God is Good August 21, 2010
by Konnie Drews
God is good. God is good all the time. I truly believe this, not because I have been blessed beyond measure or because I am on a mountain top right now. I believe that God is good because I have truly experienced his grace and provision in the most unexpected ways and at the most painful times.
On February 19, 2010, I rece
ived a phone call from my mom saying that my older sister, Wendy was in the hospital in Sacramento. They were not sure what was happening, but she was in ICU with a possible brain bleed. My mom, step-dad, sister (Sherry) and I got a flight immediately as a result of guest passes that a pilot friend had a recently given to us. Do I believe in coincidences? No, I know that all-powerful, all-knowing God provides when we are in need. We were on a plane within 3 hours of the initial phone call. God is good. When we arrived, the news was bad. Wendy was unconscious and did not have brain activity. She was pronounced brain dead due to bacterial meningitis. She was an amazing, generous, fun and passionate woman, only 43 years old. I miss her and I miss all the lost memories and opportunities. Yet, I still say that God is good. We can ask why she died so prematurely, but instead I choose to believe that God is in control and He is good. He desires to reveal himself to us, if we take the time to look.
I am thankful for the times He shows himself so clearly because we are too weary to pursue Him. The day after Wendy was pronounced, we went to her apartment to begin looking for legal and financial information. She was fairly disorganized and had papers and photos and crafts mixed together in her office, as she recently moved. Almost immediately upon shuffling papers, I came across a certificate of her baptism and pictures from when she was baptized back in 1992. Was that a coincidence? No, God is good. In recent years, she had not been following God’s ways and so I was thinking about that and her recent choices, but finding those pictures gave me the assurance that all was right. At that moment, the peace of God came over me and I knew that she was with Him
God continued to show himself to us in amazing ways. As we planned the memorial, we did not know where to turn, as we were not from Sacramento and Wendy was not actively attending church. We made many random phone calls and ended getting a pastor and church to let us have it there just days after she passed away. As we were driving up to the church, Sherry and I both recognized the church, having been there with Wendy previously seven years before. The pastor knew Wendy and the church was familiar to us. Was it a coincidence? No, I know that God is good. God’s fingerprints were all over the week following Wendy’s passing. Today I still grieve the loss of my sister and honestly, I am not sure I have accepted it. It is a huge hole in our family, yet I am thankful for the opportunity to know God in a new way. There will always be trials, challenges, sickness and deaths for all of us. But, God is good and always will be and He will be present during those times and we will find His fingerprints in each circumstance if we look.
Konnie, thank you so much for sharing this incredibly painful yet God-filled occurance in your life. God is good all the time, and even if we don’t see what He’s doing, He is working His plan for our lives perfectly. Thanks again!
Konnie,
Thank you for writing this. I too believe God is good. He was there for us each step of the way as you said. Sometimes it is hard to see his hand print upon our lives, but if we look and listen, it will be there. I see this more than I ever did after we received the call about Wendy. God is good and he loves us.
I love you, Konnie.
Sherry