Over the past five months we have endeavored together to gain a better understanding of God by studying his divine essence and attributes, which are the various aspects of his character that makes him God and distinguishes him from all other beings. We have learned that God is a unity and Trinity—one God, yet three persons at the same time. We have learned that God is a spirit who is omniscient (all-knowing), omnipresent (everywhere present), omnipotent (all-powerful). We have learned that God is transcendent (above and beyond creation) and yet immanent (near his creation). And we have learned that God is eternal, immutable (unchanging), holy, loving, wrathful, gracious, faithful, long-suffering, sovereign, and that he is constantly guiding everything through his providence. Needless to say, we have learned a lot about God, and it has been my sincere hope that this sermon series has broadened your understanding of him and deepened your relationship with him.

            After spending so much time trying to learn more about God, it may sound rather strange or at least anticlimactic to conclude the series by focusing on God’s attribute of incomprehensibility. The literal meaning of incomprehensibility is that something or someone is difficult or impossible to understand. Some of you feel that way about your spouse: “Ugh, my wife is incomprehensible; I don’t understand anything about her!” But when the term is applied to God, it is generally used in the more general sense of knowing, but yet not fully known. He is beyond man’s capacity to understand or explain exhaustively. In this sense, God is beyond human reason and logic because he is infinite and we are finite. Albert Einstein once said, “That deep emotional conviction of the presence of a superior reasoning power, which is revealed in the incomprehensible universe, forms my idea of God.”

We can know many things about God and we can even have a personal relationship with him, but it is absolutely impossible to know everything about him. There are a number of biblical passages that testify to this attribute of God, but the most comprehensive treatment of God’s incomprehensibility is found in the Book of Job.

A Journey through the Book of Job

            The Book of Job begins by telling us that Job was blameless and upright, a man who feared God and shunned evil. He had a deep faith, a loving family, perfect health, immense wealth, and an excellent reputation. God blessed his life and gave him everything that a person could possibly want. But in a very short period of time, it was all stripped away. All of his wealth was stolen from him, all ten of his children were killed in one day when a roof collapsed on them, his whole body was inflicted with itching and painful sores, his friends accused him of committing some egregious sin, and even his wife even said, “Why don’t you just curse God and die?” (Job 2:9) But Job maintained his faith and integrity through it all.

            When we put ourselves in Job’s position, we have to wonder how he could endure all of these things and still believe in God’s sovereignty and not curse him? Why didn’t he just give up his belief in God and become an atheist? How could he continue to live with such pain? Why didn’t he just put himself out of his own misery?

            How about you? What is your response to God when you experience pain and suffering in your life? How would you react if all of your life savings was stolen? How would you respond if your health suddenly went down the drain? What would you do if all of your kids were killed in a single accident? How would you respond to God?

            The Book of Job consists of a series of dialogues between Job and his friends as they try to ascertain the meaning of evil, suffering, and justice. But they had to learn the hard way to trust in God and not to lean on their own understanding. At the beginning, they tried to reason it out all by themselves. But after all their discussions, they never solved anything. The Book of Job concludes with the solution that divine revelation is the only way for man to find the answer. Job ultimately accepted the fact that his “reason” was incapable of comprehending God and his purposes. So, he simply trusted in God that he knew what he was doing. In the end, he embraced the incomprehensibility of God, but it took him a while to get there!

Let’s take a look at a few places throughout the book where God’s incomprehensibility is specified. Notice first 5:8-9, where Job’s friend Eliphaz says: “If I were you, I would appeal to God; I would lay my cause before him. He performs wonders that cannot be fathomed, miracles that cannot be counted.” Eliphaz advises Job to direct his appeal to God because he is the only one who has the answer to every question. God’s “wonders” and “miracles” can never be fully understood by human beings. Even if God chooses not to answer his questions, he is at least asking the right person.

A little later, in a soliloquy on God’s sovereignty in Job 9:10-11, we find Job echoing Eliphaz words: “He performs wonders that cannot be fathomed, miracles that cannot be counted. When he passes me, I cannot see him; when he goes by, I cannot perceive him.” Here, Job acknowledges his limited ability to understand or even see God and this gives him comfort that God has a reason or purpose to his suffering that he cannot understand.

