence asking “Why?” of those adults in our lives. Sometimes we receive thoughtful responses and sometimes just the “Because I said so” kinds of responses. At some mystical point of maturity we stop asking “Why?” Maybe it comes when we are living away from our family of origin and out on our own, but often we assume we have all the answers or the questions we have don’t have answers. Either way, we seem to stop asking “Why?” out loud, that is until something in our world gets rocked. Then the question “Why?” takes on a different tone and it’s directed at God.

Sometimes we receive a plausible answer to a “Why?” question that we ask God. Sometimes we receive silence. In a needy time, silence seems so cold and distant. But really, the silence may not mean uncaring, but rather, come closer. God’s silence may in fact be His invitation to sit with Him in our frustration of not knowing “Why?” God’s silence is not God’s absence. He is a very present help in time of trouble (see Ps. 46) Sometimes sitting alone with God slows us down enough to let go of needing to know the answer to “Why?” and we end up comforted with the knowledge that God knows and that is enough.

Do you know and trust God enough to move from “Why?” to “I accept”? Would you like to?