God is Good

     I told my church yesterday morning in our Thanksgiving service that I was thankful that even when life doesn't feel good, that we can trust and know God is good. It's been after a year of soul stretch and searching that I can say from the depths of my heart that God IS good!

     Somehow as Christian's, at least I for one, have had to come up against the hidden, subtle concept that when we are following God, God will bless us with those things that feel like a blessing, feel good. When we step out into something that feels bizarre and scary, step out in faith, because we feel like that is what God wants us to do, we automatically expect a rewarding outcome. We stepped out in faith, right? We are fighting for a good cause, are we not?

     It was a year ago, after having stepped out in a similar faith step, out into some unknown waters, only to have everything that I was fighting for crash around me, that I had to re- evaluate what God being good looks like.

     How does it feel like good when your faith was rewarded with a crash. When the miracle you felt God was pointing you towards ended in pieces at your feet? If God is good, this doesn't feel like good!

This feels more like betrayal, like God let me down and honestly I didn't like that feeling. I knew it had to be a human feeling because God doesn't do wrong, God never fails, my God says He is only good. I searched for answers to the mixed messages and confusion churning between my heart and my mind.

Following is a clip from my journal:

     “How do I know I can believe what He is saying next time?

     Jesus whispered to my heart and asked me if I believe He is good? Is Jesus all good, with no darkness in Him? Does He give only good things to His children? Of course I knew the answers. So, what if Jesus promised to do exceeding abundantly above what I ask or think but He had to take this away to give me something better... God is God! He keeps His promises but He also sees the whole picture: sees it from a totally different perspective...

     Thank you Jesus that you can be trusted to be working out only good in my life! You have goals, You see the process that's involved in completing or accomplishing the goals and purposes You are working out in my life. This is not a dead end street, a messed up mission, a defeat, or even God going back on His Word. This is only one chapter in the whole book; one link in the chain, and the end of the story; the next chapter, has not yet been read. Yes, they are written, God has every day planned, I just haven't gotten to the next part yet.”

     I look back over my journal of the past year and see God's faithfulness to whisper to my heart and strengthen my faith. One clip from last November, John 20:19 had ministered to me. Only in my case it was changed to fit my situation: “Blessed are those who “don't understand what I am doing” and believe me anyway.

     The story of Mary and Martha and the death of Lazaras ministered to me. Jesus knew ahead of time how the death of Lazaras would bring Him glory, but at the same time his heart hurt for Mary and Martha as they went through the pain of the death. Jesus cares and hurts when we hurt.

    I still don't claim to have all the answers, to understand what that chapter of my life was about, but it is comforting and strengthening to know that we can safely follow God wherever He takes us, wherever He leads, because God is good. It might lead us into hard things, into things that don't make sense, but He will lead us one step at a time as we commit every step into His hands. I may never totally understand but sometimes it's like the song that says, “It's not about what's waiting on the other side; it's the climb”.