GOD, OMNISCIENCE OF
The Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptations, and to reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished.
—II Peter 2:9
1982 To Comprehend God
John Wesley said: “Bring me a worm that can comprehend a man, and then I will show you a man that can comprehend the triune God!”
Never try to arouse faith from within. You cannot stir up faith from the depths of your heart. Leave your heart, and look into the face of Christ.
—Andrew Murray
1983 Putting Ocean In Hole
Augustine, that great saint of God, was once walking upon the shore of the ocean, while greatly perplexed about the doctrine of the Trinity. As he meditated, he observed a little boy with a sea shell, running to the water, filling his shell, and then pouring it into a hole which he had made in the sand. “What are you doing, my little man?” asked Augustine.
“Oh,” replied the boy, “I am trying to put the ocean in this hole.”
Augustine had learned his lesson, and as he passed on, said, “That is what I am trying to do; I see it now. Standing on the shores of time I am trying to get into this little finite mind things which are infinite.” Let us be content to let God know some things which we cannot know.
—Moody Church News
1984 Tennessee’s All-Seeing Christ
Gatlinburg is a tourist city buried deep in the Great Smoky Mountains of Tennessee. This city of 1,764 inhabitants all but rolls up sidewalks in the winter but is literally working alive in the summer. In and around Gatlinburg are many beautiful scenes, and many rolls of film are used in these parts! But the most photographed sight in Gatlinburg is the sculptured head of Christ in the Christus Gardens. This breathtaking marble figure of Christ is sculptured in such a way that the eyes appear to “look” in every direction. Regardless of where you stand, the eyes are upon you.
—Carl C. Williams
1985 Give God Credit For Ignorance
A Theological student came to Charles Spurgeon one day, greatly concerned that he could not grasp the meaning of certain verses in the Bible. The noted preacher replied kindly but firmly, “Young man, allow me to give you this word of advice. Give the Lord credit for knowing things you don’t understand.”
—Our Daily Bread
1986 How Big A God Do You Have?
When Henry Norris Russell, Princeton astronomer, had concluded a lecture on the Milky Way, a woman came to him and asked: “If our world is so little, and the universe is so great, can we believe that God pays any attention to us?”
Dr. Russell replied, “That depends, madam, entirely on how big a God you believe in.”
—Selected
1987 Spider Webs Over God’s Eyes
In the old time, when the Greek worshipped images of their gods, it was said that when spiders stretched their webs across the eyelids of the image of Jupiter, the people were regular in their attendance to worship. They liked to feel that the spiders’ webs were preventing Jupiter from seeing their sins, and in their poor, feeble way were, no doubt, grateful to the insects for covering the eyes of a god who, they thought, would punish them for their sins if he could see their ways.
—W. Birch
1988 Lifeguard’s Ability To Tell
A friend of mine said to a life-saver at Newport, R. I. : “How can you tell when anyone is in need of help when there are thousands of bathers on the beach and in the water making a perfect hub-hub of noises?” To which he answered: “No matter how great the noise and confusion, there has never been a single time when I could not distinguish the cry of distress above them all. I can always tell it.” And that is exactly like God. In the midst of the babel and confusion he never fails to hear the soul that cries out to him for help amid the breakers and storms of life.
—Aquilla Web
1989 The Eye In Prison’s Hole
Lafayette tells us that he was once shut up in a little room in a gloomy prison for a great while. In the door of his little cell was a very small hole cut. At that hole, a soldier was placed day and night to watch him. All he could see was the soldier’s eye; but that eye was always there. Day and night, every moment when he looked up he always saw that eye. Oh, he said, it was dreadful! There was no escape, no hiding; when he lay down and when he rose up, that eye was watching him. How dreadful will the eye of God be upon the sinner!
—J. H. Bomberger
1990 Mark Twain’s Address
One day at the Knickerbockers Club in New York, a group of Mark Twain’s friends recalled that it was his birthday, and decided to write him a collective letter. They composed seven or eight pages of nonsense and, since they did not know offhand where Mark was, addressed it:
Mark Twain
Lord Knows Where
Several months elapsed when a postal addressed to them was received, bearing this message:
He did. Mark Twain
1991 On Long Prayers
“Pa,” asked a little boy, “does the Lord know every thing?” “Yes, my son,” replied the father; “but why do you ask that question?” “Because,” replied the boy, “our preacher, when he prays, is so long telling him every thing. I thought he wasn’t posted.”
—Foster
1992 God Gets 100%
An ill-prepared college student taking an economics exam just before Christmas vacation wrote on his paper. “Only God knows the answers to these questions. Merry Christmas!”
The professor graded the papers and wrote this note: “God gets 100, you get 0. Happy New Year!”
1993 The Overwhelming Molecule
I read in a magazine this month that every cubic inch of gas, at normal temperature and pressure, contains four hundred and forty-three billions of molecules. And this result is based, so it was stated, on an actual count, one by one, of a known fraction of the molecules, much as the doorkeeper of a public building counts the visitors that enter.
I tried to get some conception of the magnitude of this number. Assuming that there are one hundred million men and women in the United States, I figured that if each one of them would give me $10,000,000,000, then I would have a billions. But if each one were to give me $4,430,000,000,000, I would then have as many dollars as there are molecules in a cubic inch of gas under normal pressure and temperature.
But this is not all, for this same scientific writer said that each one of these molecules is in mass eighteen thousand times greater than that of a single electron, and that the diameter of one molecule is fifty thousand times longer than the diameter of an electron. And God knows every minute detail of each molecule which He created.
—Ford C. Ottman