God Is Bigger Than You Can Imagine

Francis ChanBy Francis Chan4 Minutes

Any knowledge of God that we think we have here on earth, everything that the most brilliant scholars have ever grasped of heavenly truth is like a dim reflection of real truth in a mirror. Not like one of the mirrors we have today, but like a piece of shiny metal that you can just barely make out your face in. It’s childish. It’s temporary.

Do you really think you have God figured out? Do you really think you have 100 percent correct theology? If so, that’s a scary place to be. About a year ago, I was speaking to a friend who is a special needs teacher. He has a heart to reach his students with the gospel. He shared that, for a while, he wrestled with wondering how the Gospel could be communicated to and accepted by kids who are nonverbal. But then God opened his eyes to see the foolishness of that kind of thinking. Did he think God didn’t have to stoop down to accommodate his own intelligence level?

How could we possibly think that God can’t accommodate people without some of the capabilities we have, as though we’re somehow on a closer level to God? As though God could make the jump down to my level of intelligence, but others are too much of a stretch? How disgustingly arrogant that is! I was so convicted by this truth. Somehow, in my imagination, I had been thinking of God communicating with the heavenly beings in English at my level of comprehension. The truth is that God probably communicates in a mode that I can barely fathom.

I have said many times that I believe one of the most important passages for this generation is Isaiah 55:8–9 where God says, “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”

In many ways, we have lost a sense of the true holiness of God, and that has caused pride to grow and fester in the church. Everyone seems to start out with the assumption that his or her opinion of God is right, rather than recognizing that all of us have an incomplete, flawed knowledge of God. Without humility, we will never have unity. More importantly, without humility, we cannot be in a right relationship with God.

Imagine what it could be like if, rather than viewing ourselves as the defenders of truth, we lived like it was our God-given duty to defend the unity of the church. I see this spirit in the early church fathers, and there’s something so beautiful and attractive about it. When disagreements arose and began to threaten the church, they confronted each other face-to-face with the goal of discerning truth, reaching consensus, promoting peace, and protecting a unified church. From these councils we get statements like the Nicene Creed.

Imagine coming together, not ignoring or hiding our differences but acknowledging them and working through them. Doesn’t that sound infinitely more attractive than squabbling with each other and trying to convince others to join your camp?

Rather than fighting for followers or individual glory, let’s prioritize the glory of God and His unified bride.

Excerpted from Until Unity ©2021 by Crazy Love Ministries. Used by permission of David C. Cook. May not be further reproduced. All rights reserved.