In Job 11:7-12, Job’s friend Zophar is even more explicit about God’s incomprehensibility when he says:

Can you fathom the mysteries of God? Can you probe the limits of the Almighty? They are higher than the heavens– what can you do? They are deeper than the depths of the grave–what can you know? Their measure is longer than the earth and wider than the sea. If he comes along and confines you in prison and convenes a court, who can oppose him? Surely he recognizes deceitful men; and when he sees evil, does he not take note? But a witless man can no more become wise than a wild donkey’s colt can be born a man.

These rhetorical questions are obviously meant to be answered negatively as Zophar makes the point that God and his ways are unfathomable. Humans can never gain enough intelligence, acumen, wisdom, or wit to fully understand the Almighty. I love the humor in his last line: we have no more ability to understand God as a donkey’s colt can be born a man.

            After thirty-five chapters or so of nonsensical dialogue and debate, God finally speaks and puts an end to it in chapter 38. He declares to Job out of the storm:

Who is this that darkens my counsel with words without knowledge? Brace yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer me. Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation? Tell me, if you understand. Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know! Who stretched a measuring line across it? On what were its footings set, or who laid its cornerstone—while the morning stars sang together and all the angels shouted for joy? (Job 38:2-7)

            That pretty much settles it, doesn’t it? What right do we ever have to question God? Who do we think we are? Isn’t it true that we often speak words without knowledge? Were we there when God created the earth? Our understanding of God and everything else in the universe is so limited.

            When we question God, it is like your three year old telling you you’re not making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich right! It’s like Johnny Manziel telling Tom Brady how to throw a football! It is like a kid fresh out of college trying to tell you how to do your job that you have been doing for thirty years! Likewise, in our limited knowledge of the universe, how arrogant is it for us to question God’s judgment?

            Pastor and prolific Christian author A.W. Tozar, in his book The Knowledge of the Holy, explains how we often try to assert our authority over God:

Left to our ourselves, we tend immediately to reduce God to manageable terms. We want to get Him where we can use Him, or at least know where He is when we need Him. We want a God we can in some measure control. We need the feeling of security that comes from knowing what God is like, and what he is like is of course a composite of all the religious pictures we have seen, all the best people we have known or heard about, and all the sublime ideas we have entertained. If all this sounds strange to modern ears, it is only because for a half century we have taken God for granted. The glory of God has not been revealed to this generation of men. The God of contemporary Christianity is only slightly superior to the gods of Greece and Rome, if indeed he is not actually inferior to them in that He is weak and helpless while they at least had power. (p. 8)

            Well, after God finishes making his point that human beings are never in a position to question his judgment or decisions, Job responds to him in 42:1-6 with complete humility:

Then Job replied to the LORD: I know that you can do all things; no plan of yours can be thwarted. You asked, “Who is this that obscures my counsel without knowledge?” Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know. You said, “Listen now, and I will speak; I will question you, and you shall answer me.” My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you. Therefore I despise myself and repent in dust and ashes.

            At the end of the book, Job and his friends found the answer to the mystery of evil, suffering, and justice—God’s incomprehensibility! Oftentimes God does not reveal his specific reasons or purposes for doing things. Job still didn’t understand why he had to suffer so severely, but he knew that God has the power to do anything and that no one can thwart his plans. He recognized that God’s knowledge and wisdom is far greater than his and that he is out of line to question God. As he repents in dust and ashes, he was finally comfortable with God’s incomprehensibility.

            How about you? Are you comfortable with God’s incomprehensibility? Can you trust God when he doesn’t answer your questions? Can you worship him when things in your life don’t make sense to you? Will you love him when you experience evil, suffering, and injustice? Will you join Job by repenting in dust and ashes?

            The Bible affirms that there are many things about God that we will never fully understand. There is one thing about God that I know I will never fully understand—how he could allow his own perfect sinless son Jesus Christ to die on the cross for the forgiveness of my sins. That is absolutely incomprehensible, but I sure am glad it is true!

            Allow me to conclude our reflection by sharing with you a poem appropriately titled “God Incomprehensible.”