Choose Good

This world harbors evil. I know this because I have seen it first hand.
When I was 8 years old my father started abusing me and my sister. Although I feel like there were signs around every corner my family chose to look the other way. My mom continued to put us in the car, kicking and screaming, every other weekend.
Why? I still don't understand.
What my dad did to us, me at 8 and my sister at 4, was nothing less then evil. Selfishness on a grand scale. We both still pay for his sins everyday.
You don't just "get over" something like this. For many years I buried the abuse, self preservation I suppose.
I was angry, mortified. I felt dirty. I wondered what I did so wrong for this to happen.
For many years I didn't even believe in God. This mystical creator of the universe. A human man who died and came back to life.
I doubt it.
For the years we were subjected to abuse, my dad also took us to church.
On one such weekend I prayed really hard to God. I begged Him to help my sister and I. I prayed for Him to step in and protect us.
Such redemption never came.
I became cynical and pessimistic anytime someone mentioned this great God that was mighty to save.
He could have saved me BUT He didn't.....or did He?
Evil is so powerful....so very powerful. On this Earth evil is strong.
Where was God? Why didn't He stop this? I know He knew. Why didn't He stop it?

God allowed others to kill His Son. He watched the evil people parade His very own Son to certain death. He watched as they mocked and ridiculed Him. He sat back and listened as His own Son....hanging on a cross called out. His Son felt forsaken. I felt forsaken.
But forsaken I'm not.
Through the past couple of months I have felt God move in me in ways I never thought possible.
I have felt His presence through some of my darkest days.
Obviously God wants good. He sees good in people who have been forsaken by this Earthly world.
God never gives up.
BUT the only way there can be good is if we freely choose it.
God allows us to make our own choices, both good and bad.
The choices he allows are the only way there can be good in us. We must choose it freely above all else.
It is only in us choosing good over evil that we can truly know God.

God loves ME. ME!
I know now I was not forsaken.
Just as Jesus knew.
Why was evil injected into my life at such a young age? I still don't know the answer to that.
The evil that is so much a part of who I am was a evil choice made by someone who should have known better.
But I am redeemed.
Those choices are not who I am.
God has crafted me into an amazing person. I could NOT be this amazing without those struggles.
I choose good. Choose good. It takes effort to find good sometimes but it can always be found.
God's love, mercy, grace is BIG. Bigger then any evil this Earth can scheme.
I trust God. I love God. I believe God.
Choose good. Choose God.