This morning, I am reflecting on some verses from Psalm 97:1-6 NIV:
[1] "The Lord reigns, let the earth be glad; let the distant shores rejoice.
[2] Clouds and thick darkness surround him;
righteousness and justice are the foundation of his throne.
[3] Fire goes before him and consumes his foes on every side.
[4] His lightning lights up the world; the earth sees and trembles.
[5] The mountains melt like wax before the Lord, before the Lord of all the earth.
[6] The heavens proclaim his righteousness, and all peoples see his glory."
I was struck by the phrase - "Clouds and thick darkness surround him". Lately I have been reflecting on how God takes us past our knowledge, outside of our knowing, and this phrase fits into that theme. We tend to think of how darkness and clouds blind us to what's around us for they obscure what is there. In this case He is the light of the World, and yet we can't really see Him or understand Him fully. There is a sense of unknowing, and that is what I read here. We can't know God fully, we can't fully comprehend what He is doing right in front of our eyes. We can look, and try to understand, try to see, but it is beyond us. We need to be ok with this, for we are limited in our minds, limited in our understanding, and see only partially this side of eternity.
I was thinking it is interesting that we can see the foundations of His throne, and can identify them as righteousness and justice. We hear this earlier in Psalm 89:14 NIV: "Righteousness and justice are the foundation of your throne; love and faithfulness go before you." These two characteristics are obviously key to who God is, and to His Reign. If they are the foundation of His throne, they are the foundation of His reign. He is Pure and Holy and His decisions and judgments are just and true.
When combined with the clouds and thick darkness, it seems to me that god is communicating to us that we may not be able to see and understand all that He is doing, but we can take comfort in knowing that whatever it is, it is right and just. He won't use unjust means to achieve something. He won't allow unrighteousness influence to cloud His judgments. We may not understand from our perspective, but He will be true to His character always.
We like to say "God is good, all the time" and that is necessary because sometimes we can't comprehend what good thing He is doing. We look and even though He is moving and arranging things right in front of us, we can't see or understand the fullness of His activity. Maybe sometimes, He covers Himself in cloud so that we don't misconstrue or misunderstand His intentions and direction because of our limited understanding.
For example. my honey is directionally challenged, and often times does not recognize the way I am driving in our car. Something feels wrong to her and she will ask if I am going in the right direction. Sometimes she even is a bit unsettled and tries to convince me I am going in the wrong direction. I, on the other hand, am not directionally challenged, and the vast majority of the time, I know exactly where we are and have a plan of how to get where we are going. If left to her, she would turn wrong, or just stop the car, unable to move forward for lack of understanding. I think that in the same way, if God revealed everything to us, we would constantly be challenging Him out of our ignorance, uncomfortableness and lack of understanding, and would be unwilling or unable to move.
This morning I am encouraged to trust myself to God's Righteousness and Justice and allow Him to move in ways I don't understand. I can limit God's move in my life by only engaging in what I understand, and that is not something I want to do. I want all of God, all of His plans and purposes to be accomplished in me, even those I don't understand or comprehend. I want to be able to press forward into Him, into the cloud of unknowing, into His love that surpasses understanding and knowledge (Eph 3:19), so that I might "be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God."
Amen and Amen!
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