my god IS good

"God ees good--" "Oll de tiyme--""And oll de tiyme--""God ees good!""And de best?""De best ees yet to come!"


Forever those words will echo in my head in a West African's accent. But now they aren't those same words in an African accent that I took for granted. Little did I realize growing up that those words aren't always easy to say. Those words weren't easy for the hungry, the poor (I mean dirt poor, lives in a shack, doesn't know when their next meal is poor), & the hurting families who were surely under that tin roof-ed church singing praises beside our fortunate missionary family. And just like so many volunteers & new missionaries reminded me when they came, I could have been learning from the Africans. I should have been. So many people before me had come to Senegal with that "heart for God" and that "missions on fire" attitude ready to change Senegal when they found that the Senegalese were actually changing them. I understood how that could happen- it happened to me before. But not like its happening now.

Those 3 words can be nearly impossible some days. They're so loaded with questions after something like our loss... something like a lot of the losses and lacks that must have surrounded me in the hearts of those Africans growing up that I was so unaware of. Losing babies in Africa is almost commonplace. But I bet it still hurts just as bad to those moms in that deeper down place that I now know.

But, no matter what happens, those 3 words ARE true. God IS good. No matter what I question, no matter how I hurt, the principles & promises in the Bible are true. That does not change though everything else in my world seems to be a bit different than before now. He still saved me. He is still in the business of good works. He still saved my sons- they are in Heaven with him. Without Him- without the promise of a better place- where would we be now but further from hope?