I mentioned in last week’s post that I have been studying the book of John since September. It has been such an incredibly rich study by Kathleen Buswell Nielson, who I highly recommend, that John will continue to be a go-to book for me. Her thought provoking questions have led to discovering truths by digging deep and meditating on the Word.
I see so clearly how the entire book of John is written so that we may believe in Christ and know that in Him alone is Life. I’ve seen it through Jesus conversations with the Pharisees and his friends. I’ve seen it in each of the “I AM” statements. I’ve seen it in the miracles He performed. I’ve seen it in His prayer to The Father, His death and resurrection. And in His goodness – because He knows even when we “see” we still struggle to believe – He reappeared to His disciples one last time.
As I’ve been reading His final conversation with His disciples something struck me in the final verse of the final chapter. It’s a verse I have never thought about, but now that I am it blows my mind! This is what it says:
“Now there are also many other things that Jesus did. Were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.”
Think about what this is saying…
If everything Jesus has done and is still doing in the lives of all His people from all time was recorded in books for us to see, the world would not be big enough to hold them. Wow!
Just think about yourself and the people in your life and what you have seen of God’s work in and through them! Or even just take one week or a day…
For me since Monday I’ve seen a close friend’s teen-age son who has gone through cancer and has lost a limb because of it receive clear scans. I’ve seen my daughter and her high school show choir friends spared from real tragedy in a wreck that totaled a car. I’ve seen a conversation between my daughter and a camp friend become watering ground for new hope. I’ve seen predicted bad weather and a possible tornado not mount to anything destructive.
Now consider all that we miss or never know about. As typically it’s just the more spectacular things we notice or talk about it. And this is in just a small sampling of people in our own little worlds. But think wide, world-wide, from eternity past to eternity future!
God is in it all! Every detail, big and small!
He is orchestrating moments and miracles of His grace in each of our lives. And yet we miss it; we fail to see Him.
My prayer today is for Eyes Wide Open! That we might “see” so that we better believe. And with hearts and eyes turned to the things of the Lord that we might confidently rest in Him as Life. Life, even and especially, in the unknown and in the hard…when we don’t “see” His timing or His ways but that we will remember all that He is and all that He has done!
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Love the post Kristen! You are great at digging deeper and posing thought provoking questions. I have listened to John twice in the last week myself and agree, it’s really cool when The Lord helps you “unearth” something new about it! One of my favorite hymns says “the love of God is greater far than tongue or pen could ever tell, it goes beyond the highest star, and reaches to the lowest hell……if we with ink the ocean filled, and were the skies of parchment made, were every star on earth a quill, and every man a scribe by trade. To write the love of God above, would drain the ocean dry. Nor could the scroll contain the whole though stretched from sky to sky”. As you we’re saying, there is no way to contain God’s works or His love! Chokes me up!!;) Thanks for your post, keep up the good work!!!! I know it’s a blessing to many!!;) Xo, Jenn
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Oh, thank you, Jenn! I appreciate your encouragement! And I love the words you wrote out from that hymn- what song is it?