"Deal with it." Advice given me by Carl Jordan.
Try
to picture your life without any of the causes or results of grief,
sin and pain. What would that free you to do?...(Serendipity Bible
10th Anniversary Edition, page 1053).
Many
years ago a good friend of mine gave me some excellent advice. I was
bemoaning privately with him some difficulty I was under and he
firmly said "Deal with it" or he might have said "Just
deal with it." I consider this some of the shortest but best advice
I've ever received. For it says quite bluntly to face the facts,
don't give in, don't try to run away, don't fret, don't engage in
stultifying wishful thinking – to the contrary it says take
responsibility.... just deal with it. A call to responsibility and
facing the facts is always good—you can put your money on it. I
have called this advice to mind repeatedly in the years hence.
Partly because of this my long deceased friend lives on vitally in my
life. (He is the same friend who gave me the abiding "little joke". Click here).
The
Bible question today asked us to picture one's life without any of
the causes or results of grief, sin and pain. It asks what that would
free us do. One possible answer is that it would open inconceivable
avenues of advancement on all fronts. But my firm answer is rather
that a perfect environment is simply unknown and unknowable. The
human mind, because of unintended consequences, has not the power nor
resources to figure this out. What we need to do instead is to see
life as it is and, like my friend challenged me to do, just deal with
it.
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