Change

When I think of the word change I imagine things happening slowly. In a controlled way. Caused by decisions I have made.
In fact change in lots of people's lives seems to be sudden and unexpected. Chaotic and unpredictable. Caused sometimes by happy events and often by sad events. A number of people we know have been afflicted by sudden change by the death of family members or by illness. This is a sort of change that you can't plan for - I suppose you could dread it happening just in case it did happen but I don't suppose that that would help. I'm not sure how I would cope if this kind of thing happened to me. I have had unexpected change; the most sudden and bad I suppose was being made redundant, but even then I was kind of half expecting it. Other changes have been more expected and planned: The birth of my children, getting married, buying a house and these have been happy things in contrast to the pain and loss of a bereavement.

How are we supposed to cope when bad things suddenly happen? Do we retreat from the world so it can't hurt us any more? If we have a faith in God to we blame him or cling to him? Or both? How do we help those who have been devastated by this grief,we can comfort them and pray for them, but we can't make things better?

I don't know.