Thy Will Be Done

I've been having a discussion with a friend of mine about my last post. Some of you may already know that, as it's kind of public. This post is not a response to that discussion, or even a commentary on it. It's about a thought that came to mind as I considered one of my responses.

"Thy will be done." It's a popular phrase among Christians. There's good reason, as it's not only a quote from Jesus, but it's something that all Christians should strive to live by.

What does the Bible say about God's wisdom? Isaiah is a good book to go to for this one. Isaiah says "he is wonderful in counsel and excellent in wisdom" (Isa. 28:29). It describes the Holy Spirit as "the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD" (Isa. 11:2). Also in Isaiah, God, referring to His judgment of the King of Assyria, says "By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom, for I have understanding" (Isa. 10:13). Jeremiah says He is "great in counsel and mighty in deed" and His "eyes are open to all the ways of the children of man" (Jer. 32:19). The Psalmist, speaking to God and considering the living creatures of the world, says, "In wisdom have you made them all" (Psalm 104:24). So basically the Bible says God is perfect in wisdom, understanding, and counsel.

I thought of the idea that we all probably have at some point or another. "If I was God, I would do things differently." I don't think any of us has never, ever thought that at some point. There's a lot of suffering in the world, a lot of sin.

I think of Bruce Almighty. In the movie, Bruce is given the omnipotent powers of God. But that's it. He doesn't get all the omniscience, or any of the omnipresence. If you've seen the movie, you know the chaos that Bruce brings about by unwisely abusing his powers. But the omnipotent powers are all we think about when we wonder what things would be like if we were God. We either give little to no thought to the omniscience or the omnipresence, or we give just enough thought to supplement the omnipotence.

The problem with thinking that we'd do things differently if we were God is, if we were God, we'd have all the perfect wisdom, knowledge and understanding He has. We'd know everything, we'd know the reason for everything. As a result we'd be doing things exactly how He does them. There would be no difference whatsoever. Why would there be? If God is perfectly wise and powerful and knows everything, He knows the reasons for everything, so He's working things out perfectly. And, like Romans 8:28 says, "And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose" (emphasis added).

That's the kind of thought that, when we really, truly think about it, enables us to say, "Thy will be done."