Wrestling with the Secrets of God

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The Lord our God has secrets known to no one.  We are not accountable for them, but we and our children are accountable forever for all that he has revealed to us, so that we may obey all the terms of these instructions. Numbers 29:29

Are you concerned that there are things about God you just don’t understand?  Don’t be.

As Moses finished giving God’s law to the people, he told them, “The Lord our God has secrets known to no one.  We are not accountable for them, but we and our children are accountable forever for all that he has revealed to us, so that we may obey all the terms of these instructions” (Numbers 29:29).

Yes, God has secrets.  No, you may not understand them. But what we are responsible for is what God “has revealed to us,”—what we know and understand.  We know and understand God’s revealed will to us, first, from reading and studying scripture. The Apostle Paul wrote to a young man named Timothy saying, “You have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus” (2 Timothy 3:16).

God also reveals Himself to us through the person of the Holy Spirit. “But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes,” says John 16:13, “He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come.” We hear the Holy Spirit most often in times of quiet.

It’s much less personally costly to be perturbed by the secret things of God we don’t understand, than it is to obediently live out those we do.  Corrie ten Boom put it like this: “Don’t worry about what you do not understand.  Worry about what you do understand in the Bible but do not live by.”[1]

[1] 2021, August 7. Corrie Ten Boom quote: Don’t worry about what you do not understand… worry about what you do understand in the Bible, but do not live by. Minimalist Quotes. Retrieved July 7, 2022, from https://minimalistquotes.com/corrie-ten-boom-quote-100745/