What Color Is Your Parachute 2018 by Richard N. Bolles copy

Postscript
Millions of people in this country have no religious beliefs. But
untold millions do. And it is not uncommon that for them,
unemployment turns out to be a major spiritual crisis in their life.
They cry out, “How could God have let this happen to me—if
He truly loved me?” Their faith, far from helping them out of
depression, often plunges them into it. They write me and ask for
some help and advice. Here is what I tell them.
We can revisit our picture of God and how He works in
this world. In the Christian church, for example, the Creed does
not begin with “I believe there is a God….” It begins with “I
believe in God….” I think we all understand this distinction,
between believing something about a friend of ours, say, that she
is tall, or smart, versus believing in that friend. To believe in
someone is to trust them, and to trust that they feel toward us as
they say they feel.
We can, instead of abandoning our faith, put some energy
into rethinking our faith on a higher level. Some 89% of us in
the U.S. say we believe in God, but the question is, What kind of
God do we believe in? Half a century ago, a man wrote a book
titled, Your God Is Too Small. Unemployment or any crisis often
reveals how poor and small our concept of God is. It is small
because it holds God responsible for everything that happens in
the world.
Each of us has to figure this out for ourselves. But since
people have asked me what I think, after ninety years on this
Earth, my thoughts ramble along in this fashion: In the Christian
faith, Jesus said the most important thing in the world, to God,
was that we love Him. Robots can’t love. He has to give us
freedom so we can choose to love, or not. With that freedom,
however, comes the possibility that we will make wrong choices,
and thus introduce tragedy into the world. Look at the mess the
world is in right now. Look at Congress. God didn’t do that!