Steve Saint's Story of His Daughter's Death

Yesterday, in the first message on the book of Job in our series on suffering, I struggled to make it through reading the story Steve Saint tells of his daughter's death. Here's the link, for those of you who asked. For those of you who weren't there yesterday, here's enough to encourage you to go and read the whole thing.

Saint said:

I believe God planned my daughter’s death. ... 

We have an idea that if we do what God wants us to do, then he owes us to take the suffering away. I believed that; I don’t believe that anymore. ...

...Grandfather Mincaye...saw her at the hospital, lying on a gurney with a tube down her throat and needles in her arm, and he grabbed me and said, “Who did this to her?”...

I didn’t know what to say. “I don’t know, Mincaye. Nobody is doing this.” 

And just like that, this savage from the jungles grabbed me again and said, “Babae, don’t you see?” 

No, I didn’t see. My heart was absolutely tearing apart; I didn’t know what was going on. 

He said, “Babae, Babae, now I see it well. Don’t you see? God himself is doing this.” 

And I thought, what are you saying? ...

Why is it that we want every chapter to be good when God promises only that in the last chapter he will make all the other chapters make sense, and he doesn’t promise we’ll see that last chapter here?

Job 1:20-22 (ESV, emphasis added)

Then Job arose and tore his robe and shaved his head and fell on the ground and worshiped. And he said, "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return. The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD." In all this Job did not sin or charge God with wrong.

If you want to listen to the message where he told the story, you can find it here.