A young woman in Honduras was murdered earlier this week. She had been raised in an orphanage that my family and I had visited several times, but had aged out and was making a living as a young adult. Tragically, she was gunned down as she walked home from her bus stop, the victim of a heinous crime in a place where life is too often cast aside.
I have no answers for why God would allow such evil to exist, or why someone who had overcome significant hardship would then endure such a violent death at a young age. But at the same time, I have no answers for why God would allow me to have such a blessed life, living in relative safety and luxury. I had no role in where I was born, nor did I determine the home in which I would be raised, and it is a small minority of the world’s population that gets to grow up in the safety and security of a good home in the United States of America. For whatever reason, God has allowed me to live for more than five decades in conditions that most of the world could only dream of, spared from the reality that so many others face on a daily basis.
This perspective helps to remind me that the relative comfort and material success that I have attained is almost entirely due to circumstances beyond my control. Yes, I have worked, but it would be foolishness to say that I worked harder than someone in some other part of the world who had to work all day long in a strip mine because that was the only job opportunity available. Those people didn’t have educational opportunities, social safety nets, or parents encouraging them to shoot for the stars. My blessings are because God decided to bless me out of His abundance, and not because I earned them.
A recurring theme in Scripture is that God blesses people and nations so that they can, in turn, bless others. In Genesis 12:2 God says to Abraham: “And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.” In Luke 12, Jesus tells the parable of a rich farmer who plans to build a bigger barn to store his wealth instead of sharing it with others, and is condemned for his selfishness. In Acts 2, we see that the early church grew and met the needs of the poorest when those who had been blessed with material possessions willingly sold some of their holdings to provide the necessary resources. As a result, the conclusion that I reach is that God saw fit to bless me and my family so that I would then, in turn, share my blessings with others – whether that be my fellow islanders, my neighbors in need in this nation, or those in orphanages in places like Honduras.
My friends, you have been blessed beyond measure, and while it is fine to enjoy some of the comforts that those blessings can bring, please remember that the ultimate use of those blessings is meant to be the blessing and uplifting of others. Doing so won’t eliminate tragedy like that which occurred in Honduras, but it can help to alleviate considerable suffering and bring hope to those who have none.
Peace and blessings – Pastor Aaron