1+1=932

I was born with a scientifically-wired brain.  I was one of those brainy kids in school who was always really good at math and science.  It just always made sense to me.  There was something about the laws and certainty of these subjects that I liked.  There was some predictability, there was order,  and there was stability.  This is probably why one of my Bachelor's degrees is in Biology.

In math 1+1=2.  Always.

In science, it's the scientific method that intrigues me.  A person can come up with a theory, gather information about that theory, and then design an experiment with data to draw a conclusion.  Repeated often enough with the same conclusions, the theory becomes accepted scientific principal.

In "real life," however, 1+1 sometimes equals 932, or sometimes it equals 57, or at other times it equals -10, metaphorically speaking.

I am realizing that I have a tendency to apply the scientific method to circumstances in my own life.  I develop a theory about why something is happening in my life, and then I go about gathering the "evidence" as to why this is so.  Most of the time this "evidence" makes complete sense to me.  I can even point to "experiments" (aka events) and data that prove this theory correct and then draw conclusions.

I have so ingrained in my head the logic and analysis of scientific ways of thinking that the thought of something in my own life not following a set equation feels, well, a bit like a foreign language.  But, this is a foreign language I am being asked to learn.

God is the author of the scientific laws and principals that govern our planet.  But, He is  not bound by them.  He supersedes them.  He is above them. He doesn't think the way we think, feel the way we feel, nor see things the way we see them.  He created the laws and principals of science for order and peace.  These laws are good things, but I have gone too far and applied the same a+b=c logic to the way the Lord works in *everything.* 


If there's anything the Bible proves over and over, it's that His choices and ways of doing things do NOT always make sense.  He doesn't always make what we would call the logical choice or do things the way we would expect.  His conclusions and feelings on a subject are not the same as ours much of the time.

I look at men like Gideon (hiding in a cave before the Lord sought him out), David (a young boy when anointed king), or women like Ruth (a foreigner) and I realize just how off my thinking is about how the Lord works.  I mean, He has this very real tendency to do things pretty opposite of any way I would ever think to do them.  He uses people I would never have chosen.  And in fact seems to deliberately pick people, events and circumstances specifically because they DON'T make sense.

When I look at the conclusions I have drawn about my life, I have to wonder....are my conclusions all wrong?  *I* think a+b=c, but is that really the truth?  Are the conclusions I am drawing about my circumstances really the same conclusions that the Lord has?  When I have decided that something in my life is a certain way because of some evidence or data I have, is it possible that my logic is all wrong?

I'm not referring to Biblical principals...those don't change. Truth is truth.  What I am referring to are the conclusions I draw about other things in my  life.  For example: I am single.  There's evidence to "prove" that I am not the ideal type for most men in a lot of ways, and thus my conclusion is that there's something "wrong" with me.  Maybe, just maybe, even though I think I have lots of "evidence" to back up my conclusion, my conclusion is faulty.  This is just one example of how the Lord has been speaking to me throwing away my evidence and data and conclusions and start over from scratch.

When I say it feels like learning a foreign language, that's not an exaggeration.  To look at my circumstances and force myself not to look at evidence and events that seem to prove my conclusions feels like I am being asked to rewire my brain all over again. 

Blessings,
Erin