WARNING: This is a post with more questions than answers. I’m still searching. *Shoves microscope in trench coat pocket.*

I’m struggling with something. On Sunday, the pastor at church said, “God is a good God is different from God does good things. He cannot be anything but good. It is impossible for God to deliver anything to you that is not good. He cannot. Wickedness is not of God.”

I’m guessing she meant wickedness isn’t of God but judgment is?

If she says only good comes from God, why does He say in Isaiah 45:6 & 7

I am the LORD, and there is no other.
7 I create the light and make the darkness.
I send good times and bad times.
I, the LORD, am the one who does these things.

I really don’t know.

In chapter 9, God goes on to tell Isaiah:

“What sorrow awaits those who argue with their Creator.
Does a clay pot argue with its maker?
Does the clay dispute with the one who shapes it, saying,
‘Stop, you’re doing it wrong!’
Does the pot exclaim,
‘How clumsy can you be?’
10 How terrible it would be if a newborn baby said to its father,
‘Why was I born?’
or if it said to its mother,
‘Why did you make me this way?’”
11 This is what the LORD says—
the Holy One of Israel and your Creator:
“Do you question what I do for my children?
Do you give me orders about the work of my hands?

I know we need to trust without questions but I’m annoyingly curious, I need to know; what does this all mean? It’s hard to understand what this all means especially when we are dealing with darkness and death, depression and despair. It is frightening to think that the God we know to be good is aware of the trying times His children are battling through, struggling to survive when the tides are bent on drowning them. The alternative doesn’t bear thinking about. That God doesn’t know? How can you trust a king if he isn’t even aware of the going-ons in his kingdom? But Isaiah 45 assures us that God DOES know. After experiencing the worst disaster of my life, the only way I could bear to think about God’s existence logically, the only way to not consistently blame Him for allowing my loss (not even the devil for happily causing my grief), was to just assume that He wasn’t aware of the evil, the loss I had suffered, the pain I felt. He just couldn’t be!

It took me a while to realize that nothing actually surprises God. But, if He wasn’t surprised by it…do you mean to say He saw this coming and still let it happen?! I don’t know. I think once every year I get into this mini-faith crisis that I have to work out with a lot of self-medication; so I throw myself into God’s word and I study until I find the answers I need.

I’m stuck on this amazing devotional called My Utmost for His Highest, it’s on the YouVersion Bible app. As I sat in quiet contemplation during my morning devotion on Monday, I really thought about the things I typed above and as though God Himself were listening in, He sent me message.

Day 5: My Utmost for His Highest.

“Vision And Darkness

Whenever God gives a vision to a Christian, it is as if He puts him in “the shadow of His hand” (Isaiah 49:2). The saint’s duty is to be still and listen. There is a “darkness” that comes from too much light—that is the time to listen. The story of Abram and Hagar in Genesis 16 is an excellent example of listening to so-called good advice during a time of darkness, rather than waiting for God to send the light. When God gives you a vision and darkness follows, wait. God will bring the vision He has given you to reality in your life if you will wait on His timing. Never try to help God fulfill His word. Abram went through thirteen years of silence, but in those years all of his self-sufficiency was destroyed. He grew past the point of relying on his own common sense. Those years of silence were a time of discipline, not a period of God’s displeasure. There is never any need to pretend that your life is filled with joy and confidence; just wait upon God and be grounded in Him (see Isaiah 50:10–11).

Do I trust at all in the flesh? Or have I learned to go beyond all confidence in myself and other people of God? Do I trust in books and prayers or other joys in my life? Or have I placed my confidence in God Himself, not in His blessings? “I am Almighty God . . .” —El-Shaddai, the AllPowerful God (Genesis 17:1). The reason we are all being disciplined is that we will know God is real. As soon as God becomes real to us, people pale by comparison, becoming shadows of reality. Nothing that other saints do or say can ever upset the one who is built on God.

O Lord, with much dimness I draw nigh to You. Clear the dimness away from me and flood me with the light of Your countenance.”

It’s a start.