The Switch…

To Joy (part 14)

A young person told me she has trouble with the Bible because it so often contradicts itself. Which made me think of the confusion the disciples experienced when it seemed Jesus contradicted himself too. 

In John 16:16 he told them: “In a little while you will see me no more, and then after a little while you will see me.” Well, that set them off:“What’s he getting at?” they mumbled to each other in verse 17. “First he says we’re never going to see him again, and then he says we are going to see him again.” Confusion. 

I can understand why people say, “I give up on the Bible; it doesn’t make sense,” but Jesus took that into account with his disciples. He “saw that they wanted to ask him about this,” verse 19, so he took the hint and opened up a conversation. I sensed the same thing with the young person I was talking to. I could tell she was dying to get into her thoughts about the Bible but she was hesitating, so I opened the door to her – just like Jesus now did with his disciples. 

The key point being, that there was an explanation. His disciples may have been confused, but he wasn’t. He knew exactly what he meant by his supposed contradiction. In his death, for instance, they would never see him as a flesh and blood human like that again. But only three days later they’d see him again – but in a different body that could pass through the walls of a locked room. An easy explanation, but in their limited understanding at the time they couldn’t see it. 

And isn’t that how it is for us when we too don’t understand what the Bible says or what’s happening to us personally? We’re stuck with our limited range of insight into what God’s up to, and what we’re supposed to be getting out of whatever’s happening to us, or what he means in some difficult scriptures. But everything God does and says is sourced from a vastly different dimension in which everything is understood and can be explained, witness what happened here in John 16. 

It’s another reason for joy, knowing that with God everything has an explanation, and if we’re confused he knows it. And if Jesus’ example in John 16 is anything to go by, he’ll help us understand as well…(continues Friday)