deepish random ponderings

Part of my morning routine is to have a little roam around the Blogworld. These blogposts do many things - some posts amuse and entertain as I read of the events small and large that form part of the daily lives of my blog friends. Other posts inspire creativity, and then there are the posts that inspire me to think and ponder.

This particular morning there are 2 posts that sent me down a particular path of thought. First I read the latest update from our friends Mark and Tash over in London. Tash is battling secondary breast cancer. In Doodlebug vernacular what is happening to her stinks, but she remains such a positive and vibrant person.

While I was digesting the latest news which isn't good, I visited Jordan over at the Wonderwheel and her beautiful piece on faith and its place in parenting. One particular point Jordan brought up was the belief in "everything happens for a reason" and how she prefers to turn that around to believe we can find reason in everything that happens. Jordan wrote her piece so beautifully that I won't butcher it by trying to paraphrase what she said, but I wanted to think out loud for a while over here instead.

I believe in an omnipotent, omniscient Heavenly Father and that He has a plan for us. This means that I believe things happen for a reason or purpose even when I don't see clearly what that reason or purpose is in the short term. Usually the reason can only be seen by hindsight.

Life on earth may appear random in the way good and bad things happen to people. A bit like a boardgame e.g. Monopoly where landing on the "chance" box means drawing a card that might earn us a blessing or a tribulation in a completely random fashion. But, according to scientific theory, nothing is truly random. What might appear random to one person might have a pattern to another. All the bad things that happen such as war, natural disasters and disease are part of our earthly existence. So are the personal disasters or trials we face in our life. Are these things random? Are our reactions to them random? Some people find faith despite disaster or even because of it while others use these things as a reason not to believe in God.

I believe that everything happens for a reason and that the reason is for us to find reason or purpose in everything, to find faith, to find good in ourselves and others and to use this for good.