In the beginning, God (Elohim) created the heavens and the earth…

Genesis 1:1

What is that old saying? “You never have a second chance to make a first impression.”

Like English, Hebrew has small letter gods and capital letter gods. The Elohim of Genesis 1:1, is as big as they get. He is the “all-powerful creator of the universe who knows all, creates all and is everywhere at all times.” Creators are, by definition, bigger than and outside of what they have made. Because of this, they decide what they will create and the rules by which it will operate. (True, though not always popular.)

That is exactly the kind of God that Moses, the author of Genesis, intended. The nation of Israel needed to understand that the God who had called them was the sovereign God of creation. How could they fear? Their God created and controlled nature. How could they have other gods before Him? There weren’t any. How could any weapon or plan formed against Him prevail? Their God went before them.

We criticize unbelievers because they refuse to accept anything that they can’t understand or control. Yet believers can cause unintentional damage by thoughtlessly proclaiming a certain situation or outcome as the will of God. To look at a set of circumstances, especially tragic ones, and pronounce them “God’s will?” This is a call we cannot make.

I have never forgotten something that happened many years ago in a women’s Bible study that I attended. One day a lady in the class asked if she could share how God had healed her husband of pancreatic cancer. Near her, in the front row, sat our group leader, listening along with the rest of us to her beautiful testimony. How many women in the group remembered that only a few years before, our leader had lost her husband after a brief and painful battle, to an incurable form of cancer.

God’s will is a journey. Sometimes it is a smooth and sunny path; at others, a rock-strewn trail, but it is one continuous road leading to one destination. And only God knows when the journey will be over and the eternal purpose for it all will be made clear.

When He acts on the left, I cannot behold Him; He turns on the right, I cannot see Him. But He knows the way I take: when He has tried me, I shall come forth as gold (Job 23:9,10 NASB).

Nancy Shirah