Your birth was no accident. Sure, it’s possible that your parents may not have expected you, but your arrival was no surprise to God. There’s a reason you were born, and your life has a purpose in God’s grand plan.

That all sounds well and good, but I have struggled for a long time with scenarios of lives cut short, as I grieve and cope with loses in my own life. I don’t think we do it intentionally, but it’s natural to have an egocentric perspective and think about MY life and how the world in which I live affects ME. It is far more difficult for us to think outside of ourselves and realize that maybe our lives have a purpose far beyond what we can grasp or imagine.

Lately, I’ve been drawn to passages of Scripture about lineages. (Admittedly, I used to skip over huge sections of verses like these, because they seemed irrelevant to the story.) Take a look at Matthew 1, for example. It begins with the genealogy of Jesus, from Abraham onward. Most of the names in the list mean nothing to me; some aren’t even mentioned elsewhere in the Bible. And yet, folks like Azor, Achim, Eliud and others had a vitally important role to play in human history: they were ancestors in the story of the Messiah!

My brother died at age 30, and no offense to you menfolk, but that’s barely mature for a guy, much less old enough to have lived what we might consider a “full” life, by today’s standards. What purpose could be served in such a seemingly premature death? When I read passages of Scripture like Matthew 1, I’m reminded that my brother’s purpose was fulfilled in ways that God understands but I do not. Maybe it was the birth of his two children or the lasting influence of his life on others – who knows. Generations from now, someone might look back in history with the advantage of hindsight and uncover details of his brief life and put pieces in place that I couldn’t even begin to fathom right now. The point is, I don’t need to know.

That’s where faith comes in: we will all face unanswerable questions in life, and we can decide to throw up our hands in frustration or take God’s hand in trust. I choose to trust that God has a plan, and our lives – however long or short, however grandiose or unnoticed – are important pieces to his puzzle.