God’s ways are beyond our understanding. One of the most famous analogies about God’s purpose in suffering is that of a bear caught in a trap in the woods. The hunter, wanting to help the bear, approaches him, but the bear won’t allow it.
The hunter, determined to help, shoots a dart full of drugs into the bear. The bear is now convinced that the hunter wants to hurt him.
The drugged animal, now semi-conscious, watches as the hunter actually pushes the bear’s paw further into the jaws of the trap in order to release the tension.
The bear has all the evidence it needs to conclude the hunter is evil. But the bear has made its judgment too soon, before the hunter frees him from the trap.
At some point God will seem unfair to those of us trapped in time, but we make our judgment too soon.
One day, perhaps not until heaven, we will understand what the Hunter was up to in our lives. Until that time, God says “Trust me. I have a plan I’m working out in your life, even though in the darkness of the storm you cannot see what that plan is.”
