But He's Good.
"Then he isn't safe?" said Lucy."Safe?" said Mr. Beaver, "don't you hear what Mrs. Beaver tells you? Who said anything about safe? 'Course he isn't safe. But he's good. He's the King, I tell you."
Thursday night, I got a text from one of my closest friends. It was the kind of text that no one wants to get. The kind of text that is sent to share news that rips your heart into pieces. The kind of news that leaves you feeling helpless and heartbroken.Someone I love was going through a kind of heartache that is so overwhelming it's hard to describe. The thing about loving people is that when they hurt, you hurt. So I have spent the last few days hurting, grieving, crying, praying.In times like these, we tend to ask a lot of questions of God. It's hard for us to grapple with suffering without knowing the reasons for the suffering. It's hard for us to see God as present in our circumstances when all we can see is pain.Thursday night as I was crying and praying and trying to fall asleep, I asked God a lot of questions about who he is and why these things happen. In the quiet of my room, the response that came to me was the above conversation between Lucy and Mr. Beaver from The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. They are discussing Aslan, who is a clear representation of Christ throughout the Chronicles of Narnia series.As I fell asleep Thursday, I held on tightly to this idea that God is good. None of my questions had been answered or explained, but this truth calmed me enough to get some sleep.The next day I wasn't really sure what to do with this thought, so being the English nerd that I am, I looked up both words to see if it would help me understand the scene that had come to my mind.To be safe means to be free from hurt, injury, or risk.To be good means to be righteous, excellent, kind, honorable, and worthy.Looking up the words was helpful but I still felt like I needed more, so I went looking for verses in the Bible that would back up this thought. This belief. This element of my faith. I wanted concrete words from the Bible to show me that this idea that I was holding onto was in fact the truth. And I found some.Psalm 119:68 "You (God) are good, what you do is good; teach me your decrees."Psalm 107:1 "Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever."Lam. 3:25 "The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord."Psalm 145:9 "The LORD is good to all; he has compassion on all he has made."Psalm 34:8 "Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the one who takes refuge in him."