Read the transcript from today's video devotional.
Reading this verse, I'll be honest, is pretty humbling. I don't know if you find yourself in this position ever, but as I look at these words, I am immediately stricken with the message that is coming from God through the prophet Isaiah to the people of God—like, from the heart of God is a communication that is delivered to human people.
That by itself is already so incredible to consider as a reality. Then I go even further, because the message that God is delivering through the prophet is one that, sadly, I forget way too often.
God is saying to us that His ways are higher than our ways.
Why This Matters
You might be thinking, what are you making such a big deal about this for? I don't understand why that matters.
Here's why it matters for me. Even as a person who's seeking with everything that I have to do good things on behalf of God in the world, to be a good husband and to be a good father, to be a good friend. I'm a pastor, so I want to love people well. With all of those things as a goal in my life, I'm trying the best that I can to figure out ways to pull those things off in a good and meaningful way.
If I'm completely and totally honest with you, I think about my ways to do that way more often than I think about God's ways to live. I'm way more concerned on a regular basis, as a human person, with my own plan coming to fruition, my own thoughts about things being figured out, my own ideas being planted in the world.
God's Ways Are Better Than Mine
Why do I need to be reminded so often and so clearly that the ways of the God of the universe who created me are actually better than the ways of the guy who was created by Him? That is so humbling. I wonder if you feel that with me.
When We Can't See the Way Forward
I wonder if hearing today that God's ways are higher is an encouragement to us because we go, man, I can't see the way forward. I don't know what I'm going to do. I don't know how I'm going to figure this out. I don't know how I'm going to reconcile with that family member. I don't know how I'm going to overcome this challenge. I am exhausted in all of the ways I've tried to play this out.
We're encouraged knowing that He has ways. He has thoughts. He has ideas that are greater than ours. Amen.
Why Do We Turn to Our Own Resources?
Also, why is it that we so quickly turn to our own resources, to our own thoughts, to our own understanding, when we have at our disposal the thoughts and the ideas that come straight from God?
How Do We Access God's Thoughts?
You might be going, all right, well, how do I access these thoughts?
The beautiful gift is we start right here with what we're doing in our Verse of the Day. God's Word revealed to us gives us a little bit of an insight into these thoughts that He has on our behalf.
Through prayer, through times of meditation, we're able to think and consider about the things that God has given for us to know about Him.
Through community, through church, we're able to spend time together and be reminded of the ways that God thinks about our lives—ways that maybe aren't our natural ways of thinking.
Take Rest in This Truth
Today, take good rest in the fact that God's ways are greater and higher and better than we could ever imagine.
