"Daddy, if God made everything, did he make the telephone poles?"
We were on our way to the mall to eat with our boys when our 3-year-old son, looking out the window of the car, asked this deeply theological question.
We had been teaching our children that God created the world and everything in it. From the earliest age possible, we wanted to download the glorious doctrine of creation into the brains of our children and pray that God would allow it to capture their hearts.
I'm not sure that our toddler understood, at heart level, what implications the doctrine of creation had on his little life, but I do know this for sure: all human beings have a deep desire to understand.
Whether we're 3, 30, or 90, we spend much of our time each day trying to figure life out. We're not designed, like the rest of creation, to live by instinct. No, we've been given mysterious analytical abilities and a hardwiring to pursue knowledge.
Our drive to understand and our ability to interpret are holy gifts from God, designed to draw us near to Him, so that we can know Him and understand ourselves in light of His existence and His will for our existence.
But sin makes these gifts dangerous. They tempt us to think that we can find our hearts by figuring it all out. Have you ever thought something like this: "If only I could understand this or that, then I'd be secure." I know I have many times.
But no matter how hard we try to decipher, it never works. In our most brilliant moments, we're still left with mystery to some degree; sometimes even painful mystery. We all face things that appear to make little sense and don't seem to serve any good at all.
So, here's what I want to leave you with today. I've said it many times before: rest is never found in the quest to understand; rest is found in trusting the One Who understands it all.
Take some time to memorize or reflect on Psalm 62:5-7. "For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence, for my hope is from him. He only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress; I shall not be shaken. On God rests my salvation and my glory; my mighty rock, my refuge is God."
In moments when you wish you knew what you weren't meant to know, there is rest to be found. There is One who knows. He loves you and rules what you don't understand for his glory and your eternal good.
REFLECTION QUESTIONS
1. What questions did you have for God this week?
2. What questions has God answered in your life? If there was a delay, how was that waiting good for your soul?
3. What questions has God left unanswered in your life?
4. Which of those unanswered questions cause you to worry, and why?
5. Where, or how, can you find spiritual rest in the midst of uncertainty?
