One of my exercise routines is to walk the walking track at our school. About a couple of years ago I was doing my walk when a little girl from our church who was about four years old at the time waited for me on the track and took my hand to walk with me. As you can imagine, I was honored beyond words. Then after awhile off she went. But it was enough to stir up a thought in me as to what I would do if anyone tried to hurt her. I’m not known as a violent man, but I can tell you this that if anyone had come up to us on that track and attempted to harm her, you’d have witnessed some serious violence on my part to protect her, even if it cost me my life.
I’m far from being alone in these sentiments. I cannot think of a dad I know who wouldn’t lay down his life to protect a young child from danger or protect any vulnerable person for that matter. It seems to be a universal instinct unless we school ourselves into suppressing it.
Where did this powerful instinct to protect the vulnerable come from? I suggest to you that it is a minuscule embodiment of something in God’s heart — something he put in us. For that matter I would go so far as to consider it something he did in us to extend his own help to those who are vulnerable. That is to say, every vulnerable person we protect is in fact an act of God through us.
Take to heart what that means: when you take hold of God‘s hand to walk with him, his heart goes out to you with such deep affection that he would sooner lay down his life protecting you before he would see any harm come to you.
But then we have to ask how it is that even children can and do suffer from terrible cancers, for example, or tragic accidents that maim them for life, or unspeakable abuse? Where’s the protection? Where is God in the face of such horrors?
That is an important question, but if we leave it generalized, then I must say I don’t know. Nobody knows. But if we bring it up close, into our specific life situations, I think something of an answer emerges. That is to say, that if we will pay attention to our own passionate sentiment to protect the vulnerable, and in so far as possible, live to sooner die before we would allow anyone around us to suffer harm, then we become part of God’s protecting work in this dangerous world.
So instead of endless questions on the problem of human suffering in the presence of the fact that each human being is precious to the Lord, let’s at least make sure that we curtail the suffering we so easily inflict on others. In spite of our unanswered questions, by God’s grace, let’s make sure God can protect as many people as possible through each of us.
