Everything Happens for a Reason and Other Misstatements of Faith

On May 19^th I fell off the tailgate of my pickup truck. I broke both legs in multiple places and sustained severe soft tissue damage. After two surgeries and five days in Intensive Care I was transferred to a rehab facility where I spent another two-plus weeks. Thus, the Irreverent Reverend was missing in action for a few weeks; but I’m back, a little the worse for wear but back nonetheless.

Such accidents occasion reflection. For example, life can change in an instant. Exiting the tailgate of a pickup truck is something I have been doing all my life. This time it went horribly wrong. Sometimes life is what happens when you are making other plans.

Many well-meaning friends and healthcare workers were quick to state that, “everything happens for a reason.” They posited that this accident had some larger purpose in the eyes of the divine so that I might gain some kind of insight.

I don’t buy it for a minute. God did not send this to me as some sadistic lesson on _______; fill in the blank. God was not offering a cosmic commentary on my human experience in the hope that this clueless human would manage to get it, whatever “it” is. I think this makes God into a real creep.

On the other hand, neither did God intervene to save me from my klutziness.  No giant magic hands appeared to catch me and cradle me to the ground so I might avoid injury. I heard no trumpets signaling the suspension of the laws of gravity for my singular benefit. If God were to protect everyone from personal disaster, God would have quite a job—protecting little Jimmy from crashing on his bicycle or saving Mary from a rear end collision because she was looking at her phone. The opportunities for divine intervention to save people from themselves are endless. I dare say such suspension of the laws of nature would result in utter chaos around the globe.

Here’s the reason my accident happened: GRAVITY. It is Newton’s first law of motion. This law states that an object (my body) will remain in motion until acted on by a force (the driveway). As a result of such an outside force acting on the object in motion, the object’s movement in changed (stopped dead with a splat in the driveway).

There is no mystery here. It’s simply the law of gravity proving itself in a moment of klutziness and misstep.

Instead, God’s presence was revealed in countless other ways. Neighbors heard me screaming for help and came to my aid. One neighbor who is a nurse got a towel to rest my head on and helped me calm my breathing. Two other neighbors stayed by my side calling 911 and calling Jean to come home right away. They all stayed with me until the rescue came and Jean got home. Later, they returned and finished the job I had started when I fell. I only knew one of these neighbors, but in those moments they were the very face of God. In the ambulance I wept with gratitude for their presence and care, as well as for the ambulance staff who were comforting and encouraging. There were countless other epiphanies in the following days. The surgeon, nurses, aides, dietary and housekeeping staff were unfailingly kind and competent. Later in rehab I again encountered the very face of the divine in those who cared for and encouraged me to begin the first hesitant steps toward recovery.

Sometimes we are so busy looking for God in a burning bush we miss how God shows up in a glowing twig. Waiting for a manifestation of the divine in trumpets and fanfare, we can miss how the holy shows up in a handclasp and the still small voice of calm.