Yet the bottom line is that we believe we will never understand why Reese has suffered so greatly for most of his three years. We have decided that if some greater purpose exists, its true meaning will elude us as long as we are in this life. When I sit alone praying for my son, I sometimes pray with as much bitter confusion as faith. When I turn on the television because I can't sleep nights, I see children in Bosnia hit with rocket attacks, children in Africa starving to death, children all over the world suffering. At these moments I have to stop myself from cursing what is good.
Life is good.
Life is of God. I believe it is inherently negative to curse what is of God, so I do not allow myself to do that. But I do not pretend to understand this world either, and I cannot simply accept it with a smile. The trick is to maintain the faith that chaos is not the norm in the spiritual realm, though it is often all we can see from the earth. James Elliott James Elliott lives with his wife, Marchelle, and son, Reese, 3.