It is January 12 and all day I have been wanting to blog about Haiti. But the recent situation in Arizona weighs heavy on my heart as well.

I am not going to pontificate on why God allowed these tragedies to happen. (I was not too happy at this time last year.) But what I have learned in the past year since the Haiti earthquake and continue to keep in mind in light of the Arizona shooting is that God is sovereign—He is in control of all of these situations.

I don’t understand God’s mind, and I can’t explain why He didn’t prevent any of these things when, on many levels, it seems as if He could have kept them from happening. But as a believer in His son Jesus Christ, I will attempt to rest in the knowledge that the finite cannot ever fully understand the mind of the infinite and His ways are much greater than mine. A recurring theme in enjoying God right now is trust, and in all of these things, God is constantly asking me: Will you trust me? Will you trust that my judgment is in everyone’s best interest?

God challenges me and tells me in Jeremiah that He knows the plans He has for us, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give us a future and a hope. And then I wonder about the kind of future a dead 9-year-old has and the hope her parents have. Trust is not always easy.

It is during these times that I find myself a bit somber but also a bit more willing to give up control because I have no control over these situations. I have to rely on the fact that an omniscient, omnipotent God does. Otherwise the world goes to”hell in a hand basket” (as they say) and thinking that way gives me no comfort or peace at all.