x

X is for the unknowable, the unguessable. That which is beyond our reach. God, in his purest form, is beyond our comprehension. What we know or think we know is what he has chosen to share, to make available to our minds and our spirits in a form that we can perceive. X is for the mystery, the apparent contradictions. The whys and the why nots. X is for the unknowns of the future and the unknowns of the past.

The emotions we feel during the transition from one year to another point to this aspect of God. We know what has been but not what will be. In the last twelve months we have all experienced changes welcome and unwelcome, had to let go of some things or people, had to hold on to others. In ignorance of the next twelve months, we hope. We trust.

I have no more control over the events of the coming year than I do over God. He doesn’t do things the way I think he should, usually. Or as quickly as I would like. Sometimes he doesn’t act at all when I think he should; I have friends with deep, strong faith whose lives seem to be full of tragedy and challenge. I would like God to bring those difficulties to an end, but he hasn’t, not yet. I don’t understand why those same people also express greater joy in their connection with God than others who don’t have their problems.

The prophet Isaiah sums this up neatly in the Old Testament: “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” (Isaiah 55 v 8 – 9)

I believe that I will always have questions, genuine questions that I simply won’t be able package a neat theological answer for. My faith does not rely on being able to box everything up neatly with a bible reference, but on being able to communicate with God, even if it’s a serious of questions occasionally bordering on doubt or defiance. God knows what I’m thinking anyway, so it’s pointless to pretend at those times when my desire to understand is frustrated and I want to pack up my toys and go home, so to speak. To reject God altogether because he doesn’t meet my expectations. I know that he is bigger than my doubts, my fears and my ideas about what should be. I know that he responds to honest words, however un-religious they sound. Generally speaking, my least religious words are the most honest.

And his responses are often surprising.