God is Good

A friend and I were once discussing the term, theophany. The word literally means a God sighting. We were wondering what exactly that looks like in the present day. It has been a while since bushes burned with God speaking through the flames.

We decided to see what we could find as we looked through Scripture to discover how we might have a God sighting today. My friend and I both happened upon James 1:17 "Every good and perfect gift comes from above, coming down from the Father of Lights..."

If every good thing is a gift from God and God is good, then when we take time to notice the good that takes place in our lives, we are seeing a glimpse of God.

So, my friend and I decided that we needed to train ourselves to see God in the midst of the every day by taking note of the good in our days. We made a plan. She and I each got a journal and we planned to write every good thing that took place in our day. We would then meet once a week and share our lists.

The first week our lists were short. Looking for good was actually a little more challenging than we thought. You see we were out of practice. Our eyes had not been trained to see good, in fact much of the world around us, spoke to what was wrong with the world rather than celebrating that which was good. We needed practice seeing. We needed practice looking for good.

With each week that passed our lists grew in length. Soon the pages could hardly hold the good we'd see. There is good everywhere when we look for it. A beautiful sunrise, a smile from a stranger, a great conversation, an amazing meal, a new connection and the list goes on and on.

The possibilities to find good grow as we look for it.

There is a spiritual discipline that I believe is under utilized today. It is the discipline of celebration. Celebration is taking time to notice God and celebrate His goodness. I needed to train myself to see Him and that took practice. As strange as it seems, I had to work at seeing good and discipline myself to actively pursue the visible expressions of God's goodness in my every day life.

My friend and I spent months making lists of the things we'd see, smell, taste, touch and hear that were good. And a discipline was formed and I saw the goodness of the Lord.

I use that list still to this day when I forget and need to be reminded of the goodness of God.

I'd love to hear your list this day of the ways you've experienced the goodness of God in your life. Write me about it. And we can all be encouraged as we read!