The question of God’s goodness

I have wrestled with this question a good bit this year, and I imagine you have as well during times of your life.

We were just given two great gifts. Yesterday, for a few hours we wondered if our son had diabetes (I am a diabetic). I spent a few hours wrestling with God and shaking my fist in a don’t-you-dare-do-this-to-us-this-year type of fashion. Thankfully we were able to test Campbell’s blood with my tester and see that he is not a diabetic. First blessing.

Then, this morning we learned that a long-time builder friend of ours is going to purchase and install badly needed new windows on our house (we would not be able to afford this on our own). Wow! What blessings and amazing abundance! God is good!

Here’s the thing: When I am being honest, I want God to be good primarily because of his blessings–not because of who he is. If I had my choice, I would choose a life that includes 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep each night, children who obey my every word, a pedicure twice a month, comfortable finances, and gifts of free windows for my home on a regular basis. There is a part of me that longs for this kind of life, free from any challenges. I won’t go into it here, but these longings are the beginning of a longing for heaven.

It’s tempting to say “God is good!” only when we’ve received recent blessings (and we should be praising God for them). But was God any less good in January when I was diagnosed with breast cancer? Is God still good when children die of malaria and all sorts of terrible tragedies happen daily?

Author Dan Allender discusses this topic in his book, “Bold Love”: “If God’s goodness is looked for primarily in turns of fortune–a car screeches to a halt a few inches from your child, a check comes in the mail at the right moment from an unknown friend, a diagnosis of malignancy is found to be incorrect–then the verdict on His heart toward us will always be pending on the arrival of a new set of facts.”

The fact is that the foundation of God’s goodness is his forgiveness of his wayward children; that he rescued us while we were running away from him in pursuit of our own way. The Lord has brought this truth to me this year, and upon first re-examination (all my basic theology has been tested this year), I was not too thrilled. I want God first to be good because he blesses me, and then I want him also to be good to forgive me. The first seems like a bigger deal than the second. But the reality is that my forgiveness is a FAR BIGGER DEAL. “His goodness shines bright in the light of his redemptive love,” says Allender. I still have a ways to go in realizing my great need of forgiveness for my sin, which is the cancer of my soul.

Is God good because he just gave us these two beautiful blessings? Yes he is! But our recent “fortune” is not the basis for his goodness. God’s sending his son, The Rescuer, to earth to walk the same paths that we do today, to suffer greatly and to offer his life so that we could have a relationship with our Father the way we were created to, and that I can wear Christ’s robe of righteousness on a daily basis–that’s the real reason God is good.

-Sara

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