Tipping Point

Hurricane Igor slammed into Newfoundland this week with ferocious winds and rain.

They saw it coming but were powerless to stop it or steer it out to sea.

An 80 year old man was swept away in the flood along with bridges, roads and homes.

We wonder. . . and we ask Why?

Job and his friends wore themselves out pondering the 'Why?' question. Sometimes our best explanations don’t fit.
Eventually God steps into their conversation and asks more questions:

Can you raise your voice
to the clouds

and cover yourself with
a flood of water?

Do you send the lightning bolts on their way?

Who has the wisdom to count the clouds?

Who can tip over the water
jars of the heavens?

Job 38:34-38

In a dazzling barrage of case studies from nature (read Job 38-39) God asks who has the wits to design sunsets and dawn, who can re-direct Orion, who can tame dragons or manage hurricanes, inventory the clouds or command rains to start or stop? Who can tip over the water jars of the heavens?

Wouldn’t we love to control the weather? Don’t you wish you could open the vaults and get an explanation for earthly suffering?

Like Job we are fragile creatures in a vast universe; we have no bragging rights before God. But God does not humiliate us with our frailty; he gives us dignity. An almighty God chooses to involve us, frail as we are, as trusted partners in amazing, mind-bending high purposes.

Lake Huron - Photo Courtesty of Dave McKee

Clouds – and all of nature beyond our control, are parables to us of God’s grace.

The power of God and the beauty and mystery of God’s creation hint that there is a similar beauty and moral order in the universe.

That’s the tipping point that leads us to a mature relationship with God and a deeper, wiser view of the way the world works.

Even if God never explains the mysteries of our life, we can know – or learn - that God is trustworthy and good. Like Job, we will never fully comprehend God, but we can enjoy relationship with God. There is amazing dignity in that.