Everything Happens for a Reason

     This saying is a pretty common one I heard growing up and in the movies and in books I read. When I heard it said, a lot of times when I was more skeptical and doubting I would find it kind of a  nuisance, sometimes even dismissing any possibility of the truth of this phrase. 

         I honestly couldn't see how everything could truly happen for a reason, especially the bad stuff. 

But then as I got older, I started looking back at my life and noticed patterns and coincidences that I couldn't just simply deny away. I looked at the job I've landed and held down. I have been interested in military/war topics and history, and now I spend 5 days a week cleaning up after the ROTC department at MSU. 

        I look at the church I ran into and joined, and even though I haven't been perfect in my relationship with them, they still took me under their wing and loved me like a family member, even given my quirks and difficult tendencies.

        I look at the last 10 years (or longer) and I often have gotten angry, upset, and bitter because of some of the darkness that existed in my life. 

I held on to a lot of rawness for a few different things in my life, but as I've gotten older and matured a little bit, I have been starting to, rather slowly I'll admit, take a different perspective on things like my mental health, the tragedies of my past, and the outcomes of those things that have occurred, for better or worse.  

Even mistakes happen for a reason. If there is one thing that defines and shapes a person more than the glory of successes and victories, it's how that person responds to and addresses mistakes and failures. 

      I've made a ton of mistakes in my life. Some have been worse than others. Some almost cost me my life. In my anger and bitterness I blamed others for my mistakes, I blamed the country for my mistakes, and I blamed the world for my mistakes.  

 A real man doesn't blame everyone else when they mess up. A real man holds himself accountable and admits he was wrong. Even though a lot of my situation was out of my control, I definitely didn't help the situation with my choices by any means.

 In the midst of my darkness, my sin, my shame, and my hate, God used all this evil in my life to bring me to the awareness of how much I needed a savior. How much a sinner and a corrupted person like me needed to be cleansed and needed mercy. Thank God that He sent His Son as a means out of this broken life. 

 Jesus doesn't care how corrupted I got, how angry I am, how much I have sinned and transgressed against God, He loves me nonetheless, and will cleanse me of all this darkness in due time.

 I listened to this song over the last 4 years called "The Light." It is such a powerful song to hear in the midst of a lot of suffering.

 One of the lyrics in the song goes "Sometimes darkness can show you the light." 

     I wouldn't have come to the realization I needed help, to the realization I needed God, if I hadn't gone through the hell I went through. I wouldn't have realized how much I needed mercy.   

Everything does happen for a reason. I know that now. Even my biggest mistakes and the biggest tragedies of my life. God can redeem even the worst of things, even the worst of us, and He can save us in ways we don't understand, and He can save us however He wants to and whenever He wants to. 

      I know where I stand with God. I may not be perfect. I may not always be in control of myself, but He loves me nonetheless. He always will. I know in my heart He holds the people I have lost over the years in His Infinite Kingdom, where those spiritual brothers of mine are immersed in the Liberty and Love of the Creator for all time.  

       As far as the whole fate versus free will debate goes? I have a thing for "the middle way," the middle ground. As a result, I am a compatibilist. I believe fate and free will both exist, exist in relative harmony with each other, and the complexities of existence and the sheer amount of possibilities, probabilities, and outcomes through time are too complex for a finite, limited consciousness to process and understand, but for an infinite mind with unlimited capacity for awareness and understanding, understanding the intricacies and complexities of the arrangement between fate and free will is probably quite easy for the infinite mind of God. 

For us, though?  We are always at the mercy of forces and natures we do not understand. We are always at the mercy of God. 

Thank God for that. God can be pretty merciful. We all need His mercy from time to time.