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Why Me Lord.P7 This book is designed for your personal reading pleasure and profit. It is also designed for group study. A leader’s guide with helps and hints for teachers and visual aids (Victor Multiuse Transparency Masters) is available from your local bookstore or from the publisher. Fifth printing, 1987 Most of the Scripture quotations in this book are from the King James Version of the Bible (KJV). Other quotations are from the Holy Bible: New International Version (NIV), © 1973, 1978, 1984, International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Bible Publishers; the New American Standard Bible (NASB), © the Lockman Foundation, 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977. Used by permission. Recommended Dewey Decimal Classification: 241.1 Suggested subject heading: THE WILL OF GOD IN CRISES Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 80-52947 ISBN: 0-89693-007-6 © 1981 by SP Publications, Inc. All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America VICTOR BOOKS A division of SP Publications, Inc. Wheaton, Illinois 60187 Dedication To the women in my life: Mary, my mother Emma, Pat, and Lillian, my sisters Cathy, my wife Lori, my daughter Gerrie, my editor Gloria, my secretary Anita, my typist Contents Preface 9 Part I—How to Live 1 Why? Why? Why? 13 2 The Choice Is Yours 22 3Triumph Out of Tragedy 28 Part II—How to Die 4 Life after All 39 5 Am I Normal? 45 6 Broken Hearts Do Heal 52 Part III—How to Help 7 How to Help a Grieving Friend 63 8 Helping a Friend Cope with a Terminal Illness 73 9 How to Explain Death to a Child 82 10 Making the Funeral Arrangements 90 11 After the Funeral Is Ove 98 12 Preparing for Your Own Death 105 13 Questions and Answers about Death— 112 Can a Christian Commit Suicide? 112 What Happens to People between Death and the Resurrection? 113 Will We Know Each Other in Heaven? 114 Is Dying Painful? 115 What Happens to Babies after Death? 116 What Is Heaven Like? 117 Preface How to live! How to die! We all need to know how to do that. Death is the common enemy of us all. It entered the world as a result of Adam’s sin and has since passed on to all men. Death is a part of life. Sooner or later it comes to all of us. Not even the only begotten Son of God es- caped it. The Prophet Isaiah tells us even Jesus was “a Man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief” (Isa. 53:3). We do not live long before we become “acquainted with grief” also. Sickness and suffering are even more common than death. Their pres- ence and prevalence are found throughout the pages of Scripture, the pages of history, and the pages of today’s newspaper. Job was right: “Man that is born of a woman is of few days and full of trouble” (Job 14:1). To live victoriously then, we must have a faith to live by and a faith to die by. We must learn how to deal constructively with both the suffer- ings of life and the sorrows of death. We must learn how to live and how to die. That’s the purpose of this book. These pages contain answers, atti- tudes, and actions that I have found to be helpful in handling both life and death. They are presented here with the hope that they will help you also. Naturally, I owe a debt of gratitude to scores of teachers, authors, preachers, and friends who have touched my life through the years. Par- ticular appreciation is due Gerrie Milburn for editing the manuscript, and to my secretary Gloria Ortega and my friend Anita Anderson for typing it. 9 Part I How to Live ONE Why? Why? Why? Don Anthony was a great Christian who died triumphantly. But be- fore his final victory, he had to grapple with the mystery of suffering. His struggle started one summer when he began having digestive prob- lems. When the difficulties persisted, he sought medical help. His phy- sician referred him to Scott and White Hospital in Temple, Texas for more extensive examination. Doctors there recommended exploratory surgery and warned him to expect the worst. The surgery revealed an inoperable and incurable malignancy. Apart from a miracle, he was told, he had only about a year to live. A few days later I visited with him, and he shared with me the struggle he was going through. Like most of us he had always assumed that he would live to a ripe old age and then die peacefully in his sleep. He could not understand why he should suddenly be afflicted with a deadly disease while still in his 40s. He was the father of two teenaged children. The thought of not see- ing them grow up distressed him. He did not know how he could cope with leaving them at such a critical time in their lives. Don believed that God had led him to his new position as director of 13 14 / Why? Why? Why? Christian education for Texas Baptists. He had just recently completed long-range plans that would require his careful coordination in order to make them successful. He did not understand why God would lead him to this position and then allow such an illness to befall him, just when his work was beginning to bear fruit. And most of all he wondered, if he were to suffer a prolonged illness, how he could learn to cope on a day- to-day basis with the pain, weakness, and discouragement he would surely experience. Don was struggling with the basic question of all sufferers: Why? This question has baffled the minds of wise men, philosophers, and saints throughout the ages. The continuation of diseases, wars, acci- dents, famine, and pestilence perplexes us. We wonder why God doesn’t step in and put an end to such things. There is no easy answer. The late Senator Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri used to talk about a disease called “the simples. “ He was re- ferring to the process of giving simple answers to the hard problems of life. Experience and study of the Scriptures have taught me to avoid “the simples” when trying to explain suffering. To blame everything on God is too easy. To label every experience as “the will of God” or the work of the devil is too simple. The problem is far more complex than that. While the answer as to why people suffer is not easy to come by, inquiring minds and aching hearts demand some explanation for it. So I shared with Don the following reasons why I believe people suffer. Judgment on Sin The oldest and most common explanation for suffering is that it comes from God as punishment for sin. This idea is more deeply imbedded in most of us than we realize. A lawyer friend of mine began having severe headaches. When the usual medications didn’t help, he went to his phy- sician. The doctor’s initial diagnosis was a tumor in the brain, but he wanted a further examination at John Sealy Hospital in Galveston. The tests there confirmed the doctor’s worst fears. It was a tumor that re- Why? Why? Why / 15 quired immediate surgery. The doctors told him that he might not come out of surgery alive. Charles asked me to visit him before surgery, so I flew down to be with him and his family. When we were alone, he said, “I wonder what I’ve done to deserve this? I didn’t think I had been that bad.” Uncon- sciously, he was expressing the belief that all suffering comes from God as punishment for sin. He believed that since he had cancer he must have committed some great sin, and he just didn’t know what it was. This idea was the most common explanation for suffering in the Old Testament days. The Book of Job is probably the oldest book in the Bible. It is the story of a righteous man who lost his family, his wealth, and his health. Three of his friends came to be with him and comfort him in his misery. They expressed the common belief of their day when one of them asked Job, “Whoever perished being innocent? Or where were the righteous cut off?” (Job 4:7) If Job was having a bad time, they felt it was because he had been bad. They believed all suffering was due to sin. This prevalent belief about suffering persisted in Jesus’ day. The dis- ciples once talked with Jesus about a man born blind. They asked, “Who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind?” (John 9:2) They were sure his blindness was due to sin. Their only question, was, “Whose sin?” This explanation for suffering still prevails today. True, some suffering is due to God’s judgment on sin. The Flood came in Noah’s day because of people’s wickedness. Amos said that famine, pestilence, earthquakes, and even defeat in battle were due to Israel’s sin. And the Apostle Paul teaches that we reap what we sow (Gal. 6:7). We live in a moral universe and we can’t go against the grain without getting splinters. However, Jesus categorically rejected this as the only explanation for suffering. In response to the question of His disciples about whose sin had caused the man’s blindness, Jesus answered in effect, “Nobody’s” (John 9:1-3).
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