Can You Fathom the Mysteries of God?

7 "Can you fathom the mysteries of God?
Can you probe the limits of the Almighty?

8 They are higher than the heavens—what can you do?
They are deeper than the depths of the grave [a] —what can you know?

9 Their measure is longer than the earth
and wider than the sea.

10 "If he comes along and confines you in prison
and convenes a court, who can oppose him?

11 Surely he recognizes deceitful men;
and when he sees evil, does he not take note?

12 But a witless man can no more become wise
than a wild donkey's colt can be born a man. [b]

13 "Yet if you devote your heart to him
and stretch out your hands to him,

14 if you put away the sin that is in your hand
and allow no evil to dwell in your tent,

15 then you will lift up your face without shame;
you will stand firm and without fear.

16 You will surely forget your trouble,
recalling it only as waters gone by.

17 Life will be brighter than noonday,
and darkness will become like morning.

18 You will be secure, because there is hope;you will look about you and take your rest in safety. Job 11:7-18

What do you think of when you think about God? When you consider the Almighty, do you reflect upon His majesty and long to know Him in true intimacy? The earnest seeker of God will be triply rewarded, growing in the knowledge of Jehovah, the knowledge of self, and the knowledge of the awe inspiring relationship between the two.

Do you consider Him as King of all Kings, resplendent in glory and worthy of all obedience? If you do, you most certainly consider his hand as sovereign in every part of the universe and over every aspect of your life and being. This truth should cause you to bow in humility and submission to the Most High God and to remember the awesome responsibility you have as a servant of His to know and do His will and to apply His every Word, always.

Do you consider His holiness, which sets Him apart from His creation in it's fallen state? To remember His holiness is to remember your sin in it's totality. Any man who ever caught a glimpse of the Holy and Righteous God was undone in himself and immediately knew of God's perfectness and his own vile nature. To see God high and lifted up in holiness is to finally and utterly see one's own sin. This fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and the first door one must open on the way to salvation. One will never meet the Savior if he feels he needs none.

Having walked through that door, the sinner is overwhelmed to realize that before him stretches the awesome love of God in all it's wondrous splendor. That love pours from God to man, offering not just hope, but the power to bridge the awesome chasm between corruption and incorruption, between eternal death and life everlasting. This truth should remind us that, despite our sin and rebellion, God longs to draw us to Himself and secure us in His bosom forever. It is, in the words of the apostle, 'much more better by much,' to realize that God does not NEED our love and our fellowship, He WANTS us, He desires us, he longs for our return to the place he always intended for us to be.

Indeed, God never NEEDS. If God were to need anything, He would not be God, for God is all in all. Everything is His and even though He gives, in endless blessing, of His attributes and His riches abundantly, He never is emptied of anything. God is completely and eternally self-sufficient. We arrogantly and pridefully think that God needs us to do His work, to share His Word, to give Him that which is due Him. In fact, God needs nothing nor does He need us. To think that we can earn our blessings or even our own salvation is to say in some respect that God is not sufficient or able in Himself - that He somehow needs us to help Him or complete Him because He is in some way lacking. What blasphemy! To contemplate such heresy for even one moment is to display to the world an ignorance of epic proportion.

One's mind may be drawn to a multitude of attributes and truths that pertain to the Almighty - to His grace, His mercy, His forgiveness, and His justice. He extends to the undeserving and the guilty, the power of His pity and compassion. He over arches His fallen creation a rainbow of forgiveness, thus encircling the world and touching it with the greatest force in the universe. Only forgiveness can overcome sin and justify the sinner; only forgiveness can break the slave free from the chains of iniquity and the tomb of decay and death; only forgiveness can destroy hate and replace it with love, the eternal, immutable, omnipotent love of the cross and of Jesus Christ.

Who can comprehend God? The honest answer is, no one; yet, that should not compel us to despair of the trying. In the effort to know the Holy One is understanding, and joy, and peace. To attempt to know the omniscience of His wisdom, the reality of His omnipresence, and the strength of His omnipotence is to challenge the impossible. What an exercise of joy! I pity the meek and lowly souls who never seek to do the impossible and know the unknowable. But a warning! To do so in one's own wisdom and effort is futile; to do so in faith, believing that 'with God all things are possible' is the greatest experience of one's life.

All of this consideration tells us much about ourselves and is essential for our own closer walk with God. To know Him is to know ourselves and, to see the two, is to see the value of becoming one with Him through Jesus Christ our Lord. He is the Way, He is the Truth, He is the Life, He is the Door, He is the Bread of Life, He is the Resurrection, He is the Vine, and we, are the branches. It is only in our relationship with Him that division becomes unity, sadness becomes joy, despair becomes hope, disease becomes healing, weakness becomes power, and death becomes life.

I often think of the immensity and power of evil and sin, particularly the sins and weaknesses in my own life and character, and, I am ashamed. But then, I remember the truth that sin, rebellion, evil, and death are finite. They had a beginning and they will have an end. God and all of His attributes, on the other hand, are infinite, boundless, without measure. His love has no measure, His forgiveness is boundless, His grace, His mercy, His holiness, His love, all are enveloped in blessed infinitude - who and what he is, he is completely, always, and forever. In that, the believer can trust, and in that, the follower can rest from his nervous and agitated labor and simply let God be God. That, child of God, is more than enough. In fact, it is 'much more better by much!'

"But God’s infinitude belongs to us and is made known to us for our everlasting profit. Yet, just what does it mean to us beyond the mere wonder of thinking about it? Much every way, and more as we come to know ourselves and God better."


"Because God’s nature is infinite, everything that flows out of it is infinite also. We poor human creatures are constantly being frustrated by limitations imposed upon us from without and within. The days of the years of our lives are few, and swifter than a weaver’s shuttle. Life is a short and fevered rehearsal for a concert we cannot stay to give. Just when we appear to have attained some proficiency we are forced to lay our instruments down. There is simply not time enough to think, to become, to perform what the constitution of our natures indicates we are capable of."

"How completely satisfying to turn from our limitations to a God who has none. Eternal years lie in His heart. For Him time does not pass, it remains; and those who are in Christ share with Him all the riches of limitless time and endless years. God never hurries. There are no deadlines against which He must work. Only to know this is to quiet our spirits and relax our nerves. For those out of Christ, time is a devouring beast; before the sons of the new creation time crouches and purrs and licks their hands. The foe of the old human race becomes the friend of the new, and the stars in their courses fight for the man God delights to honor. This we may learn from the divine infinitude." AW Tozer