If Joseph had been in our high school class he would likely have been voted "Most Likely to Succeed. He was handsome, well-built, articulate--at times to much so--he dressed sharp, and was the kind of guy who tended to rise to the top in whatever situation he found himself. Yet for the first thirteen years of Joseph's adulthood his life was a mess. He was rejected--and I mean really rejected--by his family, sold into slavery, falsely accused, put in chains, jailed, forsaken and forgotten.
His life is a poster-child for life's unfairness.
I wish I could say that life was more fair today than in Joseph's day. I wish I could, but I can't. I know children with parents who don't care, spouses with mates who are unfaithful--sometimes blatantly and cruelly so--hard workers who are under and un appreciated, and folk with the best of intentions who end up with the worst of results. If you got out of bed this morning you probably have already noticed that life isn't fair. A friend of mine says this is the way life is. And I'm the gopher.
Why?
Why does a good God allow such a dissonance between what obviously ought to be and what is?
Let's explore that a bit over the next couple of days.
First, as I begin to plumb the depths of messed-up-ness in this world I need not begin out there, I find plenty to examine right in my own heart:
- Stubbornness will compel me to insist on my own way even if it places someone else in a position they don't deserve.
- Selfishness causes me to defend mine even when it costs someone else theirs.
- Pride so inflates my opinion of my own importance that I will do all sorts of mean things to others, because I see myself as so much better than them.
I call Pogo to the witness stand.
Is it Mr. Pogo?
Just Pogo is fine. No, wait. Mr. is nice.
OK Mr. Pogo, would you comment on Life's unfairness?
We have met the enemy and he is us.
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