“This just doesn’t make sense.”
I have made this statement dozens of times during the past few months. As I found myself saying this, I began hearing the same statement from other people. Not about my situation, but for something they were dealing with. The more I started listening for this phrase, the more I heard it.
“I don’t understand. This doesn’t make sense.”
From an early age we are taught to depend on our senses. This is how we learn. This is how we live. If we can see it, hear it, touch it, smell it, or taste it, we understand. If it’s out of the realm of our senses, we don’t understand.
I remember several occasions in my life when attempting to learn something new, and for days being frustrated because I just couldn’t get it. I couldn’t understand. Then there was a particular moment, a light-bulb moment, a sudden realization and I could see what I hadn’t been able to see before. I understood.
As I read God’s Word more and more, I have come to understand that God seldom does things that make sense to the human mind. In fact, more times than not, His ways make no sense to the way we think.
In the beginning, God spoke. Not for conversation, but for creation. (Genesis 1)
Does that make sense?
God told Joshua to march his army around the walls of a city, and the walls would fall. (Joshua 6)
Does that make sense?
David fought the giant, Goliath, with a sling and a rock. (1 Samuel 17)
Does that make sense?
Throughout the earthly ministry of Jesus, the ways and means by which Jesus worked, seldom made sense to the human mind.
Jesus spit on the ground and made mud to heal a blind man. (John 9)
Does that make sense?
On and on and on throughout the Bible, there are countless examples of things that do not make sense to us, and raise a number of questions.
What do you do when you have more questions than answers?
Life happens to everyone.
Life is not fair to anyone.
Bad things happen to good people and life will not always make sense.
As humans, we are wired to want things to make sense. We can justify almost anything, if we can just make sense of it.
In the middle of a storm, you have this strange loss of perception, connection, and direction. Who am I? Why am I here? Where am I going? Why did this happen? Questions far outnumber answers. We struggle in storms for that light-bulb moment, when all that’s happening will suddenly make sense.
In life we are not always privileged to have the light-bulb moment for the things that happen to us and those around us. As long as we are living on earth, there will be things that will happen that will not make sense to us. Some of our questions will never have answers. At the end of the day we are forced to realize, He’s God, and we’re not.
When the answers aren’t clear and life doesn’t make sense, then what? Trust God through eyes of faith and not of sense. Trust God for who He is, and not for what He does, or does not do. Trust God.
I know you’ve heard it before, but it really does bear repeating. Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and don’t rely on your own understanding (senses). Proverbs 3:5
Still Believing!
