Tuesday, August 16, 2016

Not Knowing

A dear friend and I have laughed recently at how God has managed to get us ok with confessing, "I don't know."

Truthfully we were laughing to keep from crying.
Ever been there?

Questions plague us about the why's of God~ His timing, His methods, His paths AND for the life of us....we have no answer.

It honestly makes me mad.  But less mad than it used to. 

So there is some progress there....

How does God do this?

How does He take people that desperately need to know an outcome ahead of time or how long something is going to last or maybe why we have been chosen for a specific difficulty and make those people shake their heads in surrender and say, "I don't know how, why or when but I know You are faithful God and I trust You."

I have no idea.

I will use myself for an example.

The Holy Spirit has encouraged my husband and I to believe Him to heal our daughter for 14 years.

Yep.  Fourteen years.

I thought by now she would be running, talking, sitting, standing, and eating on her own.  I thought she would be doing the normal 14 year old girl things....

But she isn't.

And she is far from it.

Not only do I wonder why. 
I daily wonder when.
And more often than that I wonder how.

But this may be the coolest miracle of this whole process....BIGGER even than my daughter getting out of her wheelchair....I still believe God.

How is that possible???

I don't know.

Somehow my Lord has equipped me with daily grace to persevere in faith.

That sentence seems to trivialize these past 14 years.

Each day of each passing year has met me head on with a choice.

Do I believe or do I quit?

If my feelings were talking I would confess that I have quit believing at some point on every single one of those days.
My flesh can not do this.

But my flesh and my feelings fail me.
They bail on me all the time.
They lead me down destructive paths.

Truth remains.

Even when the thoughts of quitting take aim at my mind.....I am reminded of the One that spoke faith to me.

He has authority over time.
He has authority over impossibilities.
He has gotten me through each moment of each day since her birth and He will continue to do so....


My task is not about knowing anything other than Jesus.

As offensive and unfair and tragic as that seems....I am not entitled to any information about my life that God does not want me to know.

He demands that I know Him.

Knowing Him equips me for what He knows lies ahead of me.

He loves me.
He gives me faith.
He covers me in grace.

The why's may remain until heaven....but He stands with me in the meantime.

"I don't know" is an acceptable answer.

I don't have to know.

His pursuit of us is not that we would know more about our lives.
His pursuit of us gives us access to the One that gives us life.

He is the goal.

This life offers us a choice each day:  believe or not.  


When I demand to know the details I remind myself of Eve.

Genesis 3 opens up with Eve arguing with the serpent over what she could and could not know.

Her need to know led to her to sin.

God had provided a boundary to what she could and could not know.

One day she chose to not believe His way was best.

Not knowing what God has chosen to withhold from us is FOR us.

We must simply believe this on faith.

God is not withholding the best of Himself.

He lets Himself be known.  Fully.  By us.

Instead of allowing the enemy to tempt me with what is being kept from me...

I want to choose to flourish in all that is being lavished upon me.

More love than I can stand.
Faith that can move mountains.
Mercy that defies logic.
And grace that has no end.....

This is Jesus.

This is what He offers.

May we pursue Him.

He is the prize.














1 comment:

JSG said...

Oh my...this spoke volumes into my soul and heart. I've had a promise from God that I've been waiting on for over eleven years. I just poured out all my frustrations (again) to Him this morning. I will print this off and keep it close. Thank you.