No one and no life is exempt from grief. We all endure trials we wish we didn’t have to. And many of us are left with questions, with doubts, with fears, and with tears we think warrant some divine explanation. But what do you do when questions remain unanswered and broken things remain unremedied?
Singer and songwriter, Laura Story, knows this full valley well. Through her autobiography, “When God Doesn’t Fix It,” Laura shares the long, difficult, and still ongoing journey she and her family travel. Story walks us through events and details of her husband’s brain tumor, surgeries, and chronic disability. She gets vulnerable as she mourns the death of many of her youthful dreams and plans. She cuts to the core as she unpacks grief and doubt and discontentment. She doesn’t hold back in laying her soul bare about her husband’s illness, her struggle with her faith, a rocky season in her marriage, and her ultimate release of control to God.
The stories shared in “When God Doesn’t Fix It” highlight hard lessons Story had to learn and the truths which had to drown out the lies. Each of the twenty chapters ends with a myth and a truth. For example, chapter 12 – “Record Emotions” – reveals Story’s struggle to fulfill her duties as a worship leader when she didn’t feel the lyrics to many worship songs. Lyrics about God’s goodness were difficult to sing when she admittedly didn’t feel it. Her head knew God was good, but amidst her current pain, she couldn’t conjure up the needed feelings she thought she needed to have to sing the song. Through a study of David’s life and psalms, she saw the way David lamented and praised. When he hurt, he asked God to put a new song in his mouth. Story began to pray the same prayer and God gave it to her. So, chapter 12 ends by turning the Myth: “I worship because I feel good” into the Truth: “I worship because He is good.”
Story thought her testimony needed to be complete with a happy ending before she could share it. God taught her that her story was actually His story and He could use it to save the nations. Her single most private and vulnerable song, “Blessings,” became a chart-topping hit and a prayer for countless people who have written to tell her how God used that song to change their lives. Despite the pain and trials she and her husband have endured, she has decided to let her messy, incomplete story be used for God. Because that’s what God can do with messy things.
“It’s a hard truth to hear that our circumstances might not change and God might not fix the broken things in our lives. But I know personally that even when our situation doesn’t change for the better, we can change for the better.” This is just a bit of the honest wisdom Story shares with her readers, and it’s a truth many hesitate to share. But, it’s this hope we need in order to (as Story closes out) “live a better broken.”
A deeply touching journey and a raw account of real life hurt, “When God Doesn’t Fix It” will meet you right where you are in your grief and offer you an understanding friend and a joyful hope in Jesus Christ.