When you doubt "He lives"

Among the joys of the Easter season: a crocus,
simple but beautiful

She’d reached her end in trying to trust God--on Easter Sunday, too. And she was a missionary! But 62 years ago, Wilma Mathews, attending a service with a handful of Chinese, found she could not sing with the others, “He lives.” If He truly lived, why were they in such desperate straits? It was 1951, amidst ongoing hostilities in China. She and her husband Arthur, and little daughter, were caught deep inside China as other missionaries evacuated to safety. Local Communist officials clamped down on them, prohibiting travel and restricting their ability to secure enough food and fuel. They weren’t even allowed to talk with Chinese believers.

Back in her bare kitchen in the hovel where they lived, she remembered that in her things she still had a devotional tract by A.B. Simpson, “The ‘If’ in Your Life." She certainly had a big “if” in hers. “If” a letter had never come inviting them to minister in this far-away province, they never would have faced their current extreme deprivation. Finding the pamphlet, she read its lesson from the story of Lazarus dying. As Jesus came to Mary and Martha’s home, Martha greeted Him with that “if”: “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died” (John 11:21). In His omniscience, Jesus knew Lazarus was dying, yet He chose not to rush there. He let Lazarus die—He allowed the “if” to happen.

Simpson’s devotional continued: “I do not discount the ‘if’ in your life. No matter what it is….Come to the Lord with your ‘if,’ and let Him say to you what He said to Martha. He met her ‘if’ with His ‘if’! Said I not unto thee that IF thou wouldst believe, thou shouldest see the glory of God? The glory of God is to come out of the ‘if’ in your life.” Instead of putting a negative on that “if,” the pamphlet urged, take this perspective: “Nothing has ever come to me, nothing has ever gone from me, that I shall not be better for God by it….Face the ‘if’ in your life and say, For this I have Jesus.” (1)

We typically think only of Jesus’ resurrection in connection with Easter. But the miracle of Lazarus being brought back to life is also an Easter story. One is about God’s love in sending His only Son to die a horrific death in our place. The other is about His wisdom and power when our “ifs” blind us to His wisdom.

Like Martha, we may say, “Lord, why did you let my [parent/spouse/child/friend] die?” Or, “Lord, why did I lose [job/health/home/hope]?” I’ve been there. A few Easters, I was the one who could barely sing “He lives.” I believed it, intellectually. But I felt so overwhelmed by negative circumstances that I wondered if God really bring good out of them.

Like Martha, I needed my attention turned to the glory of God through all this. Years later, I can affirm He brought solutions, sometimes slowly, sometimes dramatically. Yes, we serve a risen Savior, powerful enough and loving enough to tenderly take our mournful “what-ifs” and turn them into a joyful “He did!”

(1) After two years, the Mathews were miraculously released. Their story is told in the classic missionary biography, Green Leaf in Drought, by Isobel Kuhn, published by OMF Books, 1958, 1981, p. 43.