Hanging In

This "faith in God" thing can be a confounding, frustrating pain at times. Faith in what? Because the world you live in is filled sometimes with gut-wrenching pain. And it isn't the turmoil in the wider world that gets you. It's the close-to-the-bone crap that levels you.

Here you have Freddie, (played by the lovely Cree Summers), praying to God to save Kim's father, a cop now lying in the hospital from a gunshot wound. And after a night of worry, Kim's dad pulls through.

But he's paralyzed, and that plain pisses off Freddie, much like us when life doesn't go exactly along the straight path we think it should go. Instead, we face unexpected twists in the journey that kicks us all off balance.

And yes, like Freddie, we're pissed. We're angry. We're ready to throw in this "faith" thing. Dwayne, with the ever-present flip-down shades, tells Freddie the story of how he prayed as a kid for a fancy new toy for Christmas and never got it. He got a coat.

But that winter coat kept him warm through a very cold winter. Then he tells her this gem. Sometimes when we pray, we get what we want. Sometimes, we get what we need. And sometimes we just get what we get. God helps us hang in there with what we get.

I always liked that. Because too many times, we waste energy trying to figure out why God is putting us through something. Maybe it's a test. Maybe it's not.

Who knows except God? And maybe after all is said and done, you figure out what God was doing and you learn whatever lesson you were supposed to learn and you become stronger in the end.

But again, who knows except God? Life is life and it isn't fair all the time. Good people get cancer. Bad people live to 100. You can't control what life throws at you.

But you can control what you throw back. Are you going to throw back anger and sadness and bitterness and hate. Or are you going to throw back love? Are you going to throw back peace? Are you going to throw back joy?

Faith can't be too hard that it can't bend in strong winds. Because life isn't going to break you, if you let it. You just have to keep moving. Don't stop.