“God moves in mysterious ways” has become a proverb in our times. Many think it is a verse from the Bible. It is not. It comes from a poem written in 1772 by the English poet William Cowper. It was eventually converted to a hymn, “Light Shining Out of Darkness.”
The first stanza reads: “God moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform; He plants his footsteps in the sea, And rides upon the storm.”
While this proverb is not a verse of Scripture, it does link up with Isaiah 55:8-9: “’My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts,’ says the Lord. ‘And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine. For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts.’” [NLT]
There is a vast difference between God’s wisdom and our human understanding. When we look at that first Christmas, we don’t always understand what God was thinking — sending His Precious Son, born to a virgin, to die on a Roman cross and bear the sins of the world. That is truly beyond anything we could have imagined.
And yet it happened. God’s thoughts, God’s wisdom, God’s actions saved us when we were lost, alone, and without hope. We may never understand why He did it this way, but we can rejoice and celebrate the miracle!
Thank you LORD. Amen & Amen
