Ignorance Is Bliss?

Some one jokingly made a comment to me the other day about wishing they could have just stayed in the womb and never had to experience life.  He meant it as a bitter joke, but it really bothered me. I knew that what he was saying came from a deeper struggle that every human experiences in their life:  the more you know and experience life, the harder and more painful your life becomes.  And still many people can attest to the more that one experiences, the greater the joy and hope that accompanies the hardships.

This got me thinking.

I began looking at life like a number scale.  When a person is born, the depth of pain or joy is at 0 because they haven't experienced life at all yet.  As they grow up, the difficulties of life increase (negative numbers) but the joys of life increase too (positive numbers).  The "gap" of knowledge and experience grows.  For some people, it seems to me that their life is deeply in the negative numbers.  They've lost a spouse, witnessed a horrific event, been abandoned, or even abused other people.  Other people, however, seem to be living a great life living in the positive numbers. They have a successful career, no straining relationships, no great loss, etc.  

As a Christian, I have hope in this evil and difficult world.  Hope that Jesus is coming back one day to judge the world and its evil and to redeem his people. Hope that He will reward those who follow, trust, and obey Him in the future.  Hope that He will make all things new and right. The more we see the evil and tragedies, the greater we cling to hope and the greater we see God working and understand Him.   So as the "gap" in the number line of life increases, the more we can experience God himself!  The deeper the pain, the deeper His healing.  The greater the suffering, the greater the hope of reward.  The darker the evil, the brighter the goodness and truth. 

So maybe ignorance isn't actually bliss. Maybe the true bliss is getting to know the perfect, beautiful, truly good God in a deeper, more satisfying way then ever before.  And if that means pain and suffering, well then, bring it on.