Tuesday, May 26, 2015

He Is Good

Forest Hill Church | He Is Good

This service from Forest Hill Church in North Carolina came up on my phone as I scrolled through several news stories.  The type of story I typically avoid for fear of the grief that rises up was the exact story I chose to click on as I laid in bed tonight. I read about a pastor that was driving home from a wedding when a truck rear ended the car him and his family were in.  It killed his two year old little boy and caused his wife at 37 weeks pregnant to be rushed to the hospital for an emergency c-section to help save their other little boy.  Just seven hours ago it was released that their newborn baby did not survive either. Now this husband and wife are experiencing the most tragic and unimaginable thing they will ever live through.  Those dates and times will be forever frozen in their minds and there will be times when they will think that they are not going to be OK.

I had to stop reading, but before I could pull my eyes from the page I saw a link to a service the pastor at Forest Hill gave to explain his thoughts on what happened and why it happened to his congregation.  He tried to answer the "Why do bad things like this happen?" and the "Why did their little boy have to die?"

As I listened I heard him speak truth.  I heard so much clarity about God's promises.  He said things that I'm not sure I would have been able to process or receive until this very moment.  If you have a few minutes, I think you should listen.  The sweet grandpa/father figure that speaks to the people in his congregation whom he loves reminds them (and all of us) to grieve with hope.

I wanted to post this so that I can come back to it and listen again.  It has given me hope to pull through an impossible night of missing my Charlie.  I couldn't even go to the cemetery tonight for fear that I might not leave.

Here are a few things that stood out to me as he spoke and will help me wake up tomorrow with the hope that God may (hopefully) give me the gift of "amnesia" as I try to finish out the school year.

-No one is immune from this evil.  If you are breathing you are inhabited by this disease called sin.

-Matthew 5:45  "The rain falls on the just and the unjust alike."

-John 16:33 "In this world you will have tribulations."  It is a clear declaration.  Anyone that is a follower of Jesus will experience difficulties.  However, Jesus said we can rejoice because he has victory over this world.

-Isaiah 57:1 "Good people pass away; the godly often die before their time..no one seems to understand that God is protecting them from the evil to come."  As I thought about this verse and the explanation that accompanied it during the sermon I realized that it is possible that God spared Charlie from pain and turmoil.  He could have been giving him a merciful gift and I don't want to take that away from him or wish something different.  I know God is powerful and works for the good of those that love him.  I am putting all my faith and hope in that verse tonight.  And Charlie, I am glad that if you had a choice to come back here with us you wouldn't.  I am glad to be reminded that you would choose to be right where you are and were meant to be; with your heavenly Father in Heaven.

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