Noel

There are seasons when everything around us seems unstable. Nations rage, evil appears to advance, families break, churches stumble, people we trusted fail, and sometimes our own lives become so disordered that we begin wondering what God is doing. Those are the moments when I need Scripture more than speculation. The Bible does not pretend the world is calm. Psalm 46 speaks of mountains slipping into the sea, waters roaring, and nations in uproar. Yet right in the middle of that picture God says, “Cease striving and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10). The chaos is real, but it is never sovereign. Isaiah saw this in a year of national uncertainty. King Uzziah had died, but Isaiah says, “I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, lofty and exalted” (Isaiah 6:1). An earthly throne had become empty. The heavenly throne had not moved. That is the kind of perspective Scripture gives us. Psalm 103:19 says, “The LORD has established His throne in the heavens, and His sovereignty rules over all.” That includes the things we understand and the things that leave us completely confused. God is never reacting in panic. He is never surprised by the next headline, the next loss, the next betrayal, or the next calamity. This is why I return to the Bible when my mind becomes crowded with everything happening around me. I do not go there to escape reality. I go there to remember what reality actually is. Men make plans. Nations rise and fall. Evil has its hour. Suffering can be severe. Yet none of it has pushed God from His throne. The world may look like it is unraveling, but heaven is not in disorder. Our peace does not come from understanding every event. It comes from knowing the One who rules over all of them. When everything around me feels uncertain, Scripture brings me back to the same place again and again: the throne is occupied, the King is reigning, and nothing has slipped beyond His hand.

One of the clearest marks of spiritual growth is that we become increasingly suspicious of our own strength. In the beginning, we often imagine that maturity will make us feel stronger, more capable, and less dependent. Over time, God teaches us something far deeper. We begin to see how much weakness has always been there, how deeply sin still reaches into the heart, and how completely we depend upon Christ for every act of obedience. Jesus said it plainly: “Apart from Me you can do nothing” (John 15:5). This does not mean that sanctification produces no real change. Grace truly transforms us. Sin is mortified, obedience grows, desires are renewed, and the fruit of the Holy Spirit becomes increasingly visible. Yet as the light of Scripture reaches further into us, we also become more aware of motives, pride, unbelief, selfishness, and corruption that once escaped our notice. A growing Christian does not become comfortable with himself. He becomes more amazed that God continues to show mercy to him. Paul understood this deeply. After years of extraordinary ministry, suffering, revelation, and usefulness, he was still being taught dependence. Christ told him, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9). Paul could therefore say, “When I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Corinthians 12:10). His weakness had become the place where the sufficiency of Christ was made unmistakably clear. This is why genuine maturity makes boasting increasingly difficult. The further we walk with God, the harder it becomes to take credit for anything good in us. Paul looked at his own labour and said, “By the grace of God I am what I am,” and then added that although he labored greatly, “yet not I, but the grace of God with me” (1 Corinthians 15:10). He worked. He suffered. He obeyed. Yet underneath all of it he saw the sustaining hand of grace. There is something deeply humbling about realizing that every step forward has depended upon God from beginning to end. The desire to obey Him, the strength to resist sin, the hunger for His Word, the perseverance to continue, and every trace of holiness in us are fruits of His work. “For it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure” (Philippians 2:13). So spiritual growth should leave us increasingly grateful, increasingly prayerful, and increasingly dependent upon Christ. The mature believer has learned enough about his own heart to know that self confidence is dangerous ground. He looks back and sees grace behind every victory, mercy behind every recovery, and Christ beneath every step that kept him from falling. The nearer we come to Him, the less room remains for boasting and the more natural it becomes to say, “To Him be the glory forever. Amen” (Romans 11:36).

We will never understand the fear of the Lord properly while we continue to think of ourselves as large and God as manageable. Scripture repeatedly brings us down to size by showing us who God actually is. “Who has measured the waters in the hollow of His hand, and marked off the heavens by the span?” (Isaiah 40:12). The One who holds creation in His hand is not an enlarged version of us. He is the eternal, self existent, holy God. Much of our spiritual shallowness begins here. We think too casually about God because we think too highly of ourselves. We speak as though our plans are secure, our strength is significant, and our judgment is final. Yet Isaiah says, “All the nations are as nothing before Him, they are regarded by Him as less than nothing and meaningless” (Isaiah 40:17). That is not written to crush us into despair. It is written to restore reality. David looked at the heavens and asked, “What is man that You take thought of him?” (Psalm 8:4). That question becomes astonishing when we understand the distance between Creator and creature. We are dust that breathes because God wills it. Every heartbeat, every hour, every ability, every opportunity exists because He sustains us. And still, this infinitely great God sets His love upon His people and brings them near through Christ. Job learned this when God finally answered him. After hearing God speak of creation, providence, and His sovereign rule, Job said, “I know that You can do all things, and that no purpose of Yours can be thwarted” (Job 42:2). Then he repented “in dust and ashes” (Job 42:6). A clearer vision of God changed the way Job saw himself. That pattern runs throughout Scripture. Isaiah experienced the same thing. When he saw the Lord “lofty and exalted,” with the seraphim crying, “Holy, Holy, Holy,” he did not congratulate himself for having a profound spiritual experience. He cried, “Woe is me, for I am ruined!” (Isaiah 6:1–5). God’s holiness exposed him. True awe does that. It humbles pride, silences boasting, deepens repentance, and makes worship weighty again. We need more than religious familiarity with God. We need our minds stretched again by His greatness and our hearts humbled by our smallness. “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom” (Proverbs 9:10). When we begin to see God as Scripture reveals Him, worship stops revolving around us. We bow lower, trust more deeply, repent more honestly, and marvel that the God who needs nothing has chosen to redeem sinners and make them His own.