How great is our Lord! His power is absolute! His understanding is beyond comprehension!
Psalm 147:5 (NLT)
When I was working at a summer camp (in my youth), I had the privilege of working in the maintenance department. I say privilege because I wasn’t particularly interested in working with little kids. So, I enjoyed stacking wood, paving roads, fixing plumbing, hauling garbage, and a thousand other tasks. But, with one week left to go in the summer, my privilege was taken away. During rec. time with the staff, I fell hard playing volleyball and broke my wrist. Because of this, I could no longer work maintenance. So, they made me a substitute counselor. Yippee!
On my very first afternoon with a cabin (whose regular counselor had the day off), one of the boys just randomly hauled off and decked one of his cabin-mates. I pulled the kid aside and angry asked him why he did it. His response? “Because I felt like it.” I kept pressing for an answer, but that was all I got in return. I couldn’t wrap my brain around that one. There obviously had to be a reason: Did the other kid provoke him? Does he have anger issues? Is this kid acting out what he sees his dad do at home? There were lots of questions, but no answers.
I think we approach God in much the same way when we have questions about why He did, or didn’t do, something. Why didn’t He heal someone? Why didn’t He help me on my algebra test? (That was a regular one of mine) Why didn’t He answer my prayer? Often times, we don’t get an answer. Other times, the answer simply is that we couldn’t understand.
I praise God that the writers of the Bible wrestled with this concept, too. In our verse today, the author stated, “How great is our Lord! His power is absolute! His understanding is beyond comprehension!” In other words, our God is so great, that we can’t understand why He does certain things because His thought process and decision-making is so far superior to ours it wouldn’t make any sense.
This is where our faith, our trust, must kick in. No, not a blind faith that just repeats, “God knows better.” Instead, it must be a faith based on a relationship with Jesus where we can say, I know God personally, and if He chooses to do this (or not do this), then He must have a good, loving reason. Though we may not understand it, He’s thought it through, seen every angle, and made the best possible choice for us and those we care about.
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