Day 97 - The K word

It's been on my heart to talk about karma. It's a word that is used so often and has certainly been used against me, and probably you as well. It's also a word that friends have used to try and pick me up, to make me feel better when I have been wronged in some way. Karma has its own religious depth, but is also an every day word. To me it's so confusing with my personal faith.

In My Year of Faith I really began to question (in a good way) the ways that God works and why certain things happen to people. I began to study and seek answers to why we were in such a deep hole. Why really amazing people battle such hard trials, and why so many immoral and selfish people are so rich and successful. How does it all work? During our year I knew that some people felt like we were being punished in a sense for being materialistic or spending so much, while others felt like we were just part of the larger picture of what the country was going through. But as the year continued, and even as things got worse, I began to understand more about how God works, and why we cannot accept karma as an answer to what happens or will happen in our life.

Here is the thing. Only God knows His plans for us. He is the one working. He often uses awful situations to change us, to bless us, and to teach us about His love. Sometimes He does discipline us to try and give us a new direction, while He holds us up in love. Sometimes God creates miracles in our lives and fills us with grace. Sometimes God allows people to make their own decisions and lets the cards fall as they do.... because He gave us free will. And so often He puts us in situations where we have to climb, crawl, dig, and fight our way out because He is working in every part of our soul. And as individuals, we have no idea how He is working in other people's lives. I have heard so many testimonies of people who were well beyond the dark paths they had gone down on their own, and God rescued them. He used it for good. So when I think of karma, I think of how impossible it is to know what or who deserves payback because we don't know why or how God is, or may not be, working in their lives. We just cannot understand all of workings around us every second of every day and how people's paths were decided and why. And when we wish bad karma on someone else, isn't that completely contradictory?

Last week my cell phone was stolen and the word karma came up in a very encouraging way. But right away I thought, God doesn't seem to work that way. Sure, maybe He will punish the person who did that, I don't know. Maybe it's the Devil trying to work in my life to unhinge me. Maybe it's part of a plan that God has for that particular person. Maybe it was just a bad choice and part of our free will as humans. I don't know. I just don't think we can judge what will happen, or expect something bad to happen because we want it to, or think they deserve it. I now know that sometimes the things that would be pictured as punishment are actually blessings in disguise. And vice versa. We just cannot begin to understand the bigger picture, and so karma is something you won't hear me say, or wish, or believe in. All I believe in is God's love for me, and I trust Him and His plans for all of our lives.