Is God Really Good All the Time?

God is good,

All the time.

And all the time,

God is good. 

As Christians, we’ve been taught those words, and they flow so easily off our tongues.  We may even get warm, fuzzy feelings when we say those words responsively in a worship service, and we say them with great gusto, meaning, and sincere hearts.

My question is this:  If we truly stop and think, do we believe that God is good all the time?  And do we express that sentiment well to those who are suffering?

Before you answer affirmatively too quickly, as we all are apt to do, let’s discuss a little bit. 

I think most of us would agree that it is incredibly easy to say that God is good when all things in our life are going well – our prayers are answered like we want them to be, we get the job we want, we find physical healing, we are spared from some traumatic event, we have enough money to pay the bills, etc.  And the truth of the matter is that God’s character IS good when life goes well.  If we live lives of gratitude, we will be grateful for God’s goodness when we experience all the good things.  In fact, we tend to say things like, “I got the job – God is good,” “my sister was healed – God is good,” or “I walked away from that car accident uninjured – God is good.”  And He truly is good! 

Where the rubber meets the road, so to speak, is when life doesn’t go as we planned – people die, sickness stays, trauma is a reality, finances are difficult, and God might even seem distant in many of those cases.  Is He still good?  The resounding truth is that He is still good because that is His true character (Psalm 145:9, Psalm 34:8, Psalm 107:1, Matthew 19:17, Nahum 1:7, Luke 18:19, 1 Chronicles 16:34, Psalm 100:5, Psalm 106:1).  If God is good, then perhaps He is not the author of the hard in this life.  It can be so very easy to blame Him.  However, this world is difficult, and bad things happen because evil has entered this world and, unfortunately, not one of us is immune from its effects.  The good news is that God is good even in the midst of horrendous suffering.  He is with us in the suffering offering His love and support and strength.  He himself was not immune to suffering when He walked on this earth as the person of Jesus, and, in fact, intentionally chose to suffer on our behalf. I wonder if we could say: “I don’t have a job right now, however, God is still good,” “there is no cure for my illness, however, God is still good,” or “my daughter died, but my God is still good”?  How would that help those who are suffering to find more faith? How might they begin to feel like God is on their side in the suffering rather than just when life is going well?  How does it change our world if we truly believe and express that God is good, all the time, not just as a responsive saying, but meant from the depths of our hearts because we’ve experienced His goodness no matter what circumstances of life have been dealt us, whether good or bad?  Let’s continue to acknowledge God’s goodness when all goes well, but let’s also do our best to acknowledge His goodness when life is hard.  It may be exactly what our suffering brothers and sisters need to hear.