he's a comin'!

Until this very week, I never understood why every Christian I knew wanted the world to end and for Jesus to come back. I would always here people say "Jesus is coming soon!" when something bad happened (like 9/11, earthquakes, tornadoes, pretty much anything), but I hoped he wouldn't. I knew bad things happened, but I also lived in a bubble. I never thought of the world as a dark, sinful...awful place. Even now, it's hard to call it that. It is beautiful....very beautiful...but oh so broken.
This week is the Casey Anthony trial. This week an 8 month old in a town not even twenty minutes away was drugged with oxycodone, pain killers, and had all of his tiny toes broken. This week, a nine month old two hours away, died from his father leaving him in a hot car for four hours...on fathers day. I am begining to see just how broken the world is...when parents can murder, drug, abuse, forget, and harm their very own children. It.happens.to.often. Child abuse is not uncommon. Child abandonment is not uncommon. It's so sad, its weighing so heavy on my heart. I can't get the 8 month old out of my head, and while driving today and thinking of him, I realized I am finally OK with Jesus coming NOW. The world is so mysterious. There is so much beauty...everything God made. The sunsets, the sunrises, the ocean, the animals, birth, the laughter of my children, people, babies, weddings, people giving their lives to Christ, missionaries, parenthood, those who are doing great and wonderful things for God...the list can go on.....
Then there is also so much pain. So much hate. Crime. Drugs. Abuse. Addictions. Murder. Sin. War. Lies. False Gods. You name it...
God has a great, great, great amount of patience.
If I sent my son to die as a sacrifice for someone, and they still choose to harm each other, I would have come back after the second chance, I would not be able to watch it all.
Isn't it weird how sin, is sin? How here on earth, we like to put "ranks" on sin...but to God, me gossiping today is just the same as Casey Anthony murdering her little girl. It's different when you look at it that way.
I know that we will never understand the world and how God works and why he does what he does. Even in a situation where a child is in a coma with 10 broken toes, God has a plan bigger than we can ever imagine. Tonight, I am ever so thankful that I can stand on his promises when I hear of the awful abuse and neglect of children right around me.