Following God yet Bad Things are Still Happening to Me

To me, it didn't make sense.

My most asked question during my transformation from domestic violence victim to survivor over the past 11 years is this:  If I give my life to God, believing and following Him to the best of my abilities, why do bad things still happen in my life? Why doesn’t God, the one who can calm the sea and perform miracles, remove all the negativity out of my world once I pronounce my belief in Him?
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Am I the only person who felt worthless after begging God to keep me alive the night my abuser attempted to kill me, only to find out that the next few years of my life continued to be inundated with unbelievable stress, anxiety, and financial ruins? My ruined self-confidence convinced me that even God considered me a loser and didn’t want to me around me.

Domestic Violence and Faith

I was so confused when I turned to my faith for assistance in unraveling the mess that my world had become after the children and I separated from my abuser. One false belief I believed to be true was that God was still punishing me for my earlier sins in life. Just like my earthly father spanked me when I was little, I was sure God was punishing me for my sins also. So, carrying this misbelieve further, it made sense to me that if I was still suffering and in pain, God wasn’t done punishing me yet.

Resentment started rising in my soul. Yes, that is great what God is offering to other people.  Yet with zero hope and confidence left in me, I believed there was no way He was offering to take care of me also.  A new sense of loneliness started filling me. Envy and disappointment filled my thoughts as I believed God’s offering of love was for other people, not for a falling-apart victim like me.
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As a newbie returning to faith, it just didn’t make sense.

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Why follow God if He isn't removing the "negativity" from my world the way I thought He promised to?

But God never said He would remove bad things that happen in our worlds when we start following Him. He never promised to remove hardship out of our lives.

What he says that He will be here will us, carrying us along during the journey.

Here are just a few examples of the many Scriptures that talk about how as God’s children through Jesus Christ we can expect to experience suffering, but how God is faithful in the midst of it.

Psalm 34:19 “Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all.”

Isaiah 43:2 “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you.”

1 Peter 5:10 “And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.”

2 Corinthians 1:3-5 “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too.”
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In John 16:33 Jesus said, “In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”

This is how one hymn writer put it, many years ago:

God hath not promised skies always blue,
Flower-strewn pathways all our lives through;
God hath not promised sun without rain,
Joy without sorrow, peace without pain.

But God hath promised strength for the day,
Rest for the labor, light for the way,
Grace for the trials, help from above,
Unfailing sympathy, undying love.

God hath not promised we shall not know
Toil and temptation, trouble and woe;
He hath not told us we shall not bear
Many a burden, many a care.

God hath not promised smooth roads and wide,
Swift, easy travel, needing no guide;
Never a mountain, rocky and steep,
Never a river, turbid and deep.

But God hath promised strength for the day,
Rest for the labor, light for the way,
Grace for the trials, help from above,
Unfailing sympathy, undying love.

~Annie Johnson Flint (1866-1942)

When I learned the truth that God wasn’t going to lay out a path of rose petals for me, I’ll be honest, it was hard for me at first. But I found that when I had to experience hardship and learn to trust Him through it, I became stronger and more filled with faith as I saw Him work in my life again and again.
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And that’s what the Christian life is all about.