ARTICLE: Why Ask Why?

In the fall of 1991, Gerald Sittser and his family were returning from a weekend trip when a drunk driver struck their minivan head-on. As a result, he lost his mother, his wife of 20 years, and a four-year-old daughter. He and his three other children escaped relatively unharmed. The following excerpt, condensed from his book "A Grace Disguised" (Zondervan), chronicles a portion of his healing.

My wife, Lynda, and I had a conversation once about an accident reported in our local newspaper. A station wagon with six children and their mother had skidded off the freeway and sunk in six feet of water, killing three of the six children. We both commented nervously that the problem was not simply that something bad had happened to innocent people, but that something bad had happened so randomly. We shivered with fear before the disorderliness of tragedy. If there were going to be suffering, we at least wanted reason for it, predictability to it, and preparation to endure it.

That conversation comes back to me with bitter irony. For the last few years my dominant emotion has been a nervous and doleful bewilderment. A pause at a stop sign, a last-minute switch of seats before departure, a slower or faster acceleration after a turn would have spared us all unspeakable suffering.

I found myself questioning the orderliness of life. While nature displays an orderliness that scientists count on every day, order does not always prevail. At times the universe seems to make about as much sense as a little girl who thinks that her fleeting grudge against a brother is the reason he got measles.

THE TERROR OF RANDOMNESS

One of the worst aspects of my experience of loss has been this sense of sheer randomness. The event was completely outside my control--an "accident," as we say. The threat of anomie was and still is almost unbearable to me. I began to look with cynicism on the absurdity of life. Maybe, I thought, there really is no God and no meaning to life. I was tormented by an inability to discover any explanation that made sense of the tragedy. An answer to the "Why?" question eluded me.

Suffering may be fiercest when it is random, for we are then stripped of even the cold comfort that comes when events, however cruel, occur for a reason. To fall while attempting a dangerous climb without ropes leads to one kind of suffering. We shake our heads at the tragedy but realize that the climber should have taken precautions or attempted a climb within his or her range of ability. But to be killed by a random bolt of lightning or a stray bullet engenders another kind of suffering, in which case we tremble because there is no satisfactory explanation, no sensible pattern. Death just happened. The victim was simply at the wrong place at the wrong time.

For a long time, I wanted to change the events of that fateful day so that I could alter the present reality the accident had thrust upon me. But my brother-in-law Jack challenged me to reconsider whether I really wanted that kind of power. Did I really want to know what was going to happen so that I could protect myself from the random accidents that inevitably occur in every life? And if I knew what accidents were ahead and could change the course of my life, would I want to know what new accidents would befall me? What I really wanted, he said, was to be God.

WHY ME?

I have asked the question "Why me?" often, as many people do after suffering loss. Most of us want control of our lives. And we succeed a great deal of the time, which is due in part to the enviable powers Western civilization has put at our disposal. The possibility of so much control makes us vulnerable to deep disappointment when we lose control.

Loss deprives us of control: Cancer ravages, violence erupts, divorce devastates, unemployment frustrates, and death strikes--often with little warning. Suddenly we are forced to face our limitations squarely. We resent the intrusion, the inconvenience, the derailment. We never plan on loss.

Loss also has little to do with fairness: There is often no reason for the misery of some and the happiness of others. Our universe is hardly a safe place; it is often mean, unpredictable, and unjust, resulting in our asking the question over and over, "Why me?"

Once I heard someone ask the opposite question: "Why not me?" It was not a fatalistic question. He asked it after his wife died of cancer, acknowledging that suffering is simply a part of life. They had been married for 30 years and had enjoyed many happy moments together. But then the time came to experience another, more painful side of life. He could no more explain why his life had turned bad than he could explain why his life had been so good up to that point. "Why not me?" is as good a question as any.

This man has perspective. Wars and plagues have claimed the lives of millions; poverty and deprivation abound among more millions. And millions of others endure abuse of one kind or another. "Why me?" seems to be the wrong question to ask. "Why not me?" is closer to the mark, once we consider how most people live.

My tragedy introduced me to a side of life that most people around the world know all too well. Even now I hardly qualify as a tragic figure, considering the good life I have been privileged to live for so many years and live even today. The accident was really a brief, albeit dramatic, interruption in an otherwise happy, secure, and prosperous life. To many people I am even heroic, which seems ironic to me, since I have only done what people around the world have done for centuries--making the most of a difficult situation. So why not me? Why should I expect to live an entire lifetime free of disappointment and suffering? That expectation strikes me as both unrealistic and arrogant.

GRACE UNDERSTOOD

Certainly, on a superficial level, living in a perfectly fair world appeals to me. But deeper reflection makes me wonder: In a fair world I might never experience tragedy; but neither would I experience grace. Grace is grace only when it is undeserved.

I prefer to live in a universe in which I get what I do not deserve--positive or negative. This means I will suffer loss, but I will also receive mercy. I dread undeserved pain, but it is worth it if I can also experience undeserved grace.

If I have learned anything over the past three years, it is that I desperately need and desire the grace of God--which has come to me in unexpected ways. Friends have remained loyal and supportive, in spite of my struggles. Quietness, contentment, and simplicity have gradually found a place in the center of my soul, though I have never been busier. I go to bed at night grateful for the events of the day, which I try to review and reflect on until I fall asleep, and I wake up in the morning eager to begin a new day. My life is rich and productive, like Iowa farmland in late summer.

And my children have become a constant source of joy to me, however demanding my role as a single parent. Almost every day I take a few moments to listen to them practice their instruments, play a game with them, shoot a few baskets, talk about the day, and read aloud to them. When they go to bed, I always follow them down to their rooms and tuck them in. And just before I crawl into bed, I sneak into their bedrooms and pray God's blessing upon them, a practice I learned from Lynda. These are precious moments, made more so by the tragedy we have experienced together.

Despite my having been a Christian for many years before the accident, God has become a living reality to me as never before. My confidence in God is quieter but stronger. I feel little pressure to impress God or prove myself to him; yet I want to serve him with all my heart and strength. My life is bountiful, even as I continue to feel the loss. Grace is transforming me, and it is wonderful. I have slowly learned where God belongs and have allowed him to assume that place--at the center of life rather than at the periphery.

So, God, spare us a life of fairness! A world with grace gives us more than we deserve. It gives us life, even in our suffering.

Gerald L. Sittser is professor of religion at Whitworth College and the author of "The Adventure" (InterVarsity).

Copyright © 1996 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

Have something to add about this? See something we missed? Share your feedback here.