Tuesday, June 19, 2012

We Have No Idea


Today we ponder Psalm 139.17-18:

How weighty to me are Your thoughts, O God! I try to count them—they are more than the sand; I come to the end—I am still with You.

Throughout Scripture we encounter passages like Isaiah 55.9: “My ways are higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.” And we tend to read them as reminders that God always has a better idea and better way. But Psalm 139’s poet would challenge us to reconsider. He would suggest that God’s thoughts and ways are so completely different from ours that we have no idea what God is thinking and doing in our lives. God’s thoughts are too weighty—too rare—for us; God’s ways are limitless. And though the breadth of God’s creativity is too great for us, the disparity between our imaginations and what God has in mind cannot separate us from God. We run out of ideas, but God is still with us. So we silence human opinion—be that what we think or what others say—and trust God’s infinite wisdom and power. God knows. We trust.


2 comments:

kkryno said...

I guess that's why it's just the best policy is to leave it alone and leave it to God. That's the one I struggle with all the time. My heart knows this but my mind still tries to "fix" it!

Tim said...

It is the best policy, Vikki. But, ironically I suppose, the moments when we would be best served by leaving it to God are typically the hardest to release. I've often wondered why that is and the best I can come up with is that those are the moments in our lives when our faith needs to be most real. Hanging on to our challenges never ends as happily as when when we remind ourselves that for all we know, we don't know enough.

Thanks for the comment; you remind us all how difficult living by faith can be!

Many blessings, dear friend,
Tim