{"id":1233,"date":"2014-06-23T19:55:58","date_gmt":"2014-06-23T19:55:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/?p=1233"},"modified":"2014-06-15T20:04:06","modified_gmt":"2014-06-15T20:04:06","slug":"under-the-eyes-of-a-watchful-loving-god","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/2014\/06\/under-the-eyes-of-a-watchful-loving-god.html","title":{"rendered":"Under the eyes of a watchful, loving God"},"content":{"rendered":"

So often I hear one or more people living with illness or pain say, “Why did God let this happen?” As many of you probably already know, I tend to take an “illness is neither bad nor good, it just is,” approach to the question of “Why?” or even, “Why me?” I don’t believe God is punishing us with illness or flogging us with pain.<\/p>\n

There is, however, another image that comes to mind when someone says, “Why?” and it goes back to one of the earliest activities that many of us did when we were children: Bicycle riding.<\/p>\n

Remember the excitement of seeing that first bicycle? Remember the little flicker of fear when we first put pedal to the metal and rode along under the watchful gaze and steady hand of our mother, father, or other caring soul who wanted to teach us to ride? Remember the elation at first “riding solo?” What freedom!<\/p>\n

And then, remember that first fall? The scraped knee, the bruised ego, maybe even the broken arm? And the same, loving parent who’d taught us to ride, picked us up, tended to our hurts, and encouraged us, even cheered us on, to ride again?<\/p>\n

As we live on this earth in human form, we will have our share of falls and hurts. Illness is one of these, as is pain, and there are others. But God is not absent as we ride and fall, feel the elation of freedom and the hard thud to the ground. Rather, he is teaching us to ride, again, and ever present to pick us up and tend to our hurts. He is, after all, our heavenly Father.<\/p>\n

As I “ride” through this life, I try to remember that God is watchful, loving, and ever-ready to pick me up if I fall. And what a great feeling of comfort and peace that is!<\/p>\n

Blessings for the day,<\/p>\n

Maureen\"Maureen<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So often I hear one or more people living with illness or pain say, “Why did God let this happen?” As many of you probably already know, I tend to take an “illness is neither bad nor good, it just is,” approach to the question of “Why?” or even, “Why me?” I don’t believe God…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":548,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,43,4,383,379],"tags":[1095,45,47,19,50,49,1097,1096,30],"class_list":["post-1233","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chronic-pain-and-illness","category-encouragement-in-life","category-words-of-encouragemnent-and-info-for-all","category-heart-health","category-lupus-2","tag-depressed","tag-faith","tag-god","tag-illness","tag-living-with-illness","tag-living-with-pain","tag-lonely","tag-lost","tag-pain"],"yoast_head":"\nUnder the eyes of a watchful, loving God - Good Days...Bad Days With Maureen Pratt<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/2014\/06\/under-the-eyes-of-a-watchful-loving-god.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Under the eyes of a watchful, loving God - Good Days...Bad Days With Maureen Pratt\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"So often I hear one or more people living with illness or pain say, “Why did God let this happen?” As many of you probably already know, I tend to take an “illness is neither bad nor good, it just is,” approach to the question of “Why?” or even, “Why me?” I don’t believe God…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/2014\/06\/under-the-eyes-of-a-watchful-loving-god.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Good Days...Bad Days With Maureen Pratt\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-06-23T19:55:58+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2014-06-15T20:04:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/files\/2013\/05\/Maureen-Pratt-Author-Pic1-246x300.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"mpratt\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Under the eyes of a watchful, loving God - 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She expected to be writing scripts. God had other plans. A few years after her graduation, Maureen was diagnosed with a life-threatening case of organ-involved lupus. Her life turned upside down as she grappled with the effects of the illness and other health conditions that ensued. She was no stranger to serious health challenges; even as a child, Maureen had survived numerous bouts of pneumonia, flu, and other infections. But lupus made her take a fresh look at her life goals - and took herlifelong, strong Catholic Christian faith and writing in a direction she'd never imagined. Today, Maureen writes and speaks about walking with the Lord while living with chronic pain and illness. Her most recent book is \"Don't Panic!: How to Keep Going When the Going Gets Tough (Franciscan Media). She is also the author of, \"Peace in the Storm: Meditations on Chronic Pain & Illness\" (Image Books\/Randomhouse), \"Beyond Pain: Job, Jesus, and Joy\" (Twenty-Third Publications), \"The First Year: Hypothyroidism, Second Edition\" (Perseus) and \"Taking Charge of Lupus: How to Manage the Disease and Make the Most of Your LIfe.\" She writes the syndicated column, \"Living Well,\" for Catholic News Service, and has also written for Saint Anthony Messenger Magazine, Journey for Women Magazine, The Upper Room Magazine, LupusNow, and Arthritis Today. Maureen's health continues to be a challenge, however she feels honored to be able to bring her perspective, from experience and knowledge, to others. \"Good Days...Bad Days with Maureen Pratt\" is a new way for Maureen to reach people who carry the burden of illness and pain in their lives, or who care for someone who does. Through the blog, she hopes to bring issues of health, wellness, and spirit into focus and, especially, inspire others that, no matter what health challenges, illness, or hardships they endure, each person can find a good way to realize the wonderful potential God has placed within each heart and soul.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.maureenpratt.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/author\/mpratt"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1233","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/548"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1233"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1233\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1234,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1233\/revisions\/1234"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1233"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1233"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1233"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}