Life isn’t fair. 

When I was in high school, I was a three sport athlete. I loved sports, and I had flourished in my ability to perform in athletics. As a junior in high school, I had just missed out on winning the state championship in the discus throw for track and field by less than a foot. I didn’t respond by being mad at myself or anything, but instead that pushed me to work even harder. I was consistent and pushed myself the summer prior to my senior year, spending more time than ever in the weight room, on the track doing sprints, running the neighborhood block, and working a job that would help me fund college where I was considering competing at the collegiate level. If you would have known me at that time, you would have known that I was doing just about everything in my power to work hard so I could reach the top of that podium. And I was rewarded for that – I had an incredibly successful fall season and I was beginning to flourish more than I ever had on the basketball court in the winter. All the work I had put in was paying off.

Until it didn’t.

I remember the sound of my ACL tearing as I did a jump stop after taking the ball down the court on a fast break. We were in St. Paul, playing against another team, when all my work had gone to waste. My season of basketball was done, it wasn’t looking good for my spring track season, and I didn’t even know what my college career would look like anymore. I was being recruited by many schools, but I had heard stories of people I knew who had an injury and all of the schools they were looking at were no longer interested in recruiting them after an injury like that. Even if I still was recruited, I truly didn’t know if I ever could return to where I was physically.

Over the next year, God would do some amazing work in me and through me to not only help me recover, but to write the story of an incredible comeback. However, that’s a story for another day. You see, after I tore my ACL and in the beginning of my rehab, I was completely overtaken by bitterness and pain. How could this happen to the one who never skipped a workout, the one who gave up her summer to go to camps and always went above and beyond? How could this happen to me? It just wasn’t fair.

These moments were some of the more painful of my life. I have been through far more challenging things since then, looking back. In the big picture, this was a blip on the radar. However, in the perspective of someone who had her identity so wrapped up in sports, athletics, and performance, this was one of the worst things that could have happened to me at that time. I know this now to not be true. I have learned since then where my identity truly lies, and it is in God and His saving work in Christ alone. However, at that time, I had lost everything and it was so incredibly painful.

I thought of these few weeks when I read the first four verses of Habakkuk. When doing some research on Habakkuk, I noticed that most of my references looked at Habakkuk chapter one as a whole. The first four verses refer to a writer, a prophet, that is confused and cannot seem to fathom why things are the way that they are, however God responds to Habakkuk in verse 5 telling him that God is working in ways that Habakkuk couldn’t truly understand. We will take the time in the future to talk more about verse 5 and the rest of chapter 1. However, I wanted to give the first 4 verses the time and reflection without verse 5 because life often doesn’t give us an answer right away. If I would have known in high school that I would end up recovering as beautifully as I did, physically, emotionally, and spiritually, after my ACL, I would not have had the time to sit in the mess. I’m not saying it’s fun to sit in the mess or that it’s always God-glorifying, but God doesn’t promise us that we will be without challenges in this life. It’s what we pull from the challenges that really matters. 

In the first verse of Habakkuk, he uses the Hebrew word “massa”, which literally means “burden”. It’s not just a message to the people, but instead it is a painful one. It’s a heavy one. This word is used elsewhere in the Bible to describe bearing or carrying something heavy, loading or lifting.  

Habakkuk 1:2-4

How long, Lord, must I call for help and you do not listen or cry out to you about violence and you do not save? Why do you force me to look at injustice? Why do you tolerate wrongdoing? Oppression and violence are right in front of me. Strife is ongoing, and conflict escalates. This is why the law is ineffective and justice never emerges. For the wicked restrict the righteous; therefore, justice comes out perverted.

Looking at the above three verses, I truly seem to understand Habakkuk’s description of this message as a “burden”. We see next in God’s answer that God is working in the mess, but Habakkuk doesn’t know that yet. He’s truly sitting in the mess, praying and wondering where His God is.

When looking elsewhere in God’s word, we see that Habakkuk is not the only one asking these questions. 

In Psalm 13, David expresses fear that the enemy will have victory over him, yet David  uses this Psalm to ask the Lord where He is. In Psalm 13:1-2, David asks “How long, Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long will I store up my anxious concerns within me, agony in my mind every day? How long will my enemy dominate me.” David is not seeing a physical manifestation of God’s provision or salvation in this battle yet, however David moves on later in the Psalm to express that he trusts God will deliver him, as God has delivered him in the past.

