Is God Good?

Is God Good?

You might know that I am going to China in about 40 days. And I’m going to be there for 90 days! Yes, 90! I will be going with nine other Americans for three months of intensive treatment with traditional Chinese medicine. Five or six days a week of acupuncture, electric acupuncture, massage, Chinese herbs, and physical therapy. Each day is highly regimented.  The hope and prayer is I will return with more function to my body that was lost in my stroke in May 2015.

Exciting times!  But also, nervous times…  I wonder, will it work? Yes, hundreds of people have gone there and been helped, but will it work for me? What if it doesn’t? What if I return home on Memorial Day with little improvement? Will I be devastated?

The ultimate question I have been dealing with is, is God good? Is he truly good? The worst-case scenario in my mind is that I would gain nothing physically after spending all this time and money, in a foreign land, 8000 miles away. While I’m hopeful that scenario won’t play out, it is a possibility.  So even in that case, I have to ask and hopefully answer, is God good?

This past week, Brad and I have been thinking about a song we sing at Stonebrook.  The line goes, “God is good all of the time. All of the time God is good.” This is the challenge for both of us- to believe this. Even when life throws “bad” at us, God remains good. Romans 8:32 says that if God didn’t spare his own Son for me, how will he not also along with him graciously—generously, kindly, freely—give me everything else.  By far—by far—the greatest good the Lord could ever do has already been done through his Son. Everything else after that is easy for him.  And good.

To believe good will come out of the next few months is the challenge we are facing.  This week, Brad and I have realized we need to sink the roots of our faith into the promises of God: promises of his power, goodness, and kindness. We have no guarantee of the physical outcome of this Spring, but we have an absolute guarantee of God. He is unchanging.

This morning, Brad reminded me of his most frequent prayer two years ago in the months following the stroke.  So, this is our prayer again: “May you be strengthened with all power according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy…”  (Colossians 1:10). Pray for us, as we will for you, that God would grant us power, heavenly power, to endure in faith in our good God, and to endure with joy.