NCB, Thanks for your support and encouragement. To be honest it has been hard for me over the last few months to keep my focus on God. I know in my heart that he is faithful and will never give me more then I can handle. But, I have found myself to be a little angry...perhaps sour towards him. There is so much hurt and pain out there that I sit and wonder why. Not that this is the first time that I have had these thoughts/questions.... But like I said that is where I am at. Thanks for the reminder.
Scott, given what we're all going through, I truly understand looking up into the sky and screaming, "WHY?!!!"
In my own case I have realized that the causes for my own misery lie with my own crisis of faith. Because of severe depression, I committed the sin of despair, and it nearly cost me everything, including my very soul. Since I awoke from my blind drive nearly off a cliff to find my marriage wrecked and my wife seeking the love of the OM, I have been facing my spiritual failings.
To cut to the chase, my depression arose out of my dissatisfaction with my life, and I now realize it was not that God had failed me, but I had failed God.
I can't blame Him for the evils and the ills that plague us. No, all these are not caused by God but by Mankind. We bring this about ourselves. We choose to sin and we choose the miserable consequences that come of it. He gave us free will and the power to choose Him or not to. Unfortunately, we tend to choose poorly.
So all this misery we see around us is not caused by God, but by us, His sinful children. He gave us His Son so that we might have a chance at Salvation, and still we turn away from that Grace. So, now, instead of looking heavenward and screaming, I know to look across to my brothers and sisters instead to scream, "WHY?!!!"
Our spouses, however, just take the cake in this (mixing metaphors here!) -- by sinning against God and the very person whom they swore not to (us). That's double the offense to God, BTW.