In Psalm 74, David writes about Israel’s feelings of rejection from God. They were promised that they were God’s possession, however their enemies have destroyed Israel as a nation. In Psalm 74:9-10, David writes “There are no signs for us to see. There is no longer a prophet. And none of us knows how long this will last. God, how long will the enemy mock? Will the foe insult your name forever?” David reflects on God’s history with Israel and how He has always provided before, yet David is struggling to see this covenant in the here and now. David asks God to remember His covenant with His people, to not forget Israel, and for God to rise up and act.

There are plenty of other examples written in God’s own word where the author may be sitting in the place between a painful thing and the time that they see how God has been working. In Psalm 22:1-2, the author asks “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me? Why are you so far from my deliverance and from my words of groaning? My God, I cry by day, but you do not answer, by night, yet I have no rest.” Jeremiah doesn’t hold back any shots when he asks in Jeremiah 14:9, “Why are you like a helpless man, like a warrior unable to save? Yet you are among us, Lord, and we bear your name. Don’t leave us!”. The author of Lamentations doesn’t beat around the bush when they say, “Even when I cry out and plead for help, He blocks out my prayer” in Lamentations 3:8.

What is so challenging in times of immense struggle is that they feel so lonely. In my times of struggle, I find myself not only struggling with the struggle itself, but I also find myself really struggling with my thoughts and beliefs about the struggle. Sometimes I wish I wasn’t such an over thinker. I don’t know if this is relatable or crazy, but I often feel guilty for questioning God and doubting His work (whether seen or unseen) in the messes of life. When silence follows prayers over and over again, it is incredibly hard to continue to pray with the hope of God moving in a situation. When you see the evil around you in this world, it is hard to believe at times that there is a good God in control of it all. When those who do evil prosper, it is hard at times to continue putting yourself out there for good when you’re just going to get crushed. Life’s just not fair sometimes. 

I truly do think that there is a time and a place for all of these doubts. When we feel them, the “who, what, when, where, and how” is completely our choice as to where we go with any doubts we may feel.

*When we are struggling or doubting, do we bring them to the lunch circle or the coffee club? Or do we bring them directly to the Lord Himself and maybe a trusted friend or two who know and love the Lord, who know and love you, and who will bring them to the Lord on your behalf?

*When we are struggling or doubting, are we honest? Do we sugarcoat the doubts, or do we just tell God like it is? Reading the above passages in Psalms, Jeremiah, and Lamentations (as well as many others in the word), I feel some sense of conviction that I haven’t been honest with God. Even though He knows how I am feeling already, how can my heart heal and let go of something that doesn’t truly reflect my current heart state? God is incredibly strong, and He can take it. All He ever asks is for our heart to be fully devoted to Him, and we cannot give Him our complete devotion if we are lying to Him. 

*When we are struggling or doubting, when, where, and how do we bring these things to God? We do know that we can bring them to Him anytime and anywhere, right? We don’t have to wait for the perfect time, perfect place, perfect heart state, perfect anything. Jesus made it so we have access to our Father at anytime, therefore we must remember this if we’re holding back something from God because of timing (because, let’s be honest, He already knows anyways). And, when we bring things to Him, do we expect Him to answer in the way that we want? Or do we lay our doubts  and concerns right into His hands in a way where we are expecting Him to answer in the way that HE deems appropriate? Realistically, we must remember who God is here, and He’s not us. He’s a far better God than we could ever be, and we have to trust that even if things don’t seem “fair”, He has a far better reason for the way He works than we could ever imagine.

 As I said before, we’ll talk next time about verse 5, where God reveals that He is working behind the scenes. However, I pray that today if you are in a season where you cannot seem to see how on earth God could be working, that you are able to bring that fully and completely to our God and trust Him with the outcome. Honestly, I am in that season now too, so I feel in a way that I am preaching to myself right along with you in this. I thank God for His track record of faithfulness in my life and the words He has provided through the Bible to me, because I have no doubt in our season that He is working in ways I cannot see. I pray to God that in this season of pain and struggling to see His presence, we (yes, myself included) can cling to the promises He has given us in His word and that we can know He is here in the mess.

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