Outside of the box

Personal Photo: This is my favorite rose at my mom's house. We have always called it the 'Sunset Rose' because of its vibrant and unique colors. Flowers are so unique, so outside of any box we could put them in; they are each different to each other, bloom in different sizes and shapes and colors, and have so many petals and layers that are hidden to the eye. We are each this way, and every time we see a flower, we are reminded of how God works outside of boxes, outside of the confinements we often encounter.

I walked into my mom's house and the smell of warm chili filled my nose while I gave some quick pets to the dogs. I made my way to each of my parents, greeting them. My dad had just returned from a three day long business trip and my mom had kept a hot meal ready for him. While we sat together, my dad talked a little about his work trip; him and his teammates had to take a personality test. I had just taken a similar personality test a few months ago, and I found myself chuckling at how many varieties of these tests there are, and how interesting it is to see how others view people you know quite well. While my dad was talking about his scores, he mentioned that it can be dangerous to put anyone into a box. My mom paused him there and took note of how important of a concept this was. She highlighted the reality of my dad's comment, emphasizing how one dimensional it is to label our peers and ourselves as one certain way, not allowing for any fluidity among our personalities.

This got my wheels turning, and it allowed me to consider how often we do this when it comes to God. Our society absolutely loves to categorize, label, and limit. It also loves to understand all the details. Humans want to make sense of things, explain and re-explain, and prove the realities of the world around us. Many times, categorizing can help us take shortcuts to understand our surroundings, but it can become quite dangerous when we limit our capability to understand by only using labels. When we consider how much we love to make sense of things by labeling, it is logical to conclude that we do the same with trying to understand God and our relationship with Him. Putting God into a box so that we can understand Him is quite a good way to prevent any type of spiritual growth, and a way to limit the ways in which we can see His influence and impact in our lives.

When we see life through the lens of only what we can physically understand and see, we are essentially removing faith from our view. Faith is when we trust what is unseen, and often not understood. And as challenging as this may be, it is important that we remember that we believe in a God that performs miracles, that doesn't have to explain Himself to us, that does things for reasons we could never understand in this lifetime. Jeremiah 32:27 states "I am the LORD, the God of all mankind. Is anything too hard for me?" This verse turns all of our categorization, all of our boxes and blurs them all together. Nothing is out of the realm of possibility for the Lord, as we are reminded in this verse from Jeremiah. There is nothing too hard, nothing too impossible, nothing too far out of reach for God to be able to make a reality.

Making sense of the world around us is admirable, and it helps us become knowledgeable and inquisitive about what we do not comprehend. My oldest brother used to help me with my physics homework each night, and when I asked him why he liked the subject so much, he told me that he loved physics because it made sense of how God created the world. In this way, striving to understand the 'why' behind things is positive. Where we get into trouble is when we limit God's capabilities to only what we can comprehend, when we put God into a box. Luke 18:27 highlights the difference between human and God when Jesus states “What is impossible with man is possible with God.” Our boxes, our minds, cannot contain the Lord. And when we remember this, it is quite empowering. Things we may not understand, things we may find impossible, are still within God's reach. When we view life this way, we are able to find hope in every situation, even ones that seem hopeless.

I find this concept of a box quite an inspiring one, as we can all relate to being labelled, judged, and confined by the limitations someone else puts onto us. And I cannot help but find peace that just like God, we don't fit into other people's boxes either. As much as the Lord is beyond human understanding, He designed us in a way that allows us to relate to others, as well as being completely and entirely unique from others as well. Isaiah 64:8 reads "But now, O Lord, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand." All of our gifts, our quirks, the way our brain works, are all because it was how God designed us. He blessed us each uniquely, crafted each and every part of us, and prepared us to fight against the devil and his workers. Matthew 10:30 takes it a step further and reminds us that "But even the hairs of your head are all numbered." Every single piece of us is loved by the Lord, and when others try to put us into a box, try to label us one dimensionally, we can remember that they do not know us like God knows us, and they do not love us like God loves us. We have the most powerful and most loving Lord, and He is in our corner, on our side.

My parents were right in recognizing what a slippery slope it is to put others into a box, and now that we are entering the Christmas season, I think it is important to remember how incredibly unique we all are, and to have patience in a season that can be chaotic and emotional for so many. When we remember that God's gift to us of salvation came in the form of a baby being born of a virgin, we can reconsider the box that we often try to put God in. He never has fit into how we think He should work, and thank God that He doesn't, because His plans are so much greater than anything we could comprehend. Boxes limit understanding, and not only confine who we are putting in that box, but also ourselves and how we can change the world with God's creation of us. Others might put us into boxes to try and understand us, but regardless of how isolating that may feel, the Lord knows every single thing about us, and built us to be unique to every box. We can take that knowledge and change the way other people view the world. Breaking down the walls of boxes is part of how we can bring others to Christ and give glory to God's Holy Name.