When Life Is Unfair - Mark 15:15-20,29-32,37-39; 16:5-7
I learned as a young boy that life is sometimes unfair to the best of people. Some of my best friends had gated saddle horses and a good saddle to ride on errands and for fun. I rode a brown mule named Old John, bare backed with two bushels of shelled corn in front of me to the Turnage grist mill where I traded one bag for the grinding of the other; no fun, but better than walking.
I wanted to be an athlete and to be accepted. Base ball and basketball were my favorite sports but I weighed about 120 pounds, was slow and had two left feet and was always the last one to be chosen to play on a team.
At eighteen and subject to the draft, I volunteered for the air force because I had a desire to be a pilot. I had owned three old cars and overhauled the motors, transmissions and installed mechanical brakes. I was mechanically minded and knew I would enjoy flying a plane. With my mechanical experience and a high school education I had no problems with the aptitude test for the Corps and past the entire test with flying colors. Then I failed the physical test because of a doctor’s error in his diagnosis. Six months later I was drafted into the Infantry and walked everywhere I went, and slept in fox holes instead of air force barracks. By the time I was twenty and serving in the 5th Army in Italy, I was convinced that life is unfair.
My father was in poor health when I left home to enter the service. He soon became unable to work, and died at the early age of sixty in 1948. I had returned to the states and got to be with him only a few months before he died far two early in age. He was denied the good years he could have enjoyed with us; especially his two grand children. I loved my dad dearly and dealt with a great deal of anger toward God, and what I saw as life’s cruelest demonstration of unfairness. That was not the last experience I had with unfairness, but I have learned that unfairness is a work of the devil and evil people and does not come from the hand of God. It has sometimes been hard to admit, but God may allow strife in the life of one of his children; but if He does it is only as a test of our faith. Mine has always been a mustard seed faith, growing, but oh so slowly. I continually pray for greater faith.
No one desires to be treated unfairly but if you are a mature adult you know by now that it happens in a wicked world of imperfection. There are times when you will know the perpetrator and you feel that others are to blame but that does not remove the pain or displeasure and the misdeed can not be undone. Revenge never pays dividends; in fact it only tends to make things worse. Placing blame on others or blaming ones self, giving up on life and people and failing to cope with the situation will never solve the problem.
You have an alternative. In Romans 8: 28 we learn that we should blame no one and turn to God in faith believing that all things work for good to you in your problems if you are one of his called—and you are living in his will for your life. Ask yourself…am I the only one that is or has been mistreated? The answer definitely is NO. You have the best example known to man, right here in verse 15 of this lesson. “Then, willing to gratify the crowd, Pilate released Barabbas to them. And after having Jesus flogged, he handed Him over to be crucified.” WAS THIS UNFAIR?
Listen, dear friend, all was well and there was no unfairness in this beautiful, wonderful, and perfect world until God, in his honesty and fairness, gave Adam and Eve the privilege of choice. The first individual choice to please one’s self instead of God was made by Eve in the Garden of Eden.
Please study carefully all the vivid descriptions of UNFAIR treatment that was dealt to the Son of God. He carried his own cross until total weakness caused him to fall. He was beaten until his body was bloody from the blows; nailed by hands and feet to the cruel cross; spit upon and offered only bitter liquids instead of a drink of water. He knew beyond any doubt that all of this mistreatment was underserved and was coming from bitter enemies—but he never became angry, and in the end made the astounding request of his Heavenly Father—“Father forgive them for they know not what they are doing.
This entire horrid picture simply explains what had to be done to save mankind from total destruction. It was necessary. It had to be. It was God’s only plan. If this is true in the case of Jesus Christ, is it not possible that our unfair treatment is possibly a necessary part of our Christian life? Bear it and pray that your heavenly Father will forgive your enemies.
