Monday, June 4, 2007

An Answer to Suffering

"Remember the poor."1

In an issue of Our Daily Bread I read about Mark and Alice Westlind who are missionaries in Colombia. In one of their monthly letters they wrote the following:

"Driving through Christmas traffic, fighting the drizzling rain, I chanced on a 4-year-old little girl. She was wet and cold and shaking. Her clothes were ragged, her hair was matted, and her nose was running. She walked between the cars at the stoplight, washing headlights because she was too short to wash windshields. A few gave her coins, others honked at her to get away from their vehicles.

"As I drove away only some 50 cents poorer, I raged at God for the injustice in the world that allowed the situation. 'God, how could you just stand by, helpless?'

"Later that evening, God came to me softly with that still small voice and responded not in like kind to my rage, but with tenderness, 'I have done something. I created you.'"

Suggested prayer: "Dear God, please give me a grateful heart for all the blessings and provisions you have so freely given to me. And give me a compassionate heart so that I will always share what I have with the poor and those who are genuinely in need—and are not in a position to be able to help themselves. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully in Jesus' name, amen."

1. Galatians 2:10.

Credit: Daily Encounter

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