the case for faith

I'm sitting around with a bunch of the most awesome teenagers a youth group could ever have and we're talking about why there is pain and suffering in the world. What a heavy topic. The thing that touched me the most was that pain and suffering is needed to give us a standard to judge what good is. Rob (my brilliant husband) gave this wonderful example: how do you know Oreos are good? Because you know what liver tastes like! It's so simple but so good. In the bad times I trust that God is in control and that whatever happens is somehow the right thing. And then after going through the hard times the good times seem so much sweeter. I attended the Black History Month celebration on base today and I thought about those who fought for civil rights and went through the underground railroad, etc. I hope I'll never know the suffering that people like that had to go through, or the persecution that Christians have in countries where Christianity is forbidden. But in some ways I think they experience a version of faith that some of us will never know...