Knowing What We Cannot Know

You, O Lord, are good and forgiving,

abounding in steadfast love to all who call upon you. —Psalm 86:1-5

Most of our anxieties arise from the fact that we've forgotten what God is like. We should remind ourselves first thing in the morning and all through the day that He is "good and forgiving, abounding in steadfast love."

Grasping the reality of God's love—getting it from our heads into our hearts—is a life-long endeavor; it dawns upon us gradually and supernaturally.

Paul describes our awareness of God's love as a paradox: a "knowledge that surpasses knowledge" (Ephesians 3:19). In other words, it doesn't come to us through reason. We don't learn it from books or sermons. It’s a supernatural acquisition, a gift that God gives us through prayer. 

Which is why Paul prays that we may know "the breadth and length and height and depth" of the love of Christ, a love that we cannot otherwise know.

David

3.12.17

Groans

“Poor little things! You can’t fly,” said the Lark.

“No, but we can look up,” said Tricksey. —George MacDonald in "The Giant’s Heart"

" Listen to my words,” David prays, “Understand my groans” (Psalm 5:1,2). God's eye is ever upon the righteous, and His ear open to their cry. One upward glance is all it takes.

Prayer can be a groan, a fleeting wish, an anxious reaction, a ragged cry of despair. “Groans are quick, and full of wings, And all their motions upward be," George Herbert said.

God is our Father. He knows more of all our needs than all our words can tell. He knows what we need before we ask Him. He reads our anxious, inarticulate thoughts and turns them into prayer.

So, if you don't know how or what to pray for it don't worry. "God does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans” (Romans 8:26,27, The Message).

David Roper

4.1.17

The Unlearning

“Whatever gain I had, I count as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord." (Philippians 3:7)

Much of what I spent a life-time and a lot of money learning seems to be slipping away. I’m unlearning now what I once knew. It’s a bit unsettling.

But I came across an old poem a few weeks ago that greatly helped me:

To learn, and yet to learn, whilst life goes by, 

So pass the student's days;  

And thus be great, and do great things, and die,  

And lie embalmed with praise.  

My work is but to lose and to forget,  

Thus small, despised to be;  

All to unlearn—this task before me set;  

Unlearn all else but Thee. 

—Gerhard Ter Steegen

David Roper