Accepting Whatever God Gives Us
It has been almost a year since Chris died and went to be with the Lord in heaven. At this time last year John and Lori had come, so they could be here with Dixie and us. Before Chris lost consciousness, we were able to sit around her bed and sing "The Goodness of God" together with John playing his guitar. What a blessing to have a family that can bless the Lord together, even in the midst of suffering and loss! That can only happen when we trust God enough to accept whatever He gives us.
Job's wife had not learned that lesson. So when Job was struck with the boils from head to foot and in so much pain, she told him to "curse God and die." (Job 2:10) "But Job replied, "You talk like a foolish woman. Should we accept only good things from the hand of God and never anything bad?" So in all this Job said nothing wrong." Job had the right perspective on life. We all need to take his statement to heart, because we will need it at some point in our life.
We are always so happy when God blesses us with good things. We rejoice and give Him thanks. At least, that is what I hope we do. However, the fact is that when we have God's blessings and things are going well, we do not learn as many important lessons, as we do when things don't go well. God knows this. Therefore, He mixes the bad things in with the good things in life, so we will learn to trust Him more and be closer to Him than ever before. It is painful, but in the long run it can be a blessing.
The key factor is how we accept what God gives us. If we get upset with Him, we will not learn the good lessons. If we get depressed and withdraw from God and others, we will just wallow in self pity and learn nothing. However, if we accept what God send us, and we ask Him what He wants us to learn from this, we will receive a blessing. That is what has happened to our family, I believe. We know better now that to live is Christ and to die is gain. We live more ready for heaven now than ever, and we know God will see us through like He did for Chris.
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Tomorrow, I intend to read Job 5-7.