it is good.

"As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today." Gen 50:20

i thank God that he is slowly melting away the bitterness that i have been carrying over my lot. not that i was really stewing in that bitterness or anything like that, but i guess there was always that feeling of unfairness and the "why are things so crap" kind of mindset.

reading this verse today, i felt like i was finally cutting myself away from those negative thoughts. if indeed i believe, as Joseph did, that God is sovereign over all and that he is the one who arranges all things in my life, i am not then complaining against the school administration but against him when i bemoan my posting. and why should i have any cause to feel hard done by, if it was God who did it? for surely no bad thing comes from him, but only good gifts such as a father would give his child.

the knowledge that none of this is beyond God's control has probably always been there, just perhaps overshadowed by the fear that they would judge me harshly if i did not perform well with these classes and brushed aside in favour of the well-meaning consolations of well-meaning colleagues. but i am tired of worrying about my grades, and consolations provide scant comfort when i have to step into class. these insecurities and temporary balms have to go if i am to move forward. i only pray that God will grant me the grace to live this out, and that i would, like Joseph, declare that God meant all this for good, for his own good plans. and surely that is enough reason to give thanks for it.

You are my RO.

"Far above the Ephel Duath in the West the night-sky was still dim and pale. There, peeping among the cloud-wrack above a dark tor high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach."

Tolkien, Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King



You are my white star.