What God Ordains Is Always Good

My dad appears to be in his last days of life.  (I haven't posted about Dad's cancer very much, and I probably still won't.  There are just some things that cannot be expressed on a blog post.)  Soon after he found out that he had cancer, Dad shared this hymn with me and told me that it had sustained him during previous difficult times and was sustaining him especially as he began to deal with cancer.

He never mentioned it again, but this seems like a good time to share the hymn once more.  Here are the words, and if you'd like to hear the music, it's here.

by Samuel Rodigast, 1649-1708
Text From:THE LUTHERAN HYMNAL
(St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1941)

1. What God ordains is always good;
His will abideth holy.
As He directs my life for me,
I follow meek and lowly.
God indeed in every need
Doth well know how to shield me;
To Him, then, I will yield me.

2. What God ordains is always good.
He never will deceive me;
He leads me in His own right way,
And never will He leave me.
I take content What He hath sent;
His hand that sends me sadness
Will turn my tears to gladness.

3. What God ordains is always good.
His loving thought attends me;
No poison can be in the cup
That my Physician sends me.
My God is true; Each morn anew
I'll trust His grace unending,
My life to Him commending.

4. What God ordains is always good.
He is my Friend and Father;
He suffers naught to do me harm,
Though many storms may gather.
Now I may know Both joy and woe,
Some day I shall see clearly
That He hath loved me dearly.

5. What God ordains is always good.
Though I the cup am drinking
Which savors now of bitterness,
I take it without shrinking.
For after grief God grants relief,
My heart with comfort filling
And all my sorrow stilling.

6. What God ordains is always good.
This truth remains unshaken.
Though sorrow, need, or death be mine,
I shall not be forsaken.
I fear no harm, For with His arm
He shall embrace and shield me;
So to my God I yield me.