If we trust only when we understand, we’ll live with lots of doubt. God’s wisdom is bigger than anything our mind can conceive.

It’s humbling to admit, but important nonetheless. We will never reach true, sturdy, and lasting peace and rest of heart by means of understanding. “Why?” we may ask. Because there will always be things in our life that we do not understand.

God reveals in his Word all the things that we need to know, but he does not tell us all the things that could be known. He reveals his plan for all his people in his Word, but he does not tell us his individualized sovereign plan for us. We simply are not able to contain in our limited brains all of God’s plans for us and all of the reasons for those plans.

Now, here’s the rub: God created us to be a rational human being. He designed us to think, that is, to strive to make sense out of our life and our world. That is not a bad thing in itself. In fact, it is a very good thing. Our ability to think, interpret, examine, define, explain, and understand is meant to drive us to God. (Not be independent)

Our mentality is meant to lead us to him and to enable us to understand his revelation to us. So biblical faith is not irrational, but we must face this:

Faith will take us beyond your ability to reason

We never could have started at the fall of Adam and Eve and used reason to predict the coming of Jesus and his death on the cross. Old Testament believers knew that God was going to deal with sin and give new life to his people because God told them that this was what he was going to do. But they did not know that the death of the Son of God would be the means by which this would happen.

In the same way, as we stand between the “already” and the “not yet,” we can be assured of all that God has told us in his Word, but we can also be sure that there is much that he has not told us about what is to come, personally and collectively. So there will be mysteries and surprises in our lives.

If we suspend belief at every encounter with mystery, we will spend large portions of our lives not believing.

If we question God’s goodness and love every time he acts in a way that is unexpected, we will end up concluding that he is not good.

If we refuse to rest when we don’t understand, we will end up living lives of distress.

So where is peace and rest of heart to be found? We rest in the fact that in his Word God has told us all the things we absolutely need to know, and then we rest in the complete perfection of his wisdom and character. We rest not because we know, but because the One who knows it all is the definition of what is wise and what is good.

For further study and encouragement: 1 Corinthians 1:18–31

Tripp, Paul David. New Morning Mercies. Crossway. Kindle Edition.