A little girl is run over by a drunk driver, who has a long criminal record. She dies, he lives.

Stories like this abound. A child, a teenager, a young adult, someone still in the prime of his life, are snatched away by death leaving their loved ones in total shock. A person who never hurt anybody, who made the world a better place just by being alive, is suddenly gone.

A helpless sense of loss, feelings of injustice, and unanswered questions are followed by anger. Sooner or later, someone asks: “Why did God let that happen? She was a good person!”

I don’t write this as an attempt to comfort anyone experiencing such loss at this time. I don’t think I can. But this verse I came across this morning might help make sense of such senselessness:

The righteous pass away; the godly often die before their time. No one seems to understand that God is protecting them from the evil to come. Isaiah 57.1

In our limited human mind, we think that the way a person lived his last two, five, or ten years is a guarantee of how his future years will be like. But God knows better. And as a favor to that person, He intervenes before evil can touch that life.

Of course, in the process of being kind to that person, He appears to be a wicked, heartless God to his loved ones.

Even in death, we need to remember that there’s more than one side to every story.