Give Thanks to the Lord, for He Is Good!

Need I say more? 


Actually, I need to apologize for not writing more -- not because I have a massive following hanging on my every word, but because there is so much praise to be done! 


Classes are wonderful; these people are wonderful. Haven't had a lot of time for painting or printing (pictures when I recover my camera charger from Georgia), but when that has happened, it has been wonderful too. This is hard. It is a big change and a lot of work, but it is "miraculous." It's from my Father. 


But I want to particularly thank God for the way He has carefully provided for my every need -- the close-cutting way in which my resources - my expenses come down to the dollar is elating. He knows what I need (how many time the past three weeks has He provided just a few days before for a need I didn't know I had?), and He gives me what is good. 


Better than that,  He IS Good. Please don't think that in praising His provision I am preaching the prosperity Gospel. If grad school wasn't where He wanted me; if I were hungry, sick, and alone, I could still praise Him. What I am given is good, "for He satisfies the longing soul, and the hungry soul He fills with good things." It is because of who God is, not a wealthy and comfortable lifestyle, that Paul is able to say "Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ." 


Psalm 107 (verses 1-16) says it so much better than I could: 


¹ Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good,
   for his steadfast love endures forever!
² Let the redeemed of the LORD say so,
   whom he has redeemed from trouble
³ and gathered in from the lands,
   from the east and from the west,
   from the north and from the south.
 ⁴ Some wandered in desert wastes,
   finding no way to a city to dwell in;
⁵ hungry and thirsty,
   their soul fainted within them.
⁶ Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble,
   and he delivered them from their distress.
⁷ He led them by a straight way
   till they reached a city to dwell in.
⁸ Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love,
   for his wondrous works to the children of man!
⁹ For he satisfies the longing soul,
   and the hungry soul he fills with good things.
 ¹⁰ Some sat in darkness and in the shadow of death,
   prisoners in affliction and in irons,
¹¹ for they had rebelled against the words of God,
   and spurned the counsel of the Most High.
¹² So he bowed their hearts down with hard labor;
   they fell down, with none to help.
¹³ Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble,
   and he delivered them from their distress.
¹⁴ He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death,
   and burst their bonds apart.
¹⁵ Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love,
   for his wondrous works to the children of man!
¹⁶ For he shatters the doors of bronze
   and cuts in two the bars of iron.