God’s Ways Are Not Mysterious Afterall

Today’s reading: Ephesians 1:3-10

I have never felt comfortable with the popular phrase (actually, I’ll just call it what it is, a cliche), “God works in mysterious ways.”

Today’s reading helps me understand the problem with those words — which do not appear in the Bible.

“With all wisdom and insight he has made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure that he set forth in Christ, as a plan for the fullness of time, to gather up all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.”

The fact is, God’s ways are not a mystery at all. He has, indeed, made his will known to us. And He has thoroughly explained his ways throughout the Bible. 

In fact, I can summarize his ways in just one paragraph.

God loves all of mankind, even though we were once willing to deny, torture and murder his son, the very person He sent to spread his message of love. (And even though our history is filled with many other incidents in which we denied his love.) Once our evil had been accomplished, God heaped even more love upon us, and, though we can be counted upon to continue to denying Him more than 2,000 years later, God continues to love us.  And, in fact, He has promised to love each of us forever.

This mystery that everyone seems so puzzled by is also solved by the famous piece of scripture that even many non-Christians can recite by memory: “God so loved the world that he gave his only son so that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

That, to me, is glorious, not mysterious.

What’s mysterious is mankind’s behavior.

After years of study and thought, I still don’t understand how Pontius Pilate could rule as he did or how an entire city full of people could demand, and then celebrate, Jesus’ crucifixion, or how Peter — and the other disciples — could deny his teacher 3 times, or how Thomas could not believe without seeing, or how modern people can hear the story of Jesus and respond with boredom or indifference.

It’s all just too weird for me — even though I am often one of the modern day deniers. (I did it again just  last night!)

So next time I hear someone utter that ridiculous phrase, my response will be, “God makes perfect sense to me! It’s our ways that are mysterious.”

Thanks be to God for His eternal love. May I (and we) never question it.