God is Good

       I learned, as a child, that God is Great, God is Good. And I hear a lot of people saying “God is good all the time” when God gives them what they want. Today, however, I want to echo Job’s words  “God gives and God takes way, blessed be the name of the Lord”.
      I had just read some words of Corrie Ten Boom that seem to apply the situation we are living as we continue to think about all the recent suffering brought about by the massacre in the school here in Rio. These are the words: “Often I have heard people say, ‘How good God is! We prayed that it would not rain for our church picnic, and look at the lovely weather!’ Yes, God is good when He sends good weather. But God was also good when He allowed my sister, Betsie, to starve to death before my eyes in a German concentration camp. I remember one occasion when I was very discouraged there. Everything around us was dark, and there was darkness in my heart. I remember telling Betsie that I thought God had forgotten us. ‘No, Corrie,’ said Betsie, ‘He has not forgotten us. Remember His Word: “For as the heavens are high above the earth, so great is His steadfast love toward those who fear Him.”  Corrie concludes, “There is an ocean of God’s love available—there is plenty for everyone. May God grant you never to doubt that victorious love—whatever the circumstance.”
      Our circumstances do not change God’s nature. And I cling to that truth in a world where Japan is hit with two earthquakes in a matter of weeks, in a world where 13 young people are murdered, in a world where children are enslaved, where there is so much suffering and pain. Having a sovereign, great, good and gracious God puts all of this in place.  Even with all these horrible things happening around us, God is still God. In Him I trust. I really am having to learn to walk by faith and not by sight.
      In one of my favorite books “Polishing God’s Monuments”,  I learned how important it is to continue to look at how God has acted in the past, thus polishing his “monuments” in order that I can look forward to trust how he will act in the future. And as my new best friend, Paul, says “But one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press forward to the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” (Phillippians 3:13-14)