Gospel Musings: Tests, Trials, and the Fairness of God

In Sunday School this past week we were discussing a bit about how we don't always see why the Lord does what He does in our lives. In the scriptures we can see stories that often don't make sense to us - why does it seem like the Lord would punish one person and promote another in sometimes seemingly random ways? We know that of necessity much had to have been left out of the story. Sometimes it seems easy to fill in the blanks with our own interpretations. Life is like that too though, often times we may look around and wonder why others seemed to be so blessed when we struggle. Sometimes we may even have the reverse where we wonder why we are so blessed while others are struggling. It's all to easy to make judgement calls filling in the same blanks - attributing what we see as punishments to greediness, wrong doings, laziness, foolishness, or the like and attributing what we see as blessings to the talent, skill, intelligence, or righteousness of the receiver.

I think that when we do so we are forgetting that God is the one in control. He knows us not just how others know us but how we really are deep down at our very core. He knows our thoughts and intentions, He knows where our heart is, and He knows what is best for us. As part of knowing what is best for us He may allow or even place certain challenges in our pathway back to Him that allow us to grow and learn. It doesn't mean that He doesn't love us. It doesn't mean that He is trying to punish us or be cruel, it just means that He knows there is something more we need to be doing and learning and I think that although calling these things tests seems to have a dispassionate nature to the trials we face that the Lord is extremely passionate about our well being. He wants us to be able to succeed. He rejoices in our successes and growth and sorrows when we struggle and hold ourselves back. 

I've heard people say that because He does this that God isn't fair. In the short perspective it certainly seems so sometimes. Thankfully however, God doesn't work based on a short term perspective. His perspective is based in Eternity. In the eternal scheme of things fairness means that everyone gets what they need - exactly what they need. I think it's almost impossible to truly appreciate this eternal view while in mortality and so we fall back on judgements towards others and ourselves that are often unjust. Still as long as we can recognize the folly of such judgements and keep working on maintaining that eternal perspective we have a better idea of God's true love for each of His children in all their tests and trials whatever form they may take.