“It’s a little too high,” I say to my husband.
I’m on a small kitchen step ladder. My arm stretches as high and deep as I’m able.
“Here,” he answers. “Let me get that for you.”
He’s been telling me that since we dated. He’s tall enough that he can reach what my fingers stretch for, but can’t quite reach.
“Got it,” he says with the jar in his hand. He puts it into my hands, smiles, and steps down.
My kitchen leaves a bit to be desired. The cabinets are narrow and although tall, there is a lot of wasted space at the top. It’s too high. Countertops are narrow and scarce. Too few. We move about like worms in a can. It’s too tight.
This morning I read one of my favorite passages of Scripture. It’s often comforted and challenged me. It inspires me to know God more and reminds me of His complete knowledge of me. Psalm 139 never fails to expose my shortness, shallowness, tightness, while it displays His Highness.
“O Lord, you have searched me and known me! You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar.” (Psalm 139:1 ESV)
As David writes, he wonders at God’s intimate knowledge of his person, thoughts, and God’s inscrutable paths.
“Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high; I cannot attain it.” (Psalm 139:6 ESV)
Literally, David says, “I can’t reach it.” It’s beyond his grasp. He recognizes that no matter how far he stretches, no matter how much he grows in knowledge of God, still, God’s ways and thoughts are higher. Unreachable.
And David finds God’s—-“beyond reach,”—-wonderful.
This same David, running for his life, mistreated, scoffed at, hunted, robbed, wounded, and weary found the un-definable ways of God high and out of reach, but wonderful.
There are times in my life when I have considered the inexplicable doings of the Most High as less than endearing. I’ve murmured and grumbled with “Why?” “It doesn’t make sense,” or “It’s not fair.” I’ve grappled with things that seem unjust, painful, and unanswerable this side of heaven.
I’ve wondered how such a Mighty Benevolent Father, capable of rescue, leaves us to stew in our humanity and grieve in our disabilities and woes. And at times, I’ve found the meaning of all of it, out of reach. No matter how hard I try, I just don’t get it.
Perhaps that is one of the reasons we live in a continual battle to lower, scoff, and deny any authority beyond our own, as though our reasoning could possibly be on the same level as God’s. Being god ourselves has always tempted and slithered into our world view and natural bent. It’s evident in so many ways.
It shows in how we respect others, in our me-first culture, and in value for the gift of a baby’s life. Our short sighted conclusions lower, rather than magnify, esteem for His Sovereignty. We are prone to wander because of what we don’t understand, rather than anchor in the One who knows all.
But David found awe in the unreachable. He accepted justice in the unattainable. He discovered grounding in the unexplainable.
When a grieving Job saw a glimpse of God’s Sovereignty, he found new perspective, “ Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.” (Job 42:3 ESV)
When Isaiah saw God High on His throne he moaned in repentance,
“Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” (Isaiah 6:5 ESV)
The author of Hebrews wrote of Christ’s inconceivable power, “He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power.” (Hebrews 1:3 ESV)
These truths beyond every stretch of our understanding and imagination open our eyes to a tiny peek of blinding glory. They move us to our knees.
God is able to use whatever you may be going through right now in unexpected and unforeseen ways. It may be the very thing that brings deeper understanding of His character and broader knowledge of His greatness.
While I try with all my might to open the jar taken from the heights of my cabinet, I reflect on the
verses I read in Psalm 139. I grimace and growl with an accompanying “Rrrrgh” in my attempt to twist the lid. My husband stands and watches with a smile on his face. He holds out his big palm.
Today, in just the tiniest most inept way, this kitchen, which I emphatically still do not like, with its shelves I can’t reach, illustrate David’s words. I’m reminded to thank God for His higher ways, even when I don’t understand them.
I place the jar back into my husband’s capable hands and with one powerful twist, the lid turns.
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An article I recently wrote appeared on christianity.com. I’d be happy for you to take a look!
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