Why Whys Aren’t Wise
I. Story
Viktor was seated in a crowded train headed for Budapest. He was one of the leading bee experts in Hungary and he was transporting a box of bees, which he had placed under his seat. He was enjoying the passing scenery and the cool breeze coming from the open window. As he was talking to the passenger seated next to him, he felt something crawling up his leg. Then he felt two and then three somethings crawling up his leg. As he pulled up his pant leg and looked down, he discovered that his bees had escaped from the box and were beginning to crawl up his legs.
Being a bee expert, he was not panicked, but he was afraid of the possible danger to his fellow passengers, so he calmly suggested that the other passengers leave the car while he recaptured the bees, which would involve a bit of disrobing as well. He was a modest man, as well.
After the other passengers cleared the car, Viktor began taking his pants off. Just as he had pulled them free of his legs, an express train passed, and the sudden draft from the open window blew his pants back into the corridor where they wrapped around the head of a conductor. A startled onlooker pulled the emergency brake. As the train lurched to a halt, somehow a fire started.
When other train officials rushed to the tragic scene they discovered Viktor, minus his pants. They assumed he must be an escaped mental patient, so they bundled him off to the nearest mental hospital, where it took Viktor 3 days to convince the doctors he was sane.
Viktor certainly had a bad day, and I am sure that several times that day, and the days following, he repeated the question, “why me?”
II. Response
I don’t suppose that anyone here can relate to Viktor’s problems? Do you ever have things happen to you that make you ask, “why me?” Of course you do. It is part of the human condition, so much so, that it has even become institutionalized.
III. Murphy’s Law
Edward A. Murphy was an engineer working on Air Force Project MX981 in 1949, designed to see how much sudden deceleration a person can stand in a crash.
One day, after finding that a transducer was wired wrong, he cursed the technician responsible and said, "If there is any way to do it wrong, he’ll find it."
The contractor’s project manager kept a list of "laws" and added this one, which he called
Murphy’s Law.
We know it better today as "if anything can go wrong, it will."
Murphy’s law has caught on so well because it does seem to explain the way life goes for most of us. Many derivations now exist:
The Murphy Philosophy
Smile . . . tomorrow will be worse.
Hartman’s Automotive Laws:
1. Nothing minor ever happens to a car on the weekend.
2. Nothing minor ever happens to a car on a trip.
3. Nothing minor ever happens to a car.
Cannon’s Cogent Comment:
The leak in the roof is never in the same location as the drip.
O’Toole’s Commentary
Murphy was an optimist.
IV. Application
Murphy’s laws are the secular attempt to answer the “why” question we so commonly ask. “Why am I having such a bad day today?”
“Because if anything can go wrong, it will."
But what kind of an answer is that? It’s essentially the same answer Judy and I got so good at when our children asked us why they needed to obey. BECAUSE.
In fact, I think the Spanish language has this approach down to an art. In Spanish, why is por que, and so is because. A little Mexican girl who doesn’t want to go to bed, says to her mother, “¿por que?” Her mother simply responds, “por que”
But let’s face it, these are only minor irritations in life. In a few days Viktor can go back to his bees, I’ll have the leak in my roof fixed and your car will have been repaired (maybe even twice, because the mechanic missed the real problem the first time.)
V. When Really Bad Things Happen
What happens when we confront the big problems of life? Why didn’t God keep my son from dying in that car crash? Why did God let my house burn down? Why was I born with the fingers I have? Why did God allow 9-11 to happen? The whys fall thick and fast when more serious tragedies strike.
Fortunately, we are not the first to have been overwhelmed by apparently senseless tragedy. The Bible is full of cases where people, and even whole nations, were visited with tragedy and the people immersed in these events asked why too. In most cases there was no satisfactory answer.
Habakkuk, a prophet in Judah, was one such person. Little is known of this prophet except that he penned a short book that is placed near the end of the Old Testament. Scholars are divided as to when he wrote, but it was probably toward the end of Manasseh’s reign, during the reign of Amon, or possible the first part of Josiah’s reign. Israel was in captivity at that time and only the Northern kingdom, Judah, remained.
