What is Good?

In The Shack, God challenges the main character, Mack, saying that he "must give up [his] right to decide what is good and evil on [his] own terms." More and more I am realizing that I can't accurately judge what is "good" and what isn't. Quite frankly I'm wrong a lot, thinking that hard things are "bad" because I'm looking at them from my own perspective, when really they produce growth, healing, and make me cling to God more.

More and more when people ask how my day is going, I find myself wondering...is it "good" or "bad"? I don't really know. "Hard" does not automatically equate to "good" or "bad." Not all hard things produce growth or have purpose: there is the pain of a wound being inflicted (bad pain/damaging pain) and the pain of a wound being healed (good pain/healing pain)---cleaning out the cut, putting on some Neosporin and a Band-aid. Pain with a healing purpose still hurts, but it hurts in a different way.

Sometimes I don't know which kind of pain I'm experiencing, but God does. I'm amazed at how God knows what is good for me and what I need so much more accurately than I do. Isaiah 48:17 says, "I am the Lord your God, who teaches you what is best for you, who directs you in the way you should go.” God knows what is best and He knows what is good, even when I'm not sure what that is.