The Things I Used to Think

You know how sometimes the sun's rays will shine through a bank of clouds, leaving part of the land covered in light and the rest covered in shadows? 

I used to think wherever those rays landed, those were the only people God spoke to. 

And you know how some vehicles have an emergency brake handle in the center console?

I used to think if you pulled the handle the seats would eject.

And radios - you know how the song changes every few minutes?

I used to think a new band would literally set up of their instruments in a room at the radio station.  I could never figure out how they could change things so quickly in between songs.

The things I used to think.

Don't ask me how my childish mind came up with those things.  Somehow or another, we come up with outlandish notions as children because in our little minds, they make sense to us.

But now I know.

Where the sun's rays fall can't limit to whom God speaks.

Because now I know He's bigger than that.

And I'm not going to die when I pull the emergency brake and get catapulted out of my car.

Because  now I know emergency brakes are more about my safety.

And the wonders of technology means Brad Paisley isn't scrambling to get his band out of the way in order for Rascal Flatts to play their next song.

Because now I know. 

I love how the pastor Isaac Anderson said it in a sermon once about becoming disillusioned with God.  He said, "Maybe we need to set aside whatever notions we might have of who we think God is in order to go in search of a God worth finding.  A God that is big enough, and mysterious enough, a God who isn't so much worthy of our disinterest, but worthy of our devotion."

There are a lot of things I used to think were right and true, some silly, some not so silly.  I'm a little older and a little wiser.  I'm grateful that God is the kind of God that doesn't leave us alone at the crossroads of things we used to think and things we now know.  We're always learning, always growing - sometimes it's not easy and sometimes I think it would be easier to go back to thinking the things I used to think.

But now I know.