ahhhh…..!
My daughter is 10 months (11 months if you ask Summer) and at the age when your child starts saying “NO” (or in Tatum cause Ahhhh) and it just makes you laugh. I say no and she grunts back. She knows what not to touch and does it assessing my response. She gets mad at me. It’s hilarious.
It’s funny because it reminds me how I respond to God. I don’t fully understand how He operates. I was taught to submit to God (which I agree) but submitting does not mean accepting. What I mean by accepting is not complaining. I believe one can submit and still get angry. Look at the world around us – poverty, pain, disease, injustice. After college I had similar questions from unbelievers and had no answers (hard for a recent bible college graduate). I read a book called “When God Doesn’t Make Sense” by James Dobson. The book didn’t help me – but I’m sure it’s helped others.
I think one of the stories of scripture help me the most (1 Chr 13.5-13). David has been crown king and desires to bring the ark of God back to Israel. So they go to Judah, put the ark of God on a new ox cart, rejoiced before God with all their might on the journey home. All is well until the oxen stumble and Uzzah put out his hand to brace the ark. The most important symbol of God to Israel is about to role over into the mud, who wouldn’t reach out and hold the ark? The alternative was to hold the ark as you washed it off and listen to your buddies make fun of you. So God in His anger killed Uzzah.
So how does David respond? Angry! David was angry because the Lord had lashed out at Uzzah. Then he became afraid of God to the point he decided not to return the ark to the city of David but took it to the house of Obed-edom.
There are a lot of lessons here. You could teach about faith in God to prevent the ark from meeting the mud. You could talk about not taking God lightly and how Uzzah’s death leads to a higher respect for God and the ark (2 Sam 6.9-13). You could teach how blessing comes from sorrow (1Chr 13.14). But the greatest lesson for me was that we can get angry at God. We can stomp our feet, raise our fist in the air in protest, and God is big enough to handle it. But this anger of ours shouldn’t lead us away from Him but toward a deeper respect for Him. It causes you to say “God, I don’t agree with what you did, but accept your sovereignty over everything.”
How do you submit to God when He doesn’t make sense?
I think there is no better way for a person to realize the magnitude of God’s love for us, than when you have a child. We love our childen so much and even though we have to tell them No sometimes we tell them No for a reason. It’s not just to say No to keep them from being happy all the time. Our children don’t understand fully why we are saying no, only that we are saying it. We know better. Will it make them mad at times….absolutely but we know that it’s to protect them or to teach them right from wrong. Just like you said when GOD tells us no and we get mad. It’s also for a reason…..sometimes for reasons we can’t comprehend. And like you said we ultimately have to just accept that he knows better than we. If we rebel against GOD there will be consequences….just like if our kids rebel against us there will be.
I understand GODs love for us so much more now that I am a parent and just in that itself has taught me how to have reverence for GOD because he is the Boss. Period. So for me I am able to submit to GOD now because I realize HE is the one in control and he is the one that knows best. Not me. Even if it means me suffering…I KNow it must all be for a very good reason. Even if in my mind there is no comprehending.
So even if GOD does not make sense I am able to submit because of what I have learned by loving my children and having to tell them no at times.
Wait until Tatum starts talking and you have to tell her no for something and she looks at you and says ” you’re mean” or “now I’m sad” or” you’re ruining my life” and it breaks your heart even though you know it’s in her best interest. I can just imagine how GOD feels when we lash out at him for something that he only means to protect us from.