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(Dedicated to Brenda 1950-2021)

I just came from participating in the memorial service for my friend Brenda. Her husband Ray is a lifelong friend and pastor at a Christian church in Indiana. They dedicated their lives to Christian ministry and living true faith in Jesus Christ these past 40 years.

Young Brenda was a beauty queen, playboy bunny, and starred in some Hollywood films. With all her beauty and fame, she was empty on the inside until that day when she submitted to the good news of salvation and she became a beautiful NEW person, inside and out. Shortly thereafter she ended up marrying my pastor friend Ray and had 3 beautiful children who honor me with the title “Uncle”.

Now, if Hollywood and modern religion had their way to tell her story via a Hallmark movie or the like, through her spiritual transformation she would become the perfect woman, perfect beautiful wife, and everyone would live happily ever after. The real story, as usual, doesn’t play out that way.

Brenda had struggled with manic depression and other various health ailments as a young woman. After her conversion…she still struggled with manic depression and even MORE health ailments. She had difficult pregnancies, car accidents where her injuries added to her lifetime of pain and limitations. Her health both mentally and physically was a struggle her whole life…which also became shared struggles for her whole family.

My biggest “fist-shaking” at God during my life has been about why He allows so much suffering and pain in this world. If He is all-knowing, all-powerful, and so loving…how can he allow these things to happen? Jesus and his disciples were the conduits for many healings and miracles…but He didn’t heal or touch everyone. Why not?

I think I am finally getting it after six decades on this earth (not that he OWED me an explanation). His plan as spelled out in the Bible includes the free will of men and women. He set up HIS justice from the beginning to include consequences for sin and disobedience. For thousands of years, this small part of His universe called Earth has been revolving in a chain reaction of death and dying because of OUR disobedience to the natural laws that come from God. Our blindness, our infirmities, our mental struggles all come from genetic and systematic “cause and effect” in relationship to God’s nature. He is perfect, we aren’t. He is spirit, we are flesh AND spirit…but we have allowed our spirits to be snuffed out by our sin. It is only by the miracle of faith in the life, death, and resurrection of God’s Son Jesus that we are saved from the end result of our cause and effect world.

So…aren’t believers meant to be symbols of success, prosperity, and popularity in this world? Aren’t believers supposed to have enough faith so that they are healed, sinless, and be perfect human specimens? The more I get in tune again with faith in God’s revelation to us the more I see that none of those things really matter. God does not count on us…we count on Him. God does not wait for us…we wait for Him.

The Bible tells us that His strength is made perfect in our weakness. Even the great Apostle Paul had a physical affliction that never left him, and he tells us God’s answer to his prayers to removing the affliction was…

“…My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:9-10)

Contrary to some modern Christian theologies of today, God has not promised us a bed of roses in this life. Some He heals, some He doesn’t. Even salvation is a gift of God, not something we deserve, lest anyone should boast of “spirituality”. The power of Christ rested upon Brenda whenever she would call upon her Lord.

My flesh and my heart fail; But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Psalm 73:26

Brenda’s humanity was not always easy to see or be around. Her immediate family had many challenges to care for her and minister to her needs over decades. Yet, the miracle that was so evident in yesterday’s memorial service was how through all this suffering, imperfection, and hardship…she never denied her faith in the savior. She always saw through the pain and darkness holding on to the hope and joy of her salvation. She was blessed with enough faith to get her through the suffering and her humanity without giving up the hope of her salvation. I am not sure I could have done the same in her shoes.

More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. (Romans 5:3-5)

Through the examples of Brenda and other great people I have known and am around today, I now see the purpose and reason for pain and suffering. I now fully respect people who are overcoming suffering. It is easy to trust and believe in God when things are going well and we haven’t a “care in the world”.

In times of prosperity and health, you would think we would be grateful and rejoicing in these gifts from God. Unfortunately, it seems quite the opposite that in good prosperous times, humans tend to get prideful and self-sufficient. We forget our creator who provides every good thing. We quickly evolved into people full of pride and conceit…our own gods. We feel superior to those who are suffering and “lesser” in wealth or health. We lose sight of the strength it takes to overcome adversity and suffering. We lose sight of our dependence on God.

Many will remember Brenda as a young beauty queen with the vivacious smile that won her congeniality awards at beauty pageants while inside she was empty and suicidal. Many will see her in old movies or advertisements as the buxom beauty that she was in the flesh.  I will always remember her from the last time I was with her.

Last fall my wife and I were at their church on a Saturday evening preparing to minister the next morning. Brenda hadn’t been to church in months from what I understand because of her health, even though she lived in the next-door parsonage. She had not met my wife yet nor talked to me since I had returned to faith last year. She and Ray had both been believing and praying for my spiritual renewal for over 35 years.  Now that it had happened, she was resolute to come over and greet us. She had to hook up her oxygen tank to her nose harness and using the walker she struggled out to her car to drive the 150 yards over to the church entrance. She then slowly made her way up a number of stairs in pain and out of breath to get to where we were practicing music. It was a total surprise, even to her husband Ray.

As she hugged me she congratulated me for coming to my senses and trusting God once again in my life. She hugged and accepted my wife as if they were lifelong friends. Then we proceeded to practice some spiritual songs for the next day’s service. After a bit I looked back midsong to the pew where Brenda sat, raising her face and hands up towards the heavens, and worshipping her Lord to the music we were practicing.  I immediately recognized the beauty of this moment, the utter joy she had on her face, all alone in the pews, in touch with the spirit of the living God. That image to me will forever represent the real beauty of Brenda when submitted to God. Even in her suffering, Brenda was submissive to and blessed in the presence of her Lord and Savior with the most radiant smile.

Being a follower of Christ does not guarantee we will live healthy, prosperous lives. More likely we will be tested and persecuted in this dark world. “For he makes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust. (Matthew 5:45). Yet God always provides a way of escape though not always AROUND our suffering. He has promised to help us THROUGH our suffering, and it sometimes seems like the stronger the person the harder the test.

“So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal. (2 Corinthians 4:16-18)

Brenda is now in the presence of her Savior Jesus Christ and seeing all that is eternal. I can’t help but feel envious in a way. Believe me, I am in no hurry to leave my wife, family, or loved ones in this world, but I have glimpsed evidence of that eternity that awaits us, symbolized by Brenda’s uplifted hands and beautiful smile as she gave praise to God in the middle of her afflictions.

One day those of us who believe will join Brenda in that place where…“God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away.” (Revelation 21:4)

As an old hymn says “But until then my heart will go on singing…Until then with joy I’ll carry on… Until the day when I behold that city… Until that day God calls me home.