God Is Good Even When Things Go Wrong, Wrong, Wrong

Lamentations 3:25

New King James Version (NKJV)

²⁵ The Lord is good to those who wait for Him,
To the soul who seeks Him.

George taught at Ikizu Secondary School in Tanzania, Africa. He was promoted to principal the year we arrived there. He loved the students and all the people in the area. Many a time he went out of his way to help someone in need, someone whom I was ready to ignore. The people loved him for it. Sylvia and I were the only missionaries without a car at Ikizu. George usually offered to take Sylvia with him on his weekly trip to town, an hour’s drive away, and never charged us a cent.

As time went by he developed numbness in his legs. Doctors recommended back surgery to take the pressure off pinched nerves. He had the option of returning to the U.S. to get the surgery done or having it done in Africa. He told me that he chose to have the surgery done in Nairobi because it would save the mission many thousands of dollars. Whether or not the result would have been the same if he had returned to the U.S. no one will ever know. But the surgeon cut too deeply and left George paralyzed from the waist down.

He returned to a small house in Cicero, Indiana, where he was simply forgotten. He hoped for a surgical procedure that would reverse the paralysis, but it never materialized. Depression settled in on him, and bitterness seemed on the verge of overwhelming him. Yet George refused to let it get him down. His indomitable will and the Grace of God overcame these, and he became a great source of courage, happiness, and joy. As the years stretched into decades, he took up quilting, some rug weaving, and wheelchair gardening. We visited him and his wife anytime we took a trip across the country. We always left their place feeling better about life, God, and ourselves.

He had fallen before we stopped by one time. In obviously severe pain, he looked at me and with a broad smile and a twinkle in his eye said, “Can you imagine anyone falling out of bed and breaking a hip?” Then he chuckled about the absurdity of it. He had had a bar mounted above his bed. He would grab the bar with his hands and move his paralyzed body out of bed and onto his wheelchair. His hands had slipped off the bar that time. The fall proved to be the final blow, and he passed away a month or two later. He had been paralyzed for over 35 years. In spite of this, he never failed to thank and praise the Lord for His goodness. What an example!

Thank You, Lord, for being good to us, especially when things go wrong, wrong, wrong. Thank You for the joy that George experienced in his affliction and that such joy can be ours, too.

Christian Icons

Matthew 5:16

King James Version (KJV)

¹⁶ Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.

Coming home from early church I noticed a vehicle start out of a side road just as I approached. The driver of the bright red pickup braked just before he would have slammed into the side of my car. His face had impatience written all over it as he tail-gated me for three-quarters of a mile down the street with his bright lights on even though it was broad daylight.

When I reached Gramercy Place, I pulled over to the left and stopped at the stop sign. He shot around on the right side of me and, without even slowing down for the stop sign, turned the opposite direction. His lips were moving as he looked daggers at me.

Hanging up in the rear window of his pickup was a choir robe. I glanced at the clock in my car:  It read 9:31. Suddenly it all made sense. He was saying, “Get the h*** out of my way! Can’t you see I’m late to church?”

On occasion I have wondered about getting an “ixthus” fish and putting it on my car--or maybe a NOTW sign in the rear window. There are even tattoos of some of these symbols; (I have no desire to get a tattoo.) But then reality takes over. What if I were to cut somebody off on the road and had a symbol of Christ on my car? Wouldn’t I be hurting the concept of Christ or Christian in the other person’s mind?

Lord, may my actions not offend others but rather show Your good works so that they can glorify You.

Pain!

Ezekiel 14:14

New American Standard Bible (NASB)

Even though these three men, Noah, Daniel and Job were in its midst, by their own righteousness they could only deliver themselves,” declares the Lord God.

Over the weekend my mother-in-law, who is currently staying with us, complained of pain when the skin around her ankles was touched. The doctor prescribed an antibiotic which eased the cellulitis almost immediately. But that evening she broke out in a rash around her abdomen. She was in excruciating pain all the time, not just when it was touched. This time her doctor diagnosed her with shingles. Apparently anyone who has had chicken pox is a likely candidate for shingles. Two nights later she fell out of bad and injured her right hand to the point that any movement proved extremely painful

Recently I have been reading about Job in Philip Yancy’s The Bible Jesus Read. A parallel between Mom’s extremely painful shingles and Job’s boils came to mind. Job lost all his wealth and all his children on a single day. Then he got these extremely painful boils all over his body. His wife callously advised him to simply curse God and die. “Friends” came over and 36 chapters of the book are devoted to their analysis of why Job suffered all these tragedies. As far as any of them are concerned, there must have been something evil that Job had done to be punished by such a terrible catastrophe.

What has Mom done to warrant days of agony from shingles? What sins did she commit? What evil have her children done so she is afflicted with this pain? Nothing I can think of.  

According to the book of Job, no one in his story ever found out the actual reason why Job suffered. To the end of the book all of the characters were convinced that God had afflicted Job because of some evil he had done. Job is convinced that he had done no such evil and desired a chance to defend himself before God. Finally God speaks to Job. God does not address these accusations. He leaves Job under the opinion that He had indeed afflicted Job. But tucked away in the first two chapters lies the surprising revelation—God allowed Satan to test Job’s faith in front of the watching universe. In the end God doubly restored all of Job’s fortune.

Is God allowing Satan to test Mom’s faith in front of the watching universe?  I asked her if she thought so. She, too, is silent on that issue. Of course, just like Job, she doesn’t know. At 98, Mom is unlikely to live long enough for a restoration of her earthly fortune. Or is God simply allowing modern medicine to prolong life and consequently in many cases to prolong pain and suffering? We all have unanswered questions.

Thank You, Lord, for loving and saving us. Thank You also that You have guaranteed the outcome of this conflict with Satan. We chafe under the malevolence and hatred of Satan, of course, yet we thank You for the eventual victory we will have over him through Christ’s victory.