This week my meditation Psalm has been Psalm 118 and it has prompted me to examine my heart with regard to what I really believe about the Lord. It is a Psalm comprised of 29 verses, but I did not get past the first verse before I was knee deep in conviction.
Psalm 118: 1 (NKJV) says:
“Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for He is good! For His mercy endures forever.”
The question that the Holy Spirit introduced into the midst of my meditation was this: “Do you really believe, deep down where the rubber meets the road, that God is good?” Of course, the ‘Christian’ answer that immediately came to mind is ‘Yes, I do’. Then I began to place myself in situations where the circumstances do not seem to be good and I wondered if I would still answer the question concerning the goodness of God in the affirmative.
I had the opportunity to very much personalize these ponderings as my Mother FINALLY was able to have her hip replacement surgery on Tuesday. She has suffered a great deal over the past months awaiting the healing of a venous ulcer on her leg so that she could have the hip surgery. She has not walked, except with the aid of a walker, for 4 plus months. This was extremely difficult for a woman who was accustomed to exercising daily and being very active with her grandchildren. Her health, physically, mentally, and emotionally, has declined during this time of waiting. I truly feared that should the surgery be delayed yet again, she would not be able to bounce back to her former self.
As I stayed with her the night after surgery, she kept saying over and over, “Thank you, Lord, for letting me have this surgery. God is so good to me.” Believe me, I agreed with her 100%. But the thought came to my mind as she proclaimed her praise for the goodness of God, “What if she had not been able to have the surgery. Would we still proclaim that God is good?”
After pondering and meditating on this verse, I have come to the conclusion that, yes, God is indeed good, but that goodness often must be viewed in light of eternity.
Psalm 118: 18 (NLT) placed this in perspective for me. “The Lord has punished me severely, but he did not let me die.”
This temporal life is not all there is, dear friends, and God’s purposes in allowing certain situations to occur that may seem like punishment to us, may not be understood this side of eternity. My musings and ponderings on this verse left me with a desire to come to the point where if my salvation was all I had left, if God allowed every other earthly blessing to be taken from me, my salvation and eternal security would be enough AND God would still be good.
