Bible Brief: God’s Thoughts vs. Our Thoughts
I used to use the following illustration to try to demonstrate the knowledge of God vs. the knowledge of man: “Pick up one grain of sand. That is what man knows. Compare it to the entire universe. That is what God knows.” In other words, man knows virtually nothing.
But I’m not really sure that illustration is accurate. Look at Isaiah 55:8-9: “’For My thoughts [are] not your thoughts, Nor [are] your ways My ways,’ says the LORD. ‘For [as] the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways, And My thoughts than your thoughts.’”
How high is heaven above the earth? Well, that is incalculable, of course, infinitely high. But that is how much higher God’s thoughts and ways are above man’s thoughts and ways. Not even a grain of sand in comparison.
We don’t understand much of what God is doing, and frankly, we humans don’t like a lot of what is happening on our earth and in human history. And, being humans who are always trying to justify our actions, we blame somebody else—God. Just like Adam blamed Eve (and God—“the woman YOU gave me...Genesis 3:12) for his sin, and Eve blamed the devil. And while most of humanity’s problems today are caused by humans, not all of them. Hurricanes, earthquakes, tornados—we have no control over those. Why does God let such things happen? We don’t know. The thoughts and ways of God are infinitely higher than ours.
And, frankly, even if He explained it to us, we probably either wouldn’t believe Him or accept His explanation. We know nothing compared to God. We don’t like that, but that doesn’t change the truth of the matter.