If the good Lord is willing

"The Lord is good, a refuge in times of trouble. He cares for them who trust in Him." - Nahum 1:7

A line from a song that barber shop quartets like to sing goes, "If the Lord be willing, and the creek don’t rise." While it was neither an English major nor a theologian who wrote those lines, it does bring a powerful question into focus: "To what extent does God will that the creek doesn’t rise?" And there’s a second, "Why doesn’t God stop it when the creek overflows and turns into a flood?"

That issue has really been on my heart lately. Dick Johnson, a pastor and police chaplain, asked if I had any insights that would help him handle a tough funeral. A young man, seventeen years old and a star athlete, was killed when his motorcycle went out of control. The young man riding with him was thrown seventy-five feet and an arm was severed. Students were asking the question often asked in the face of tragedy, "Why didn’t God prevent this?" Naturally they grieved. A young life with such great potential was snuffed out, and another permanently maimed.

Where is God in times of need? The Bible says simply, "The Lord is good. When trouble comes, He is the place to go! And He knows everyone who trusts in Him!" (Nahum 1:7, the living bible).

We live in an imperfect, broken world, and there is always the tension between God’s love and His honoring the natural laws of cause and effect. God is a refuge and strength to His children, but this, of course, does not save us from ourselves and our own mistakes.

"If the Lord be willing, and the creek don’t rise" goes the line in the old song. When the creek does rise, and you face tragedy, the circumstances will either drive you to God, or drive you away from Him. When you turn to Him you find a solace and a strength, the kind that David had experienced before speaking of walking through the valley of the shadow of death. When you turn away from God, you deprive yourself of the only real help that is there. I’ve never been quite able to understand why God gets blamed for the consequences of living in a human world.

Is it okay to tell God how you feel, how crushed you are, and how much you wish something had not happened? Absolutely! Read the book of Habakkuk in your Old Testament and you will be party to the dialogue of the man who questioned the way God was seemingly standing back in disaster. Then God answered Him. Listen for the answer. And then you will learn that God is not silent in times of trouble. He’s very much there speaking to us about the brevity of life and the importance of including God in our lives. Sometimes through sorrow, His quiet voice comes through the loudest. - Resource Reading: Psalm 23

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