The Way God Works

As this is my first official post on this site, I suppose the polite thing to do would be to give all who care some semblance of an idea regarding just who I am. Well, to those of you who care, tough luck. I'm Frederick III; look it up in The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, if you are interested.

That aside, an interesting truth has been pressed upon me lately--a truth that has helped me to see the value in both mundane and downright unpleasant circumstances. It also helps to explain why it is that God so rarely elects to work in spectacular miracles (by which I mean, e.g., the feeding of the 5000 or the healing of the blind man) any longer. And, no, it is not because the world is so much more rational or sinful or skeptical or whatever now than it used to be. What is this truth, you ask? It is quite simply that God has chosen to work His will in this world through means; that is, God uses means to accomplish what he would accomplish in this world.

By way of example (just one--I could think of countless), consider one of the petitions we pray in the Lord's Prayer--if you're like me, often without even thinking about what you are saying, much to my (and your?) chagrin. We say (in some manner similar to this, anyway), "Give us this day our daily bread." What do we mean by this? We are asking God to provide what we need to survive on a daily basis. Perhaps even more amazing, God has promised to do just that (see the end of Matt 6, e.g.). How, though, does He do this? By miraculously causing the bread to appear out of thin air on our dinner tables? Generally, no. He does it by means of the farmer who grows the grain, the miller who grinds and prepares it, the baker who bakes it, the trucker who gets it to the store, the grocer who stocks and sells it, the bagger who throws it on the bottom of our bag so that the bread can be all squished when we get home, the employer who has given us the job that provides the wages with which we are able to purchase the bread, etc. I could go on and on and on.

It is vital that we realize that this does not in any way mean that God's provision of our daily bread is any less miraculous than it would be if He caused it to pop out of thin air. (Man, would my kids love that--if they didn't scream in terror, that is. It could go either way.) In our sinfulness, we (or at least I) simply tend to lose sight of the fact that it is a miraculous provision. In our sinfulness, we(I) also tend to see the process (if we ever think about it) as somehow divorced from God; that is, I do the work that earns the wage, I pay the grocer for the bread from my money, so it is up to me (and me alone) to ensure that my family continues to eat. I don't know about you, but I tend to turn the means into the source. Foolish.

Why, though, Mr. Frederick III, does God elect to use means? Wouldn't the spectacular be a lot easier all around (and be more convincing that God is indeed the one behind the process)? Good questions you have asked. While I have neither the intention nor the ability to exhaust this topic, I will briefly touch upon two of them at a later time.