Inexhaustible Questions

In a voice trembling with suffering and grief, Job cried out to God, whom he felt had unjustly allowed a series of tragedies to befall him. A righteous man, he believed he had been wrongly treated and deserved better. He did not just complain to his friends; he was so distressed that he wanted God to obliterate the day he had been born and to wipe away any evidence of his existence. He demanded an audience with God.

Within a whirlwind of probing questions, God proved the point that Job could not fully understand or explain the complex and amazing physical world surrounding him let alone the unseen moral universe of God’s good purposes and perfect justice.

God inquired of Job: “Do you know the ordinances of the heavens? Can you establish their rule on the earth?….Do you know when the wild goats give birth? Have you watched as deer are born in the wild?”

In today’s parlance that might be “Have you seen atoms and sub atomic quarks and gluons? Have you seen the ends of space? Have you revealed all the mysteries of the human cell?

Even after all the scientific discoveries uncovered by our curiosity and advanced technology, our immense universe continues to amaze with its inexhaustible secrets. Each new discovery comes with a set of new questions which are humbling reminders that there is a level of purpose that lies beyond our full comprehension.

Job’s concept of God was small and contained. When he realized how limited his knowledge of the moral universe was , he exclaimed, “I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know…I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes.”Job 42:3-6)

As we continue to formulate and reformulate our theories of life’s origins and meaning, we should do so with great humility. Giving strong consideration to not just the idea of God but to discovering how He has revealed Himself and His purposes through the natural world is just one gate which opens His “divine nature” and “eternal power” to us.