When I was in my 2nd year of being a mission volunteer, I started to be in awe of God’s wisdom. I am amazed how His plans always work for our good even though we fall into sin many times; or how we are led to the opportunities (or challenges) to become holy even though at times we chose what is always convenient for us. As I invested a lot of time thinking about how His wisdom works, I became tired and I realized that my thoughts are really far from His thought thus, Isaiah 55:9. And it was just recently that I encountered the word “hindsight” which means a perception of the nature of an event after it has happened. Basically speaking, these are the things or situations or events that you will only understand after it has happened. Sometimes, God’s wisdom is like that. We’ll only understand it if it already happened. Say for example, someone who wasn’t able to buy a new appliance for their home because they lack financial resources, but winning their desired appliance in a raffle prize at their office party the next day. Or what happened at the Live Pure Conference last year, when it rained so hard that they decided to cancel the event; but when they saw people coming back, they realized that maybe God really wanted us to continue the event because it’s His presence that is important, not Ben&Ben actually. But most of the time, we still cannot comprehend His wisdom. And we need the virtue of humility for us to accept that. And that is His inscrutable wisdom.
As I read Tito Frank’s book, I can’t help but to admire how He thinks and how he explains each point. He also pointed out the importance of the virtues and how it is connected to each other and the importance of attaining it for us to grasp how the Lord’s wisdom works. In my 11 years of serving in this beloved community, I thought I knew everything about what a servant should be but this book allowed me to understand that there is something more than what I currently own. It led me to introspect and see what is lacking in me and the things that I failed to do and the things that I shouldn’t be doing.
The part of the book that struck me the most is when Tito Franks talks about securing the lowest place. I grew in this servanthood knowing that we really need to die to oneself to be Holy. Forgetting your dreams and desires and embracing the dreams and desires of the Lord for me. But servanthood is more than that. Being a servant is more than that. It is actually taking the last place and accepting that suffering is part of the calling. I also learned the importance of being a childlike, that we need to trust Him like how a child trusts their parents. Pure innocence is required of us to fully depend on Him that on our own we are nothing. This speaks so much about the significance of having a humble heart. It is in humility that we acknowledge our nothingness and our weaknesses so we can fully see His greatness. God gave us the capacity to do things, we have our own strengths and capabilities but it should be credited to Him alone. God and His inscrutable wisdom will allow us to understand His way of thinking only if we humble ourselves before Him. He will allow us to experience the glory of His kingdom only if we are willing to drink the cup of suffering here on earth.
Truly, it’s hard to comprehend His wisdom and I like to leave it that way. The call for us now is to still say yes, even if we don’t fully understand. Remember that the God who has this inscrutable wisdom, called you by your name. He found us and that is certain.
Dhei Puyaoan is a Full-Time Pastoral Worker of MFC Youth who serves as the Zone Servant of Mindanao and as the Program Coordinator of MFC High.