For Your Ways Are Not My Ways

Numerous accounts in the Bible show how our ways of thinking and acting are different from God’s ways. We think and act differently from God because of a lack of knowledge of God (Hosea 4:6).

Imagine that you’ve recently purchased a high-tech device. You do not know how it operates or understand how it is supposed to function. The easiest way to learn about your new device would be to read the user manual detailing all the parts, features, operational instructions, troubleshooting tips, and FAQs.

With this knowledge, you are better able to operate the device. Constant use also helps you learn more about it until it becomes almost second nature.

The Believers Manual

The Bible is the believer’s guide to understanding God and how He thinks and acts, and we have to study it frequently and constantly. 

The Bible reveals the mind of God and helps us understand Him so we can think and act as He does, rather than as we’re used to doing. 

God wants us to think like him and act like him. In the Gospel of John, Jesus says, 

“Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing; for whatever he does, that the Son does likewise. “

John 5:19

Jesus shows us how we should live as children of God, and we should follow in His footsteps. We cannot do that, however, unless we have a deep knowledge of God, and we find that by studying the Bible day and night as God commands in Joshua 1:8:

“This book of the law shall not depart out of your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it.”

Joshua 1:8

For Your Ways Are Not My Ways

As humans, we are moved by what we see. In a boxing or wrestling match, we are more likely to predict that the physically more imposing contestant will be the eventual winner. God does not operate this way. There are many examples in the Bible where God chooses the “lesser” over the “greater”:

• God chooses Jacob over Isaac even though Esau is a warrior, a hunter, and Isaac’s firstborn.
• God chooses Saul from the least family in the smallest tribe of Benjamin to be king over Israel.
• God chooses David, the last born of Jesse, to be king over Israel above his brothers.
• God gives David, a teenage boy, victory over Goliath, a mighty giant of war standing 11 feet in height.
• God gives Gideon and his 300 men victory over the army of the Midianites with 120,000 soldiers.

How Can We Know God’s Ways?

God wants us to know Him, to understand His ways and thoughts. That is why he inspired men under the direction of the Holy Spirit to write the Holy Bible. 

To know God’s ways, we need to:

1. Accept Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior.

Jesus Christ is the only way to know God and understand his ways. Jesus says,

“No one comes to the Father, but by me.”

John 14:6

Therefore, give your life over to Him today, confess your sins and leave them behind, and God will give you a new life in Christ Jesus (2 Corinthians 5:17).

2. Pray without ceasing.

Prayer is spiritual communion with God. Through prayer, we can ask God to show us how to be more like Him, and He will reveal Himself to us. In Matthew 7:7, Jesus says, 

“Ask, and it will be given you.”

Matthew 7:7

3. Study the Bible.

Psalm 119:130 says, 

“The unfolding of thy words gives light.”

Psalm 119:130

Studying the word of God illuminates His ways. It helps us understand the mind of God, provides us with direction, and reveals to us God’s knowledge and truth.

Therefore, study the Bible daily and constantly. The Spirit will open your eyes and your mind to understand the mysteries of God.

As high as the heavens are from the earth, so are God’s ways higher than our ways. The good news is that God delights in revealing His ways and thoughts to his children.

God has said that if you seek Him, you will find Him. He does not intend to hide His ways from His children, but it is on us to seek understanding and knowledge by turning over our lives to Jesus, praying earnestly without ceasing, and studying the word of God diligently.

When we do, God will make His ways and His thoughts known to us.