God’s Goodness
I’m sure at some point you have heard the song, “God on the Mountain,” written by Tracy Dartt. The chorus goes like this:
The God on the mountain is still God in the valley.
When things go wrong, He’ll make them right.
The God in the good times is still God in the bad times.
The God of the day is still God in the night.
It is a beautiful song, but even if you have never heard it put to music, the lyrics are powerful enough for most of us to understand. We have all had amazing “mountain top experiences” in life. It might be the birth of a child, finally landing the perfect job, being spiritually uplifted by a conference, or falling in love. All of those events leave us feeling blessed and many times we find ourselves giving praise and honor to the good Lord for making it happen.
Yet, most of us could also very easily relate to the other side of that too. There are times we find ourselves in the valley. Psalm 23 speaks of the Valley of the Shadow of Death. Valleys can be dangerous. They can easily flood. They can make an army vulnerable to attacks from above in the hills and mountains. They usually mean you have to climb to get out. But “even though I walk through” the valleys and the shadows cast by the mountains “I will fear no evil for” God is with me (Psalm 23:4).
God may be with us on the mountaintop experiences but He is for sure with us in the valleys. He is a God that is ever present. The shepherd-king David, who endured maybe more valleys than he did mountain peaks said in Psalm 139:7-12,
“Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there! If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me. If I say, ‘Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me be night,’ even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light with you.”
Mountains or valleys, good or bad, day or night, we have a God that is with us through it all. As one of the newer hymns we sing says of God’s goodness -- “it’s running after me.” I’m thankful I serve a God whose “goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life...” (Psalm 23:6).
Ben