The Lord’s Thoughts and Ways

We learn in Jacob 4:8 “great and marvelous are the works of the Lord.” The Lord is limitless. He can do anything and everything. The Lord is perfect. The Lord can heal the sick, he can raise the dead, and he can make the blind see. Most importantly he suffered immense pain, which you and I can never image, so we can be forgiven and live with God again.

This verse goes on to say that there are unsearchable depths of the mysteries of him and we will never fully find out all of his ways, unless it is revealed to us. There is so much that we do not know, about God, about the creation, about everything. There are so many unknowns in the world. Some things we are simply not going to know until they are revealed to us. It can be revealed through personal revelation and also through our modern day prophets.

We learn in 1 Corinthians 2:14 that the natural man (which we are) receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God. Because we are natural men, we will not fully understand the things of our Lord until we become resurrected beings.

Isaiah 55:8-9 and learn that “his thoughts are not our thoughts” and that “his ways are higher than our ways.” These are some of my favorite scriptures and I would like to share these verses specifically.

8) “For my thoughts are not your thought, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.”

9) “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.”

We are often tempted to forget God and trust in our own wisdom or reject God’s way of doing things because they are not done as we think they should be done. We would usually never say out loud or admit to ourselves that we think our ideas are ‘better’ than God’s, but we ‘say’ this in our actions and choices. But it is important to remember that God’s ways, words and thoughts are not like ours, they are higher than ours.

“Elder John Taylor commented on the passage in Isaiah: “We know in part, and see in part, and comprehend in part; and many of the things of God are hid from our view, both things that are past, things that are present, and things that are to come. Hence the world in general sit in judgment upon the actions of God that are passing among them, they make use

of the weak judgment that God has given them to scan the designs of God, to unravel the mysteries that are past, and things that are still hid, forgetting that no man knows the things of God but by the Spirit of God; forgetting that the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God; forgetting that no man in and of himself is competent to unravel the designs and know the purposes of Jehovah, whether in relation to the past, present, or future; and hence, forgetting this, they fall into all kinds of blunders; they blunder over things that are contained in the Scriptures, some of which are a representation of the follies and weaknesses of men, and some of them perhaps may be the wisdom and intelligence of God, that are as far above their wisdom and intelligence as the heavens are above the earth.””

These verses are definitely a source of comfort for me. God is our creator, He is our Father and he knows everything. He has a perfect knowledge; he knows things that we cannot even begin to understand. This is why he is the best person to have on our side, on our team. He can see things in our future, things that we will do and accomplish that we do not know or see at this time. He uses this knowledge to guide our lives and counsel us. Who better to trust then someone who see’s the bigger picture clearly? His ways are better and higher than our ways, and his thoughts are better and higher than our thoughts. I cannot think of anyone better or anyone I want more than him to be on my side and to trust my life with. This is what brings me comfort. This can bring us all comfort in different ways, I urge you to think of how this brings you comfort personally.

How can we come to better understand God’s thoughts and ways?  The easy answer to this question would be to submit our will to God’s will. This is easy to answer but not very easy to actually put into action. Like mentioned above it can be hard sometimes because we often trust in our own wisdom and/or reject God’s way of doing things because they are not done as we think they should be done. We need to consciously be aware of this and do everything in our power to turn our lives and our will over to the Lord. When we do this, our lives will be filled with more joy and love and peace. We will be blessed beyond measure and we will become more like our Heavenly Father and our Savior Jesus Christ everyday. Submitting our will to God’s will is something we have to decide to do everyday. Every time we ask God for something we need to honestly mean and want that to happen if it is only his will, his time and his way.

There are many examples of ways that God’s ways are higher than man’s ways. There is the commandment we have to love our enemies. This goes against the natural man. We don’t want to love our enemies, we don’t want to do good to those who hurt us and persecute us but we are commanded to because God’s ways are higher than our ways. Another example that I can think of is the story of Abraham and Isaac. It wasn’t Abraham’s way to almost sacrifice his son to try his faith it was God’s. What about a couple not being able to get pregnant? What about the death of a child? These are not man’s ways but God’s ways and sometimes that hurts and sometimes we will never understand them. But knowing that God’s ways and thoughts are higher than our ways and thoughts gives me comfort to know that even when I don’t understand and when it hurts, there is a purpose and a plan, there is something to learn and to grow from. It is never in vain, it is never for nothing, and it is always for a higher purpose and for a higher plan. God see’s the whole picture and we just see through the tiny lens of right now.

Be Still, My Soul (124)

Lyrics

1. Be still, my soul: The Lord is on thy side;


With patience bear thy cross of grief or pain.


Leave to thy God to order and provide;


In ev'ry change he faithful will remain.


Be still, my soul: Thy best, thy heav'nly Friend


Thru thorny ways leads to a joyful end.

2. Be still, my soul: Thy God doth undertake


To guide the future as he has the past.


Thy hope, thy confidence let nothing shake;


All now mysterious shall be bright at last.


Be still, my soul: The waves and winds still know


His voice who ruled them while he dwelt below.

3. Be still, my soul: The hour is hast'ning on


When we shall be forever with the Lord,


When disappointment, grief, and fear are gone,


Sorrow forgot, love's purest joys restored.


Be still, my soul: When change and tears are past,


All safe and blessed we shall meet at last.