Job 40:1-5 “Then the Lord said to Job, ‘Do you still want to argue with the Almighty? You are God’s critic, but do you have the answers?’ Then Job replied to the Lord, ‘I am nothing – how could I ever find the answers? I will cover my mouth with my hand. I have said too much already. I have nothing more to say.’”
Humans are so quick to accuse and condemn God. Yet reality is far deeper and more mysterious than any of us can perceive. God has purposes I do not fully understand and often misinterpret. I must remember his character, that he is righteous, holy, true, faithful, just, gracious, merciful, forgiving, and full of perfect love. He deserves the benefit of the doubt when something seems confusing or contradictory. He deserves my efforts to dig deeper into his Word, to pray and ask for clarity, to trust him.
It is like the time when Jesus declared to a semi-hostile crowd, “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you cannot have eternal life within you” (see John 6:26-69). Many followers abandoned Jesus because of these shocking, incomprehensible words. But other followers, including his twelve disciples, did not. They were just as confused but knew enough about Jesus’ character and miracles to give him the benefit of the doubt and to stay with him, trusting that what he declared would make sense in the end. This is an element of what it means to fear God.
To fear God is to take him seriously, to let God be God, to not try to put him in a box, to recognize that I have already said too much. It is to acknowledge that though God has given me a mind to reason, question, explore, and learn, in a thousand lifetimes I will never find all the answers.
This is the counterpoint to the atheistic and idolatrous society we live in which claims to have all the answers – to economics, to science, to controlling the climate, to human fulfillment, to death and disease, to making the world peaceful and prosperous and happy. Yet, time and again, history has proven that every human attempt to gain power over others in pursuit of these aims has only made things worse.
“Men have forgotten God.” That statement is Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s explanation for the great disasters of the twentieth century. So it continues in the twenty-first. Is the worldwide COVID-19 epidemic revealing an ancient truth about us as humans – that on our own we are frail and vulnerable, that we are easily manipulated by conflicting statistics and opinions, that we cannot control everything, and, most importantly, that we desperately need God to rescue us?
Father, I find peace in trusting you. I don’t demand a detailed explanation or even a glimpse of what the future holds. I simply ask for your daily guidance, protection, and mercy during this time of great uncertainty and potential for rising tyranny. Yet none of these things surprises you. You are in control and I will rest in that truth.
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This week: If you’ve never read the book of Job, or haven’t in a while, spend some time reading through the sweeping finale in chapters 38-42. God doesn’t explain himself to Job. Instead he draws from the wonders of nature to show just how meager Job’s knowledge is compared to his Creator. Job then confesses to God, “I know you can do all things; no plan of yours can be thwarted.” Also, read through John 6:26-69 to get the fuller context of Jesus’s shocking words to the semi-hostile crowd. Then read Jesus’ further explanation of what he meant in Matthew 26:26-28. By giving Jesus the benefit of the doubt, Peter and the other disciples came to understand the meaning behind his words – meaning that the followers who abandoned Jesus would have learned as well had they only stayed with him.