Knew-It-All

There was a time, I hate to admit, when I knew it all. I'd been around the block a few times, to borrow a tired cliche, and I knew what life was all about. Knew what God was like. Knew how to behave.

And there were times when I shared my know-it-all ways for all to hear--my simplistic view of the world, neglecting the complexities of the human condition, of faith, of life.

Today I know less than when I knew it all.

And I regret my words back then.

Today I rest here: in the sovereign mystery of God.

I don't know why bad things happen to terrific people. I don't "get" the world's pain. I weep alongside friends who weep their bewilderment. I cling to the God who sees, who hears, who rules as King. He is the mystery I cannot fully know. His ways are above my own.

Isn't it ironic that certainty wanes the deeper you go into the heart of God? It's not that I waver more, or doubt increases. It's that, in my smallness of mind, I can't possibly "get" God. I can't understand how His mind, His heart, His will works. And His plan is so above my own desire to have everything in its place.

Used to be that would freak me out.

Oddly, I rest in God's God-ness. His otherness. His ways are so much beyond my understanding, that I can rest in that, trusting in His direction.