I Don't Understand

Very rarely do I wake up late. Most mornings I get up in darkness. I get up so early in fact, the sun is still struggling to awake and rise. In those hours before dawn, I usually find myself in conversation with God. Those conversations usually come in the form of a series of "I don't understand." Let me expound....for instance, on events that have occurred in just the last few days......

God, I don't understand why I have to move out of my apartment. The manager said I couldn't be a full time student and live here. She actually encouraged me to lie about my student status on an affidavit. I wouldn't do that and was served with a notice to vacate by the end of October. I can live here unemployed, I can't live here as a student. I don't understand how being honest can be met with such a seemingly adverse consequence. I thought honesty was due some kind of reward or something....

God, I don't understand how my car can run fine one day and be totally broken the next. I didn't make it to school because when I started my car it sounded like it was running on 3 cylinders instead of 6. I drove from my apartment to the dealership garage down the street, left it there, and walked back home. Still awaiting the final verdict. Preliminary findings are that my car is literally running on 3 cylinders. One cylinder isn't working at all and two others aren't getting enough compression to work properly. "Internal engine problem" had the same slap in the face effect as "you have cancer" would. I don't understand how my car could be that sick when I have taken good care of it. The most devastating is the potential cost to repair it....possibly 3 to 4 thousand dollars. I don't understand how this could happen God when you know I don't have that kind of money. I just don't understand.....

I don't understand my season of alcohol abuse. I don't understand failed relationships. I don't understand my season of unemployment....over 300 resumes sent out, only two interviews, and I didn't make the grade. I don't understand why I'm not preaching and teaching from a pulpit in a church somewhere. I don't understand being a student at the age of 51. I don't understand much in the events that have transpired over the course of my life. And as the adage goes: The older I get the less I understand. Understanding fully the "why's" these things have happend is still a mystery and may remain a mystery for the rest of my life.

In the heat of progressively bad news yesterday, I wondered where God was. For awhile I was tempted to throw my hands up and say,"forget it."......a tendency I have had within me for a long time. I didn't go there, again, for reasons I don't understand. I stayed calm and inwardly uttered prayers to God in faith. The more I prayed the less I wanted to throw my hands up. The thought of a drink didn't enter my mind. Before, that would've have been the solution to everything...I would fall along this train of thought...well, the God in heaven isn't fixing this so I will turn to the god in the bottle who will.....and that god never does. It was like the worse the news got, the tighter my embrace of God.

This morning I got up before the sun as usual but my prayers were different. I found myself just being before the Lord and praying for those I know and love. The car wasn't foremost on my mind. Finding another place to live wasn't either. I really just wanted to enjoy the communion with the God I don't fully understand. And that's the thing I realized.....I don't fully understand God. There is a shroud of mystery about him, an aura of the unexplainable that surrounds him. This led me to some thinking.....

If I knew God as infallibly as he knows me, would I turn to him? Probably not. If I knew his thoughts before he thought them, would I worship him? Probably not. If I saw tomorrow as clearly as he does, would I praise him? Probably not. It is indeed the aura of the unexplainable that attracts me to him. The shroud of mystery about him reminds me that he indeed is God and I am not. I wouldn't need him if I could carry his title and completely fulfill his job description. This mystery of him causes me to run to him like a moth flies to a flame....but falling into his embrace is life, not death....and I want to live,....really, really live.

The moment I was adopted into his family through the shed blood and sacrifice of his son Jesus, he embraced me and called me son. He still calls me son, he has never let go his embrace of me, and his embrace has always been gentle. I wasn't alone yesterday, he was present, even when I didn't feel his presence. He promised to never leave me or forsake me....through the whole of my life, he has kept that promise. I have never out-offended his plan for my life. He has never thrown his hands up and said,"forget it." with me as I have done with him too many times to count. My vision is so small I can't even see beyond the front door of my apartment. He sees the whole of my life....and he is performing and working his will in it, and doing so for my good. The times I've felt least used of God in my life are probably the times I've been used most of God....I don't understand that either.

He is teaching me that he is God even in the storm. He is teaching me to trust him in the storm. I have always been a "praise God" kind of guy when things go my way and a "where is God" kind of guy when things don't. I am learning that he is God no matter what kind of day I am having and he has something to say to me in both the good and the bad that come my way. He controls it all. He was in control of my yesterday and he is in control of my today and even my tomorrow.

It comforts me today to know that he knows me infallibly, completely, and has designs on me that are for my benefit, not my demise. I find life in him and no other. I rest in that revelation. So, I embrace him, his mystery, and the aura of the unexplainable about him. He loves me dearly. He gets me. He understands me. He sees me. I may feel like the most unimportant person on the planet....he doesn't feel that way about me. Therefore, I praise him, I worship him, and I turn to him when skies are bright and when the storms come.....and in it all I discover joy and life beyond description. Blessings to one and all!!

"My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts, and my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine, for just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts higher than your thoughts." -God Isa. 55:8-9 NLT