Living and loving it: “God will work it out”
What you need to know:
- Sung so beautifully by Naomi Raine, the song lets us know that whatever the situation, however bleak, however desperate, however futile, God will work something out, for our good, if we ask and trust Him to do so.
On September 9, 2023, I sat at Deliverance Church Makerere at the funeral service of Charlotte Ninsiima Adupu, a former colleague and friend. Many thoughts kept flitting through my mind. How could Charlotte be dead? Why hadn’t I ensured we had that coffee date I had been planning to ask her out for? Why hadn’t I called or chatted with her in the past months to find out how things were, instead of waiting for the perfect time for that date? She had been married less than a year! What was her husband going through? How were her family, her close friends and workmates feeling? She was due to give birth in just a couple of weeks or less. Why, why, why?
We didn’t have answers. But what most of us had was comfort that we knew where she was, because she had given her life to Christ and we know that those who die in Him go to a better place. I was amazed at what Charlotte’s husband Julius said as he spoke about the life he had shared with her. He asked for the choir, before he gave his speech, to sing the song, “God will work it out”, a song by Maverick City Lake which on any day I get to hear it tugs at my heart, releasing many emotions. I was amazed than even in his deep grief, he chose to pick that song. Sung so beautifully by Naomi Raine, the song lets us know that whatever the situation, however bleak, however desperate, however futile, God will work something out, for our good, if we ask and trust Him to do so.
On some days, this song may be really encouraging and uplifting. On some days, it just might sound hollow. What helps though is for us to look back on our lives and see the places where God has answered our prayers much to our joy and our overwhelming relief, and be reminded that He has worked many things out in our past. He is therefore not about to stop doing so.
Slightly more than a year ago, my family and I found ourselves at Nakasero Hospital, sick to our stomachs with fear and dread. A surgeon, considered to be one of the best in his field in the country, alerted us that our father’s chances of surviving the illness he had, that seemed to come out of nowhere, were less than 50 per cent. This was regardless of the route they would take to try and save him. Those chances were reduced even further (we were told later) when during surgery, his heartbeat stopped for what were a few very long seconds. Within months after that surgery, my father was very much back on his feet, getting better steadily, exercising and working. God worked that out.
I think of some people I know who struggled very hard in their marriages in the early years, until separation and/or divorce were the only things they could agree on. Years later, they are still married. The marriages are not perfect – none is. But there is contentment, peace and a genuine love borne out of a decision and determination to work through the messy, difficult parts to come out stronger and better on the other side. God worked that out.
I know that even in death, God has been present. I have been to funeral and burial services where the closest persons to the deceased spoke with strength and a firmness that God was in their midst. I have spoken to people who have lost their parents or spouses, long after the burial, who were still facing raw grief and shock, but assured me that they knew God was leading them through hour by hour. I have heard from others who said their loved one was in so much pain and so they felt God had spared him or her by letting them rest from this earthly life.
In all these situations, God has worked things out, sometimes in ways we are grateful for, and sometimes in ways we are not sure we can be happy about. The fact remains though, that He has come through. Sometimes we have to look beyond what we want and focus on what we need. As Danny Gokey sings in his song “Stay Strong”.
“But if I never see the promise on this side of the grave,
My hope might be shaken but my faith will never break.
Because I know the day is coming when You'll right all of the wrong,
So I'll praise You in the waiting and my faith will stay strong.
So if today or on any other, if you find yourself in a place that is causing you so much pain, fear or anguish, say a genuine heartfelt prayer to God and trust that He is listening. The answer might not come in the form you hope for or at time you want it to, but God will work it out.