VI. The Example of Habakkuk
Read Habakkuk 1:1-4
1. It appears that Habakkuk’s complaint is not new.
a. He has been repeating this complaint, it seems.
b. Others, especially as found in the Psalms, have complained of similar problems
i. How long wilt thou forget me, O LORD? for ever? how long wilt thou hide thy face from me? Psalm 13:1
ii. How long will ye judge unjustly, and accept the persons of the wicked? Psalm 82:2
iii. LORD, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph? Psalm 94:3
2. God’s people were acting sinfully.
3. Why has God not stopped them from their gross sinning.
VII. God Answers Habakkuk & Habakkuk Argues
God answers him in Habakkuk 1:5-11 (Read vs. 5 & 6)
1. Note: God does not answer Habakkuk’s why questions.
2. God plans to use the Chaldeans to punish Israel for their sins.
Habakkuk complains that God should not use the Chaldeans to punish His people.
Read Habakkuk 1:12-13.
1. The Chaldeans are worse than Judah. God should not use them.
2. Habakkuk reminds God not to totally destroy Judah, just to chastise them.
Then Habakkuk challenges God to give him a better answer.
Read Habakkuk 2:1.
1. Is Habakkuk being insolent?
2. He is simply asking God the deep why questions that are on his heart.
3. God encourages us to question him. (Some are afraid to argue with God.)
a. How much less shall I answer him, and choose out my words to reason with him? Job 9:14
b. Surely I would speak to the Almighty, and I desire to reason with God. Job 13:3
c. Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD . . . Isaiah 1:18
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yaw-kakh’
A primitive root; to be right (that is, correct); reciprocally to argue; causatively to decide, justify or convict:—appoint, argue, chasten, convince, correct (-ion), daysman, dispute, judge, maintain, plead, reason (together), rebuke, reprove (-r), surely, in any wise.
VIII. God Responds a Second Time
How does God answer? Reading God’s response, it seems He doesn’t answer Habakkuk’s why questions.
Read Habakkuk 2:2-4
1. God essentially tells Habakkuk, “I’m not going to answer your questions right now, just tell the people what I’ve told you is going to happen.”
2. Then, almost as if God is nudging Habakkuk a little, He says “The just shall live by faith.”
3. In other words, trust me Habakkuk, I know what I’m doing.
4. The faith that strengthened Habakkuk and all the holy and the just in those days of deep trial was the same faith that sustains God’s people today. In the darkest hours, under circumstances the most forbidding, the Christian believer may keep his soul stayed upon the source of all light and power. Day by day, through faith in God, his hope and courage may be renewed. "The just shall live by his faith." PK 386-387
God then proceeds to recount the various sinful acts that mankind is guilty of and finishes with a well known statement that is often taken out of context.
Read Habakkuk 2:20.
1. God is reminding Habakkuk that God is right where he belongs, He has not hidden himself from Judah.
2. He is also saying that He knows what He is doing, so Habakkuk can now keep quiet and stop arguing.
IX. Habakkuk’s Response
Habakkuk then takes God’s message to heart and composes one of the most beautiful prayers in the Bible praising God’s strength and glory, asking God to have mercy in the midst of judgment and expressing unwavering faith.
Read Habakkuk 3:2, 6 & 17-19
1. In our darkest hour we need to remember Habakkuk’s faith and apply it in our lives, “The just shall live by faith.”
2. When we feel like God has forgotten us, remember Paul’s words in Romans 8:35-39: Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? 36As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter. 37Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. 38For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, 39Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
X. Application
So, when you have bees crawling up your leg like Viktor, it is okay to ask “why me?” But don’t stop there. God has given a much greater opportunity.
1. God challenges us to turn to Him for answers.
2. God challenges us to argue with Him.
3. God challenges us to trust Him explicitly.
Bad things happen in this world, to good people, and to bad people, although it seems like the good people get the worst. Murphy’s law seems to be all too true. Why do bad things happen to good people? More specifically, why did this bad thing happen to me? God rarely answers that question. He would pour out only goodness on us all the time, if He could, but because we live in a sinful world, He can’t. Men have free will, and God cannot override it.
Why do bad things happen to good people? Because we live in a sinful world. Not the kind of answer we like, but there is no better answer available.
Once you have learned this and deepened your faith that God has everything under control, then maybe there is a better way to approach the bad things that happen. Don’t ask “Why Me, Lord?” when something bad happens. Ask God how He wants you to respond, and then leave the consequences in His hands.
It is all in the response. God can ALWAYS bring good out of bad, but He needs us to cooperate with Him to bring out the greatest good.
This is why Paul can say “Rejoice in the Lord alway: and again I say, Rejoice.” Rejoice when good things happen, rejoice when bad things happen, because “the LORD is in his holy temple.”
