Fighting God

World AIDS day is coming up, but it doesn't really matter because I always think about it anyway. It is such a tragedy. Although in North America AIDS is inexorably linked to sexual and other lifestyle behaviors, (98% or so ) in other countries it is not so clear-cut. Take for example a country like Swaziland with a >30% AIDS rate: thousands of children are born with AIDS, not because of a poor choice; they are innocent victims.
Or how about Malaria. Actually, Malaria kills more people than AIDS does, it always has, and the rate of it is growing. It is completely treatable, but the vast percentage of people who don't have access to medical care make the yearly death toll from Malaria about 2.7 million. Innocent victims. (I should know: when I got malaria I did absolutely nothing to deserve it.)
Cancer is another one. Almost everyone in the world will somehow be affected by cancer in one way or another. I spent my entire childhood holding my breath in gas stations so I wouldn't breathe in carcinogenic fumes, avoiding junk food, not using a microwave, eating disgusting herbal concoctions- but guess what! An average day in the chemistry lab I am breathing in chloroform, getting benzene all over my hands, spilling acid on my jeans, inhaling ether: my kids are going to be born with three heads and I'll probably die at 39.
I've concluded we can't prevent suffering. God will get us one way or the other: not that he is cruelly waiting to hurt us, but that he loves us so much that he has to hurt us. I can't hope to offer a reason for the innocent victims of AIDS, but I am seeing in my own life that so many things I consider tragedies are truly from God's hands. It is pretty easy to get mad and yell and shout when I slip in a puddle and drop all my books in the water, when I get a bad grade on something I worked hard for, when someone hurts me or a friend stands me up: but these things are from God. He gives! He takes away! Sometimes it seems he takes more than he gives. But blessed be the name of the Lord! He is using these things to make me more like him, to help me love him more, to mold my character so I can be used by him. And for a lot of other reasons I don't understand.
"I know you can do everything." Job said. "No plan of yours can be thwarted.... surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know.... My ears had heard of you, but now my eyes have seen you!"
I've pretty much wasted a lot of time fighting against people, against suffering, against God. But I've made a decision that instead of fighting against what God gives me- I'm just going to receive it. Receive what comes from his hands, whether it is painful or wonderful, because I know it is from him and I know he is good.