Think It

Awful news can hit us like a freight train: a car accident, an unforeseen diagnosis, or the sudden death of someone we love. But sometimes we have more time for the reality of the heartache to set in: a difficult child has become a prodigal, financial setbacks, a worsening health problem, aging parents, the rolling news about a pandemic. Our gut instinct is always to shout, “Why? Why me? Why now? Why this?” Many of us have a default mode of being unwilling or unable to think. The moment is too threatening, we’re too afraid, and we don’t have the mental scaffolding to come up with satisfying answers. We gravitate to leaders who confidently claim they have the answers, even if their answer is to blame someone or a group that they find inferior and threatening in some way.

When we try to get a sense of peace from refusing to think, we’re setting ourselves up for more discouragement down the road. I believe God gives us peace as we think, but we need to focus on the right thoughts. It’s easy to drift in one of two directions: either we’re “just fine” because our thoughts are too superficial and rosy, or “the end of the world is near” because we get lost in the worst-case scenario. This type of “stinking thinking” can consume us.

Let me offer some suggestions to guide our thinking processes when we’re facing difficulties and need God’s peace and hope.

1. Accept grief as an essential part of gaining perspective. (1 Peter 5:7)
2. Avoid knee-jerk blame. (Job 38:2-7)
3. Realize that the reason for your suffering can’t be that God doesn’t love you. (Rom 8:31-32)
4. You have to fight for faith. (2 Cor. 10:3-5)
5. Think about Jesus. (Phil. 4:8-9)