our own understanding...

I am continually challenged by this strange paradox of the Christian life. We are not meant to remain babies in the faith - the Bible makes it clear that we are meant to mature and learn and develop as we continue to grow closer to God, such as in Hebrews 5:12-14:

“You have been Christians a long time now, and you ought to be teaching others. Instead, you need someone to teach you again the basic things a beginner must learn about the Scriptures. You are like babies who drink only milk and cannot eat solid food. And a person who is living on milk isn’t very far along in the Christian life and doesn’t know much about doing what is right. Solid food is for those who are mature, who have trained themselves to recognize the difference between right and wrong and then do what is right.”

However, I find that as we mature in the Christian life, we also begin to depend more and more on our own understanding. We begin to think that we have 'mastered' certain aspects of understanding. No one would phrase it quite like this, but it almost seems like we believe that we have figured out God's "pattern" in certain areas - that we know what, when and why He does things and that's as simple as that. Of course, this is because we are cultured to be rational and logical. To 'make sense' of things - with the underlying expectation that everything has a logical answer with non-refutable, set in stone, concrete evidence. This, I believe can be such a detriment to our personal relationship with God. Philippians 3:10 says:

“For my determined purpose is that I may know Him – that I may progressively become more deeply and intimately acquainted with Him, perceiving and recognizing and understanding the wonders of His Person more strongly and more clearly. And that I may in that same way come to know the power outflowing from His resurrection.”

I believe that as we strive for this goal stated in this passage, we slowly come more and more to the realization that we are not able to comprehend the whys. We need to remind ourselves again and again that it is not about knowing about God and His Word, but about knowing Him. The longing to learn more about Him and His Word comes from knowing Him intimately first. Also, the more that we mature in our Christian walk, the better we become at having the childlike faith Jesus calls us to have in Mark 10:14:

"Let the children come to me. Don't stop them! For the Kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I assure you, anyone who doesn't have their kind of faith will never get into the Kingdom of God."

Is the true mark of maturity, then, the ability to simply say that we don't know, yet we trust? This obviously doesn't mean that we stop trying to gain more knowledge about God and striving to mature and understand, but, on the other hand, we are called to step out in faith.

"You can't walk on water if you don't step out of the boat."
"You don't have to wait for all the answers before you step out in faith."

These statements and more are so very true, but seem to throw knowledge and understanding out the window. To blindly trust? What a challenge. And what an even bigger challenge when we are called to blindy trust even when God is continually enlightening us with understanding, to have faith like a child when we are no longer babies. When God's standard of wisdom is to be foolish and crazy - clearly shown in the model Jesus lived out for us. I believe that God grants us more and more true understanding as we learn to trust Him above all and not depend on our own understanding. Proverbs 3:5-13 puts both these concepts together and continues to challenge me constantly in a refreshing way:

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding...don't be impressed with your own wisdom. Instead fear the Lord and turn your back on evil...Happy is the person who finds wisdom and gains understanding."

It's not our own understanding and wisdom, it is found and gained as we live by faith.

It is only when we trust blindy that we are given sight.