Rest in Peace...

Ok, first I need to state a caveat to this post: *Please understand I am not a philosophical scholar or a highly experienced theologian. I don't have all the answers. I am still working through things in life. But that is O.K. Faith is a journey. I don't mean this post to solve the problem of God's role in the suffering in our world. I just share this experience with you to give a glimpse into my life in Haiti and my faith journey. Now, onto the post...

Memorial Crosses at St. Christophe

Have you ever visited a mass gravesite? They are unearthly, surreal places. I'll never forget the first mass gravesite I visited. It was in the Lake Atitlan region of Guatemala. In 2005 Hurricane Stan ripped through the area and dumped massive amounts of rain. One night the mountainside gave way and a giant mudslide covered an entire village. The 1400 people sleeping in huts/houses had no time to escape, but were covered in mud. The next morning there was nothing to be seen. All houses, trees...everything, was covered by 40 ft of mud. The entire village perished. 

an entire village covered in mud

After living in Haiti for over 9 months I finally visited the mass grave site just a few miles from where we live. After the devastating earthquake last year there were hundreds of thousands of dead bodies to dispose of. Due to concerns for sanitation and disease, the dead were loaded onto dump trucks along with the debris from collapsed buildings and structures and driven to the outskirts of Port-au-Prince to be placed in a mass grave site named St. Christophe. There are estimated to be about 150,000 buried at St. Christophe. As I walked around this mass grave I flashed back to the time in Guatemala. So many people lost their lives from just a few short seconds of "mother nature". Natural disasters that literally only lasted seconds, but claimed thousands of lives. If anything can make you feel small and nearly insignificant, it is that feeling. Standing over thousands who were living (laughing, smiling, eating, drinking, sleeping) one minute, and then gone the next. These weren't just bodies, they used to be people who were wives, husbands, brothers, sisters, children. They mattered to someone. They mattered to God. How can one make sense of that?! There are mass grave sites all over the world. Whether due to famine, war, disease, or natural disaster, they serve as a reminder of how fragile our time here on earth is.

crosses at the mass grave site in Haiti

Seriously, what do you do with that?! I cling to the knowledge that God is in control. Not that I always understand or enjoy what happens... no that definitely isn't the case. I am not going to claim that I fully understand, and that it isn't sometimes hard to believe and trust in God amidst such vast suffering. But I do. Trust in God that is. It is something I have always struggled with but I have read, prayed, and prayed some more and have come to a place of peace about it.What I do know is this: God is good! Yes, sometimes he punishes people or groups of people. Sometimes there are consequences for sin and sometimes horrible things just happen. BUT I also know from first hand experience that many amazing miracles have occurred during the course of natural disasters that prevented even greater loss of life. Something about a natural disaster causes people to reevaluate their lives and their priorities. Natural disasters cause people all over the world to confront suffering and faith head on. Massive amounts of money in aid is sent to help the people who are suffering. People that aren't normally confronted with pain and suffering become aware of all the pain and suffering some of their fellow humans undergo.  Christian ministries have the opportunity to help, minister, counsel, pray, and lead people to faith in Christ! As it says in Romans 8:28, God can, and does, bring great good out of terrible tragedies. Sometimes we can't even see or fully understand what that good is... but it is there somewhere amidst all the pain and suffering. 

I have seen more pain and more suffering these past 9 months that in the previous 30+ years of my life. BUT I have also seen more joy and more faith in God amidst such suffering than I thought possible.

"O afflicted city, lashed by storms and not comforted, I will build you with stones of turquoise, your foundations with sapphires." Isaiah 54:11