"From your perspective, you see love and hate, good and evil, right and wrong. I see what is and what will be, and what I see is love and good, always."
To God, there is meaning and purpose in everything, including tragedy. Whether in the form of a massacre in Colorado or a single death on the streets of Los Angeles, every woe that we experience is part of the grand and beautiful tapestry that is life. This is a difficult truth, which is why we so rarely understand it.
A recent example of our cluelessness in this regard came from George Zimmerman, who in an interview with Fox News on the shooting of Trayvon Martin said, "I feel that it was all God’s plan, and for me to second-guess it or judge it ..."
The key word in the revelation is "perspective." God gets the macro viewpoint; ours is just the micro version. We can glimpse the whole design, but we cannot live within that vision. Our minds are not made to handle it. We need to sort our thoughts and actions into "love and hate, good and evil, right and wrong." Such judgments do not deny the truth of this revelation; they help us to approach it with a sense of humility. Otherwise, we are liable to mistake our pinhole for God's panorama.
Which is exactly what Zimmerman did. In the interview, he said that he does not regret his actions that led to the fatal confrontation, nor would he change them. He is a fool. Regret and shame keep us honest when we replace God's will with our own. Violence is an ugly evil, even if we find ways to justify and excuse it. It always leaves a stain on one's soul. Yes, God's grace will bring glory from the depths of evil. But we also have a role to play. Does God's plan work because of us, or in spite of us?