"God is God" by Cassandra Ballard

I thought my blog audience might enjoy the following blog written by my niece, Cassandra Ballard (Tom & Debbie's oldest daughter). Cassandra wrote this the day my father passed away. Cassandra is a very bold believer in Christ who might be Indiana's first-ever woman Senator if the Lord tarries. She is currently a student at Indiana University. Annette, Gabe, and I think she's pretty sharp. We love her!

This is pretty good...
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God is God. I should probably get that put on my tombstone when
my day comes. Some may question what that really means. In able to fully
understand, you have to know what the word God means. We have two definitions of God that are used in this small statement. First, is God as our worshiper and our creator the man in the sky whom we will all one day stand before and be accountable to.

Second, God as an occupational term: Being perfect in power, all wisdom,
all knowing. So this very simply means our God the man who created us, which whom we worship, he is all knowing and perfect in his power.


Life has an incredibly history for throwing dramatic curve balls. They can come from nowhere fast, quick, and powerful enough to knock us flat off our feet. Or they can be like a slow moving train. You see it coming, you can see the lights,
you can hear the horns, but still if you are not prepared it can cause unbelievable
damage. Or even if you are ready for it to pass by, it can still rattle some
windows if you are close enough. To me it seems as if life in general cannot be
content with a non-dramatic easy going walk. It is always ready and willing to blow in a whirlwind.


I don’t know if any of you have seen the 1996 movie Twister with Helen Hunt and Bill Paxton? But if you have, you will remember the scene where Jo and Bill were running from the tornado and they ran and they ran. As they were running it seemed like their total environment was being shaken and to be left upside down. When finally they knew they couldn't’t out run a twister, they had to “bunker” down and ride it out. They ran into a barn and tied themselves to a led pipe that ran way down deep into the ground. They gripped that pipe and held on until the end. When it was over they found themselves gripped to the pipe and everything around them destroyed. Sometimes life can be like this scene. You are trying to keep everything together and the storm continues to gain power. It blows you around and maybe knocks the wind out of you a time or two. And when it seems like the worse is upon you, you find shelter. The pipe they tied themselves to was deep into the ground. It couldn’t be uprooted as easily as some of the other places around
them. The storm went right over them and took them up in the air, but they continued to grip that pipe for security, knowing that if they do not let go, they will make it.

My grandfather just passed away and it seems like he suffered so long and so hard it wasn’t fair. And it was/is painful I feel like reality has come along and sucker punched me. Although the winds are blowing and I am knocked off my feet for a while I know I have to hold on to my life preserver, my pipe that is dug deep down in the solid ground, my faith. At my local church we sing a song called “Way Down Deep” It says ‘I got the love of Jesus, I got the joy of Jesus, I got the PEACE of Jesus deep down in my soul. The course sings ‘way down deep, way down deep’. If you do not
have Him way down deep, deeply rooted in your soul, you do not stand a fighting
chance in this world. Life throws’ way to many ‘hurricane parties’. You might
last through the first couple, but sooner or later you’re going to grow tired
and start slipping up.

Knowing that God is God is knowing that no matter what happens, I am grounded in him, and he is all-knowing, all-powerful, and completely in charge. He sees a picture that our human mind cannot even begin to imagine. During my grandfathers last couple days I kept repeating to myself “God never calls a saint home without precise timing.” I’ve heard my dad say this a hundred times! I know, God thought about it, worked things out, allowed him to live longer than expected, to die at a
specific time. Which means God was still lining things up; he was still dealing in people’s lives and using my grandfather to do so. Stepping back and
looking at some things I can see where God did do some work, but it may take
years before I see exactly why God allowed him to continue to fight for every
breath as long as he did. So as this storm passes by, as I lay gripping to my deep roots, I pray for peace, I pray for joy to be restored in people’s lives and I pray that people on the outside looking in see that our family lives and breathes the simple three word sentence, God is God.