Sometimes things just don’t make sense. After months of preparation 40,000 people gather for a weekend of music, worship and celebration. But then a gust of wind blows a sign. The sign falls and tragically a beloved pastor, husband and father is killed and others seriously injured. Within hours the organisers, devasted by what has happened, cancel the whole event. How does any of it makes sense? Where was God and why did he allow it?
These are not new questions. The writer of Psalm 77 faces a devastating situation and asks not just these questions but many more, ‘Will the Lord reject forever? Has his unfailing love vanished? Has God forgotten to be merciful?’ His questions remain unanswered. So, in his distress he returns to what he does know for certain, ‘I will remember the deeds of the Lord; yes, I will remember your miracles of long ago’. The psalmist looks to the deliverance of his people from slavery in Egypt to freedom in a promised land. We may look to the cross and a God who doesn’t stand aloof from our suffering but enters into it and triumphs over it. Death has been defeated. That was what 40,000 people were gathering to celebrate and despite the tragedy that unfolded will continue to celebrate. Along with the psalmist they will say, ‘Your ways, O God, are holy. What God is so great as our God?’