With every blinding flash, a loud boom swiftly followed. With every loud boom there followed rattling windows. Summer thunderstorms in Florida will shake you to your core if you haven’t yet lived through at least one season of them. In the middle of my baby’s nap time, a sudden pop-up thundershower interrupted his sleep. I first heard his high pitched scream, and when I burst through the door, he was huddled in the corner of his crib holding his head in absolute confusion. For the next thirty minutes I tried to teach and model for Jonathan how to enjoy the mystery of the storm. We looked through the windows at the torrential rain in wonder. When the thunder would rattle the windows, I would place his hand on the pane to feel the vibration. Every crash of thunder I’d say, “Wow! Amazing! Do you hear the thunder, baby?” By the end of the storm he was calm and would even raise his eyebrows to make a surprised face when the lightening would peel through the sky.
In 1 Samuel, David is being pursued by his greatest enemy: Saul, the King of Israel. The innocent future king scrambles from city to city hoping to dodge Saul’s various man hunts on his life. In the midst of all the confusion, David never asked God to show him the big picture of why Saul was trying to kill him. With every chaotic charge Saul led, David would press in to God through prayer. When he knew Saul was hot on his heels, David would pray. The mystery of what God was allowing or doing never shook him. This season of mystery for David only allowed for his spiritual eyes to see the fingerprints left behind by God in faithful protection over his life. This taught David to trust God in the mysterious uncertain times. These fingerprints of God’s faithfulness taught him to walk in mystery with confidence.
We all have these seasons where life feels like the greatest episode of “Unsolved Mysteries”. We become the great detectives in God’s holy story of our sanctification. We want to solve the big picture story of what God is doing instead of allowing ourselves to walk in mystery. We want the fog to lift so we can see the other side clearly. But, what if our need for raw clarity and understanding is actually an opportunity to witness a specific glory when we can’t see or know fully what God is doing?
As humans, we want a god we can see, touch, feel, and humanly comprehend. This is why we so readily turn to creature comforts to be our god. They are easily understood, you can see them, feel them, and they can respond to your stimuli in order to be real to you. While we still live in these fallen bodies, we cannot see him as we ought. We cannot comprehend him with the tainted senses, but we can catch glimpses of him in all things. He leaves his fingerprint on and in all of his creation. It is good for us to be spiritually aware of his fingerprints. His mysterious hidden nature, his incomprehensible mind, and the unrevealed parts of who he is serves as a way to experience his glory more fully while we remain human. This mystery drives us to a deeper faith. How?
Walking in the mystery allows us to more readily discern what is God’s doing and what is not. If we can recognize HIS fingerprint on events, sufferings, and the unknown, then we can know God’s workings or not. When we allow ourselves to walk in mystery, we can trust, just as David had done, that when he does work, he will leave his fingerprints on the things he is doing. The unknown is meant to keep us curious. It is meant to keep us seeking the One to whom the fingerprints belong.
Be prepared to daily have your “handy, dandy notebook” readily available. The mysteries of our lives will never be solved in the big picture until we reach heaven and our faith is made sight. Until then, we have his fingerprints on so many beautiful, yet difficult happenings of our lives. Be a patient investigator connecting the dots of some of life’s most beautiful mysteries, and you’ll reap a deep and robust faith that keeps you curious like a new toddler trying to figure out the scary storms of life, yet held and known in wonder.
The mysteries of what is happening in our current world is a real life opportunity for you to pull out your magnifying glass ready to see the fingerprints of God’s working. Are you searching for justice? Have you lost your job due to Covid? Are you battling a mental health issue that has you wondering where God is? Maybe you’re tired of being told what to believe by media outlets about the unknowns of life as we know it right now. Open your eyes. There is a deep wonder ready to captivate your anxious heart. This wonder will only satisfy you as you walk in the mystery of God, the mystery of who he is.
