He is sovereign AND I have a free will. The ANDs of God. Two truths that co-exist simultaneously with an infinite gap of mystery in between. I accept that I don’t understand how they work together.  AND I can learn to accept the mystery and trust its Creator and His purpose in it. AND I can walk with Him in intimate relationship and trust Him to reveal His wisdom and mysteries as He chooses. 

God permits our free will – therefore, He permits pain and suffering. AND He is infinitely good and just. AND He is the only One with the power to redeem the pain and suffering and transform it into something of value with goodness. 

C.S. Lewis created the character of Aslan in the world of Narnia. His depiction of the image of Jesus through this persona is brilliant. Lewis narrates, “He is not safe, but He is good” providing a picture of God’s nuances, infinitely complex. The human mind cannot wholly comprehend…

“For My thoughts are not your thoughts,
    neither are your ways My ways,” declares the Lord.
“For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
    so are My ways higher than your ways
    and My thoughts than your thoughts.” Isaiah 55:8-9, ESV

The Bible describes the ANDS and some are hard to read. AND I can accept and come to Him and trust that He will make all things right if I surrender to Him.

“Come, let us return to the Lord;
    for he has torn us, that he may heal us;
    he has struck us down, and he will bind us up.” Hosea 6:1, ESV

Facts, science, knowledge, principles, rules, religion, formulas…cannot answer the most difficult and complex questions. I need wisdom. And ultimate wisdom is a Person – Jesus. A relationship with Him puts me on the path of wisdom AND I am not alone. As I come out, come to Him, and surrender, I find wisdom from and in Him. He places me on the path and journey of wisdom and in a posture to receive wisdom – which is the only way I can navigate this life. AND I cannot short-cut it. I can’t find a formula to side-step it. I cannot navigate life, pain, suffering without it. AND I cannot use and objectify God to control and manage it. 

Pain and suffering can be an obstacle to God, or it can be the path to Him – which in the end is all I need. I get to know and trust Him. I get to know myself. 

I recognize the trauma that made me a victim of the free will of others. Then I recognize the choices I made that perpetrated MY free will on others. The burden of both is too much. I cannot bear it. Then I realize that this is the ultimate wisdom and I recount it to myself again and again. 

God did not leave us in our pain and suffering. He knew that allowing free will would bring our destruction AND He created us in His image with freedom to choose. We are not pawns in a chess game. AND God also knew He would rescue us from ourselves. He laid out a plan that at the perfect time in history, He would enter this world as a human and suffer along with us. Yet in His free will, He never sinned. He always depended on His Father in the Holy Spirit and did not give in to temptation. He willingly suffered a horrific death and the ultimate pain – separation from the Father – taking on our destruction and God’s wrath for our free will choices. He took our destruction. In Him, God’s justice and mercy met in the saving of a people whom He loves and whom He came to save. This is the ultimate wisdom and why we can place our pain and suffering at His feet in surrender. He sits with us in it. He holds us through it. He understands and knows. AND He heals it when we bring it to Him in trust.

AND along the way He further opens up the mysteries of who He is, who I am, and the mysteries of life. It is a relationship and a path. He allows me to see, experience, and understand the wisdom and mysteries of the ANDs of God as I grow in my love, dependence, and relationship with Him – ultimate Wisdom.

Now – I can exercise my free will in Wisdom. I can accept. I can trust. I can surrender.