There are many truths of the Bible that are just plain hard to understand. Take the virgin birth as an example. How in the world is that possible? Another example is the Trinity. How is it that God can be One, yet Three? Another still is the Bible’s teaching that Jesus is human in every way, yet completely God at the same time.
All of these truths seem contradictory! One by necessity is not three! If someone is human, then by necessity, they cannot also be God! How can these things be? I wish I had an easy answer, but I don’t; and that’s a good thing.
How can this possibly be a good thing!? Well, if we can completely understand everything about God, then He’s not God is He? If God can fit into my human mind, then He’s pretty small. Frankly, I don’t want to serve a God that I can fit in my head. If He’s completely comprehensible, then is He really that great? Furthermore, is he really God?
I don’t know about you, but I want to serve a really BIG God. I want the Master of my life to be bigger than I am, more intelligent than I am, and more complex than I am. The greatest thing that I’ve ever created is my kids, and even that He made possible! I want to stand in awe of the incomprehensible majesty of God.
So, what can we say about these hard-to-understand-teachings of the Bible? Well, we can say that while we don’t know how these things are true, but know that they are true. That is an answer that I can live with because it lends itself to faith.
At the same time, does this mean that God is so much more than humanity that He is out of reach? How can a relatively simple being like me have a deep and meaningful relationship with someone who is so much more than I am? How could a chicken have a deep and meaningful relationship with a human being? That’s a question that’s a bit easier to answer.
One of the things that God is able to pull off in His incomprehensible greatness is to have a meaningful and eternal relationship with humanity, in spite of being incomprehensible. It’s possible because He can…somehow. Again, I don’t know how it’s true, I just know that it’s true.
Again, these things are hard. Are we willing to obey and love a God with a degree of ambiguit? Can we love and obey a God and have some of our deepest life questions unanswered? Are we able to give ourselves wholly to someone that we cannot possibly fully understand?
This is no easy thing! If it were easy, however, it wouldn’t be faith. This is the nature of faith. Stepping out into the unknown. It requires is to extend beyond ourselves. It invites us to step out on the surface of the deep trusting in God’s promise that we won’t sink. It’s not suppose to be easy! If it were, the way wouldn’t be narrow (as Jesus describes it).
Do you have faith?
