Teresa Regula arrived<\/a> at Auschwitz as a sixteen-year-old. Once a healthy child, she contracted chickenpox, measles, and scarlet fever in the horrific Nazi concentration camp.<\/p>\n Speaking ahead of yesterday\u2019s eightieth anniversary of Auschwitz\u2019s liberation by Soviet troops, she said: \u201cWhen I returned (from the camp), I thought, \u2018I\u2019m never going to have children\u2014ever.\u2019 If they had to go through even a fraction of what I went through, I didn\u2019t want that.\u201d<\/p>\n Though she later married, she has remained childless all her life.<\/p>\n Having visited the Holocaust museum in Israel and several in US cities over the years, I know that I cannot begin to understand the horror of the atrocities inflicted on the Jewish people by the Nazis. A million of them were murdered<\/a> in Auschwitz, six million in total. A fourth of the victims were children.<\/p>\n I would imagine that many of Hitler\u2019s Jewish victims knew Psalm 22, David\u2019s famous prayer of lament. They of all people would have the right to pray its opening words:<\/p>\n My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning? O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer, and by night, but I find no rest (vv. 1\u20132).<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n David goes on to describe his suffering in detail:<\/p>\n And yet, he refuses to abandon his belief in the goodness of his God: \u201cYou are holy, enthroned on the praises of Israel. In you our fathers trusted; they trusted, and you delivered them\u201d (vv. 3\u20134).<\/p>\n Now comes the hard question: What do we do when God does not deliver us?<\/p>\n What would David say to the victims of Auschwitz?<\/p>\n One Jew in particular especially had the right to ask our question.<\/p>\n Jesus made David\u2019s initial lament his own cry from the cross: \u201cMy God, my God, why have you forsaken me?\u201d (Matthew 27:46). His death on Calvary fulfilled Psalm 22\u2019s descriptions in stunning detail:<\/p>\n Crucifixion was one of the worst forms of torture ever devised. And yet Jesus refused to drink even wine mixed with gall to dull his senses, choosing to experience the cross in all its excruciating pain (Matthew 27:34).<\/p>\n What\u2019s more, his sinless soul was made to bear the sins of all of humanity across all time (Isaiah 53:6; 2 Corinthians 5:21). You and I have no possible way to imagine the horror, disgust, and grief this must have caused him. Even worse, the holy Father was forced in that moment to turn from his sin-bearing Son, causing Jesus to cry out in agony at having been \u201cforsaken\u201d by him.<\/p>\n In total, Jesus suffered physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual pain on a level no other human has ever experienced. And yet, somehow, he found the faith to pray at the end, \u201cFather, into your hands I commit my spirit\u201d (Luke 23:46).<\/p>\n How can we do the same?<\/p>\n I have no simple formulas to offer Holocaust survivors, or those devastated by the wildfires and now the floods and mudslides<\/a> in California, or Ukrainians continuing to suffer<\/a> from Russia\u2019s immoral and illegal invasion, or anyone else facing the tragedy and pain of our fallen world.<\/p>\n However, I\u2019ve made two discoveries over the years that I find deeply encouraging in my hardest days.<\/p>\n When all is well, it is easy to trust in the God we credit for our success. When he answers our prayers in the ways we want him to, it\u2019s easy to have faith in him. But when our days are painful beyond despair, when our suffering knows no release and our grieved questions have no answers, those are the times when we need an omnipotent Father the most.<\/p>\n But he cannot give what we do not have faith to receive. And so, it is when we find it hardest to trust him that we most need to trust him. It is when we are sickest that we most need a doctor.<\/p>\n Of course, it is in such times that faith can be hardest to choose, which leads to my second observation.<\/p>\n One reason God allows us to come to the end of ourselves is so we can turn to him for the faith we cannot muster up ourselves, a faith that our circumstances can neither warrant nor produce. Then we can cry with the demoniac\u2019s desperate father, \u201cI believe; help my unbelief!\u201d (Mark 9:24).<\/p>\n I once heard a pastor say, \u201cWhen you don\u2019t have faith, pray for the faith to have faith.\u201d<\/p>\n We can ask our Lord to help us believe that his omniscient ways are higher and better than ours (Isaiah 55:9); that the God who \u201cis\u201d love can only want our best (1 John 4:8); that the Father who redeems all he allows will redeem even this, whether we understand his redemption in this life or the next (cf. 1 Corinthians 13:12).<\/p>\n Carolyn Custis James observed,<\/p>\n \u201cJoy isn\u2019t grounded in our circumstances; it is grounded in the unchanging character of God.\u201d<\/mark><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Will you choose joy today?<\/p>\n \u201cYou don\u2019t really know Jesus is all you need until Jesus is all you have.\u201d \u2014Tim Keller<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Teresa Regula arrived at Auschwitz as a sixteen-year-old. Once a healthy child, she contracted chickenpox, measles, and scarlet fever in the horrific Nazi concentration camp. Speaking ahead of yesterday\u2019s eightieth anniversary of Auschwitz\u2019s liberation by Soviet troops, she said: \u201cWhen…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4396,"featured_media":6902,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6899","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n\u201cI cry by day, but you do not answer\u201d<\/strong><\/h2>\n
\n
\n
Psalm 22 on the cross<\/strong><\/h2>\n
\n
\n
One: Faith in God is most needed when it is hardest.<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Two: My lack of faith is God\u2019s invitation to seek the faith he alone can give.<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Our latest website articles:<\/strong><\/h2>\n
\n
\n
Quote for the day:<\/strong><\/h2>\n