Entropy
It is a beautiful thing when the supporting details of our lives are shiny and new and in tip-top shape. There is nothing quite so grand as a life that is firing on all cylinders with blue skies and clear paths as far as the eye can see. It is a beautiful thing, that kind of life, but alas, it is not a permanent thing.
To the contrary, it is most likely that these supporting details of your actual life are squeaking and creaking along and just generally wearing out. The very irritating fact of life is that Everything Breaks Down. Everything.
Our houses fall apart. Our cars wear out. Our bodies get old and sick. Even the sun is slowly burning itself out. It’s not fun, but it is true. Everything in the universe breaks down. And that simple little fact guarantees that at least some of the time, our lives are going to be hard.
Life is going to let us down big time, and that is going to be a very unpleasant experience. It may be something like your car breaking down and leaving you stranded late at night on a lonely highway. It may be something like your marriage breaking down and leaving you devastated in a lonely life. It may be something like you breaking down and failing a lot of people that you love and care about. The details change from person to person and from year to year, but somewhere, somehow, something is always breaking.
And that is pretty terrible news.
In the Bible there is a book called Lamentations, and it is about as fun as its name makes it sound. The whole book is basically a very sad song of a guy who watched as God allowed the destruction of a bunch of people because of their sins against Him. It was a terrible time that lasted for a terribly long time. But even in the midst of that particularly awful breakdown, there is this relentless theme of hope.
For example, partway through Chapter 3 in Lamentations, it’s talking about a bunch of pain and hardship and yet we find these words, starting in Verse 19. It reads:
I remember my affliction and my wandering,
the bitterness and the gall.
I well remember them,
and my soul is downcast within me.
Yet this I call to mind
and therefore I have hope:
Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion;
therefore I will wait for him.”
—Lamentations 3:19-24
It is absolutely true that everything in creation breaks down. And because of that fact, you most likely have some fear or anxiety or pain in your life right now today. You have earned it, and life has given you every reason to carry it. But remember that that is not the whole story.
It is also true that God is faithful. That His plan for everybody is good. And that He never breaks down. Other things are going to keep breaking down. But if you are slogging through the breakdowns of life with no hope and nowhere to turn, you don't have to do that anymore. You can trust God to do right and be right and to care about you every day of your life.
