Connecting the Dots

 

 

 

One of our four-year-old grandsons received an activity book last week.  In just a couple of hours, he completed every one of the dot-to-dot pages in it, seeking not to color the already drawn pictures, but to discover the hidden links and unearth the surprises there by connecting the dots.

There is not just movement and attaching lines in some semblance of order, but a story and meaning to those pages after all.  Connecting the dots between the now and next is what creates not just a picture but a narrative. 

Hip hop recording artist, songwriter, and story teller LeCrae tells us why we even wonder at all.  Why do we even think there is a picture there and not just a random scattering of dots?  "We must have a storyline for those things because without a storyline we struggle to attach meaning to the incident.  We desperately desire things to make sense…We are hardwired to want to know why."

We are curious about the mysteries of this life, particularly about the outlying dots that don't appear to make sense.  And even at this point, we wonder about that way-out-there unexpected dot marked 2020.

These crazy months are taking shape of what we never expected this year to look like.  And if we even think we can explain away or understand what is going on in the grander narrative, we definitely don't know much about God.

"Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen...By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible."  (Hebrews 11. 1, 3)

Just because we don't fully understand doesn't mean there is not a sacred pattern to it, a divine design that would totally awe us. 

What is now and what is next is far beyond what we can see.

It is not that the details of a solitary picture come eventually together, but a myriad of full-blown multi-dimensional images in living color that are already there.  That is the amazing part of what pastor and author Timothy Keller calls "the adventure of His lordship."   We are not alone.  He is with us.

I may not see the picture at all.  I may not get it, even until the other side of life.   But God does.  And what God creates and redeems and restores is beautiful beyond words and comprehension.  

The unknown is not unknown to Him.

These dots all over the page may not make sense to us now.  The year 2020 may appear totally out of alignment with the flow of other years, at least in our myopic vision of things.  Or even in what we want the picture to look like.  It is not that someday it will make sense...or that someday it will be redeemed, but it already makes sense to God.  And He is already redeeming.

The picture is already there.  And we are in the midst of it.

Connecting the dots leads us to Him.  What emerges is the astonishing beauty of the eternal.  And that would be His steadfast love and faithfulness.

For now we see in a mirror dimly,

but then face to face.

Now I know in part;

then I shall know fully,

even as I have been fully known.

              1 Corinthians 13. 12